1 MR. A.P. CARLTON I appreciate that. We,

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1 MR. A.P. CARLTON I appreciate that. We, Powered By Docstoc

      1         MR. A.P. CARLTON: I appreciate that. We,

      2    as lawyers, are often given to understatement.

      3    That's the way we're trained and we operate. We're

      4    operating in an arena here where we need to operate

      5    both as lawyers and public policy generalists and

      6    I would encourage you to do that because I think Les

      7    Jacobs will tell you that the ABA House of Delegates

      8    will respond favorably to that.

      9         We often get a lot of criticism in the

      10   American Bar Association about what the House of

      11   Delegates does and doesn't do. This is one of those

      12   things where they ought to be doing things and it

      13   will look forward to receiving your accumulated

      14   wisdom.

      15         CHAIRMAN CHEEK: We hope to give them that

      16   opportunity. Thank you for your time.

      17         MR. A.P. CARLTON: Thank you.

      18         CHAIRMAN CHEEK: Welcome.

      19         MR. CREAMER: I'm Robert Creamer and I'm

      20   one of the loss prevention counsel for Attorneys'

      21   Liability Assurance Society retention group and this

      22   is Joe Lundy who was one of the other principal

      23   drafters of the preliminary statement that we made in

      24   response to your preliminary report.

1         CHAIRMAN CHEEK: We welcome you and a

2    number of us, of course, rely heavily on you and

3    appreciate all your efforts in that regard and, also

4    I might add that I am delighted to see that you're

5    having your teleconference addressing a lot of the

6    issues that we're concerned with and I for one will

7    be a participate in listening to that so thank you

8    for putting that on as well.

9         MR. LUNDY: We should tell the task force

10   that we feel it is particularly appropriate for us to

11   address you here because among other things, Bob

12   Creamer and I teach ethics at Northwestern Law School

13   and this is the room where we first taught.

14         MR. CREAMER: The crowds have gotten larger

15   so they have moved us down the pike.

16          We'll be brief because most of what we have

17   to say at this point is in our preliminary statement

18   and we purposely called it a "preliminary statement"

19   because we think we'll have more to say as this task

20   force moves along in its activities and we better

21   understand all of the issues.

22         At this point, we just would like to make

23   two relatively brief points.

24         First of all, we would like to underscore

1    the point that several others have made here today

2    that when you change the model rules of professional

3    conduct, propose to change the model rules of

4    professional conduct, those changes, if adopted by

5    the states, would apply to every lawyer and every

6    representation from General Motors down to the corner

7    grocery store, and we urge you to consider as best as

8    we all can the consequences of those systemic

9    changes. Professor Morgan has raised them, we have

10   raised some of them and we expect as we go along, we

11   will raise more.

12         And the one that we raised in our

13   preliminary statement that I will just mention and in

14   passing is, of course, the change that we think will

15   be brought to bear on the issue of lawyer liability.

16   And as we say in the statement, it seems to be the

17   law in virtually every jurisdiction that the rules of

18   professional conduct have an effect on the law of

19   lawyer liability, and they can either in a few

20   jurisdictions be taken as rules of lawyer liability

21   but even in states where that is not the case, they
22   can be used by expert testimony to establish rules or

23   standards of care and are on a regular basis, and so

24   we urge you to consider, as we say in our paper,


1    the effect that these proposed changes would have on

2    lawyer liability.

3          For example, the suggestion that what a

4    lawyer knows should -- the standard of knowledge

5    should be changed to what a lawyer should know, could

6    lead, we think, to a dramatic expansion of lawyer

7    liability in cases where the lawyer and the public

8    later finds that the lawyer's client was dishonest.

9          And so, again, as we point out in detail in

10   the paper, we urge you to consider those issues,

11   because we think they could have an important impact

12   on lawyer liability for every lawyer, in every

13   representation.

14         So with that we would be happy to any answer

15   questions that you might have.

16         MS. HENNESSY: Mr. Hanson in his testimony

17   indicated that under Illinois corporate law there

18   were provisions that were specific to publicly traded

19   corporations.
20           That concept is obviously not embodied in

21   the current model rules of professional conduct.

22   There is no distinction made and it was one of the

23   issues we wrestled with on the corporate governance

24   side.


1            Would you think that that distinction should

2    be embodied in the model rules?

3            CHAIRMAN CHEEK: And to add to that --

4            MS. HENNESSY: The obligation should be

5    different depending on whether it is a public company

6    or private?

7            CHAIRMAN CHEEK: And to add to that how does

8    that interface with 3.07 and the SEC's pathway that

9    they want to take to deal with public company ethical

10   issues and should we, you know, defer to that?

11           MR. LUNDY: I think that's part of the

12   answer to Ms. Hennessy's question that is whatever

13   the ABA decides to do, it now appears there's going

14   to be a separate set of regulatory law applicable to

15   lawyers for public companies. And I suppose a good

16   argument could be made maybe the SEC is in a better
17   position to determine what that ought to be than the

18   ABA.

19         On the other hand, we certainly agree with

20   Professor Morgan's suggestion and we intend to follow

21   his advice which is to make sure that we closely

22   monitor the SEC rule-making process, that concerns of

23   practicing lawyers, lawyers who have to wrestle every

24   day with the issues posed by the federal securities


1    laws and the disclosure requirements that they work

2    with their clients on, are heard and are part of what

3    the Commission considers when it promulgates a final

4    rule. ALAS will participate in that process.

5          CHAIRMAN CHEEK: Let me probe that further

6    and ask you your thinking about why you think the SEC

7    may be the more effective announcer particularly when

8    they are the regulator that has a certain distinct

9    interest in how they would regulate professions.

10         Why, if the Commission comes out with their

11   set of minimum standards, isn't that a risk that also

12   engenders lawyer liability in the context of that

13   lawyer's conduct under state applicable legal

14   malpractice issues. Wouldn't you have the same sort
15   of tension and shouldn't we take a leadership role in

16   trying to build a framework that recognizes what

17   Congress is deemed to be a public policy from their

18   perspective as opposed to just permitting the SEC to

19   wander down the path?

20         MR. LUNDY: I think the answer to the

21   question is we really haven't, although we teach

22   legal ethics and follow closely the Ethics 2000

23   Commission proceedings and the House of Delegates

24   consideration of the commission's recommendations.


1    We really -- ALAS as an organization -- has never

2    confronted the concept of separate legal ethics rules

3    or lawyer -- rules of professional conduct for

4    lawyers who represent public companies. I just don't

5    know how we would come out on that if we -- if that,

6    because part of your agenda, we would try to address

7    it.

8          MS. COOPER RAMO: I wanted to take issue a

9    little bit with your original comment about our

10   making sure that we don't do something that somehow

11   unexpectedly impacts lawyers and I do think that
12   there is a practical difference which then leads to a

13   different articulation about what the highest ethical

14   standards would be for lawyers who represent publicly

15   held corporations and the 99 percent of that or 98

16   percent of the corporations in America which are not

17   publicly held and for us not to recognize that and

18   I'll give you the best example on the issue of

19   independent directors. Whatever percentage of

20   corporations are not publicly held corporations, it

21   would be the rarer and small percent of those that

22   have any independent directors at all.

23         MR. LUNDY: That's right.

24         MS. COOPER RAMO: And so the tools that we


1    give to lawyers who are representing publicly held

2    companies would be virtually useless to all of the

3    other lawyers in America who wrestle with different

4    sets of problems but I guess I need you to argue back

5    with me a little bit about why it wouldn't be better

6    for us, all the lawyers in America, for us to

7    make -- I don't think it is an SEC issue, it is

8    aspirational and practical in terms of what lawyer

9    behavior ought to be at the highest level. But
10   lawyer behavior at the highest level has, you may

11   have all the same ethical standards, the

12   practicalities will be radically different if you

13   have an organization in which you have independent

14   voices and if you have an organization which there

15   are literally no independent voices.

16         MR. CREAMER: If I can revisit

17   Professor Morgan's testimony, I think the current

18   rule, 1.13, does a good job of sorting those issues

19   out and is equally applicable to a large corporation

20   or a small corporation. I think that is the rule

21   that I think we could look to for lawyer's conduct at

22   the highest level. And it is flexible enough to give

23   lawyers the discretion to fit their conduct to the

24   particular situation at hand so that's why we would


1    agree with him that the current rule does a good job.

2         CHAIRMAN CHEEK: One of the questions that

3    you are focusing on in your teleconference relates to

4    our recommendation about the mandatory nature of 1.6.

5    As you know, there are a number of states, unlike the

6    model rule, that both have it in permissive form and
7    in mandatory form, a very small number of mandatory

8    form.

9            Have you had experiences where that has

10   translated into civil legal liability for lawyers?

11           MR. LUNDY: We anticipated you might ask

12   that question and the honest answer is we haven't

13   studied whether ALAS-insured lawyers get sued more in

14   Florida and Virginia and Wisconsin and the other --

15   New Jersey -- than in other states because they have

16   a mandatory disclosure rule rather than a permissive

17   one.

18           I do think that it is probably the case

19   there are many fewer public securities offerings

20   handled by lawyers in those states than in others

21   that we can all think of. But the honest answer is

22   we just haven't studied that issue. We could

23   undertake to do so if it would be helpful to the task

24   force but --


1            MR. CREAMER: There is another practical

2    issue. All of these mandatory disclosure rules are

3    relatively recent in the last three or four years and

4    in the normal course of things, I don't think we
5    could tell you because there, to my knowledge, there

6    haven't been that many cases. It will take a while

7    if there is anything to measure for us to be able to

8    measure.

9         MR. KELLER: The one thing you commented on

10   was we should know and we heard about that earlier

11   maybe posing the same question that we put earlier if

12   you look at one of the things that we should know is

13   designed to accomplish is to make clear that actual

14   knowledge, in fact, requires more and that's not a

15   common place or look at the ceiling test.

16         MR. CREAMER: Yes.

17         MR. KELLER: And it does not permit the

18   lawyer to disregard the body of information that

19   would, if you will, flash the triggers to another

20   lawyer. Phrased that way, maybe it takes it out of

21   the diligence issue which to me is a separate issue.

22   Would you see an articulation of a standard of --

23   call it reckless, that word may be somewhat removed

24   from reckless, that would add some meat on what


1    actual knowledge means as a way of approaching that?
2         MR. CREAMER: In fairness, I cannot.

3    I looked over the material that you cite in the

4    preliminary report and I went back and read the two

5    ABA opinions that you cite, and it seems to me that

6    as we say in our paper, that willful blindless,

7    turning a blind eye, I think was your phrase, and

8    recklessness are probably, certainly turning a blind

9    eye would be. And recklessness is probably already

10   captured in the existing rule because, remember,

11   knowledge includes what can be inferred from the

12   circumstance. So, with the current definition, if

13   it's appropriately applied, I think you would

14   certainly cover the blind eye sort of situation and

15   most probably recklessness. If we go beyond that on

16   the continuum that Professor Murdock talked about,

17   I'm not sure where to stop after that because we are

18   concerned, as we say in the paper, that after the

19   company is in bankruptcy and after the damage has

20   been done and the investors have lost money, it is

21   easy to say what you should have know or where you

22   should have looked.

23         We can all look around the room and say we

24   all should have known the tech stock market was

1    overvalued in 2000. I know Joe should have known

2    that. But I don't think he did. I certainly didn't.

3    So I think that's what we're concerned about this

4    continuum. If you take it beyond the current

5    language of the rules which captures blind eyes and

6    reckless, we wouldn't know where to cut it off.

7         I thought about your question about some

8    intermediate step that I think is similar that some

9    of the other task force members talked about today.

10   We cannot come up with that definition.

11         MR. MUNDHEIM: I was going to explore the

12   same and try to urge you -- it is interesting when

13   you talk about it, you talk about actual knowledge

14   and actual knowledge in those terms does not even

15   pick up the concept of recklessness and I think

16   that's one of the things that concerns us. I think

17   we could use some help in trying to articulate a

18   standard which goes beyond actual knowledge. What

19   you really know because you have said you are

20   prepared to go beyond that in terms of recklessness,

21   closing -- averting your eyes, what I think would be

22   helpful is to get some outside assistance and try to

23   craft some language which carries us beyond actual

24   knowledge to something further.

1         CHAIRMAN CHEEK: And it could be not

2    necessarily in the form of a rule amendment but in

3    the form of a commentary or interpretive gloss on it.

4         MR. LUNDY: We'll look at that but as we say

5    in the paper, we think the blind eye is already

6    covered.

7         MR. MUNDHEIM: Let's put it in words that

8    you would be comfortable with. I think the term

9    "actual knowledge" doesn't give that message. It's

10   interesting those are the words that you use.

11         MR. McCALLUM: That's my point, too. It

12   fits together. The rule says that the knowledge

13   includes knowledge that can be inferred from the

14   circumstance but that's ambiguous. For instance, if

15   the lawyer says I didn't know it but acts as if he

16   did, that conduct that indicates that he did know it

17   that might lead to an inference that he knew it even

18   though he denies that he knew it. If that's all it

19   reaches, that's fine, but what we were trying to get

20   at was a little beyond that which is it is plainly in

21   front of him and as you say, he averts his eyes, he

22   refuses to see it. So he can quite honestly say I

23   don't know, I didn't look at the next page.

24         MR. MUNDHEIM: Let me give you a

1    hypothetical. A lawyer is told by the chief

2    financial officer that certain activities only cost a

3    certain amount, which, in relation to kind of general

4    knowledge that the general counsel has, appears very

5    low. He doesn't know anything about this particular

6    activity. If he probes he might find there is an

7    understatement of expenses. Is he all right, is he

8    not knowledgable in that sense as long as he doesn't

9    ask the next question or should he be asking the next

10   question? That's the kind of situation that I think

11   has been exercising this Commission.

12         MR. CREAMER: I think that is one of the

13   problems that again Professor Morgan deals with. Who

14   the lawyer can trust in those circumstances and to

15   take your example, if I understand it, if the

16   expenses seem low, my answer would be no. You had no

17   further duty to go beyond that and demand to audit

18   the books.

19         MR. MUNDHEIM: But should he go and say to

20   the CFO "explain that to me, I don't understand

21   that?" Or does he say "I heard the answer, I don't

22   want to know anything more"?
23         CHAIRMAN CHEEK: Assuming there is an issue

24   there that if the answer is, you know, less than


1    satisfactory and has a material impact on the client.

2          MR. CREAMER: Well, at this point I would

3    not like to go further. It seems to me that if the

4    answers are within and here we go back to the

5    continuum, are within a reasonable range, the lawyer

6    has a right to rely on those. If there are

7    circumstances that make those suspicious or

8    unreasonable.

9          MR. MUNDHEIM: I tried to give you an

10   example where there is a flag, you can denominate it

11   as red or orange, whatever you want; maybe Professor

12   Morgan, since he is here, can think about it.

13         MR. KELLER: I can put words around it as I

14   tried to do before, let's say it would be obvious to

15   any reasonable lawyer that there is a red flag. Is

16   that a standard?

17         MS. HENNESSY: Can I make a suggestion,

18   I don't think you can answer that. Can I -- it

19   probably would be helpful to us if you could look at
20   ALAS' experience with cases in which knowledge was

21   deemed to include turning a blind eye and give us

22   some idea, by courts or ethical bar counsel or what

23   have you, not necessarily if it is confidential

24   identifying, you know, who the people were but giving


1    the facts so we can put an articulation of at least

2    some circumstances in which turning the blind eye has

3    been considered to be, you know, implicit in

4    knowledge even though actual knowledge wasn't shown.

5         MR. CREAMER: We'll give you what we can.

6    You can understand that we have some confidentiality

7    issues of our own. Some of what we're likely to find

8    I think is already publicly reported cases but our

9    understanding of the law as we meet here, is what we

10   cited in our paper.

11         MR. LUNDY: The concern we have about red

12   flags and trying to further delineate them in either

13   black letter rules or commentary is that the place we

14   run into red flags is not in judicial opinions or in

15   disciplinary rules, it's in plaintiff's lawyer's

16   closing arguments to juries, that's where we run into

17   reg flags. They are always finding reg flags. They
18   are arguing to the juries that these red flags were

19   so obvious and so numerous that even though this

20   lawyer denies he knew what the client was doing, in

21   fact he had to know, that's exactly how those aiding

22   and abetting cases are argued to juries.

23         We know in a large portion of those cases

24   the lawyers didn't know, didn't even suspect what the


1    client was doing was dishonest.

2          It's very hard I think to articulate a

3    standard that will work in all situations. Even if

4    the rules stay the way they are, those arguments will

5    still be made by plaintiff's lawyers in malpractice

6    and other kind of lawyer liability suits. It happens

7    all the time.

8          CHAIRMAN CHEEK: I want to shift subjects to

9    get you out of the hot seat. I didn't notice any

10   commentary in here that related to some of the

11   subject matter that we have talked about recently

12   with President Carlton and others about this direct

13   line of communication of general counsel, independent

14   director, executive sessions and outside counsel and
15   general counsel so there is an opportunity of

16   communication that may not otherwise exist that could

17   serve to enhance their role in seeing the client

18   observe proper corporate responsibility.

19         Do you have concerns about that?

20         MR. CREAMER: We have an interest, we're not

21   ready to make any comment at this point, that's why

22   we labeled our paper "preliminary." We're looking

23   at that.

24         CHAIRMAN CHEEK: We would welcome your


1    thoughts when you get to the point.

2         MR. LUNDY: I think we do hope and we're

3    encouraging lawyers in our member firms to give us

4    their reactions to both this task force's preliminary

5    report and to any proposed SEC rules so we hope we'll

6    have a basis within a few months to be more helpful

7    on some of those issues.

8         MS. COOPER RAMO: To make sure I understand,

9    before your current view, which I recognize is in

10   transition, as all of our current views are, is that

11   1.13 is clear enough to you so that it adequately

12   allows lawyers the tools they need to behave in both
13   publicly held corporations and in closely held

14   corporations.

15         MR. CREAMER: That's what I tried to say.

16         CHAIRMAN CHEEK: And that's given due

17   consideration to the real world how difficult it is

18   for a lawyer to make a discretionary judgment, to go

19   above that lawyer's boss or that lawyer's person who

20   engaged them.

21         MR. CREAMER: Yes. All of these issues are,

22   I think, in the real world, difficult, we're not

23   persuaded at this point that changing the rules are

24   going to make those that much easier but --


1         CHAIRMAN CHEEK: Les?

2         MR. JACOBS: I think one of the tensions

3    here is the one that you constitute and that is the

4    difference between on the one hand wanting to confine

5    and define the liability and on the other hand, a

6    desire by the public certainly, by some of us to want

7    to alter behavior. And we're stretched between how

8    do we, by stating principles and stating rules,

9    improve on behavior without providing for really
10   unwarranted liability? And one of the difficulties

11   that I have, I hope as you continue to work on this

12   and we hear further from you, you can talk to us a

13   little bit not just about the fact that this change

14   or that change is going to increase exposure but talk

15   to us about the kinds of things that we can do that

16   will improve on behavior that you think will be

17   appropriate, because obviously we can go to a real

18   extreme and make you completely happy and we would

19   not have accomplished anything that the task force

20   wasn't here to do.

21         Now, with that thought in mind, switching to

22   your 1.6 comments which is a big part of your current

23   paper. You give us the statistics back and tell us

24   what jurisdictions are doing, what the restatement


1    says and what Ethics 2000 said, what we've said goes

2    beyond it and is somewhat inconsistent.

3         But it does seem to me that the rule as it

4    now -- as you apparently seem to embrace the concept

5    of voluntary or authorized but not mandatory

6    disclosure, puts lawyers in a position of negotiating

7    with their clients. Not necessarily the client's
8    behavior but the lawyer's disclosure. The lawyer is

9    not required to disclose and it puts that lawyer in a

10   position where there is an inability to say to the

11   client, "I'm sorry, I feel obligated to do this."

12   It's really I want to do it. I want to make a

13   disclosure. That seems to me, except under those

14   circumstances where the attorney-client relationship

15   has been irretrievably concluded, almost never going

16   to happen and, therefore, voluntary disclosure,

17   discretionary disclosure is in practice always no

18   disclosure.

19         And, therefore, that provision is delusory.

20         The second thing, and I'm not asking you to

21   today, unless you want to, say what you think about

22   that but I would like you to think about it and tell

23   me why we're going to get improved conduct with this

24   kind of voluntary rule.


1         The second thing is that you quote out of

2    our report what you consider to be the inconsistent

3    recommendation and the quote, it's not very long is:

4    "To make disclosure mandatory, rather than
5    permissive, in order to prevent client conduct known

6    to the lawyer involving a crime, including violations

7    of federal securities laws and regulations, in

8    furtherance of which the client has used or is using

9    the lawyer's services, and which is reasonably

10   certain to result in substantial injury to the

11   financial interests or property of another."

12         My question to you since you are concerned

13   about liability, why in the world in that factual

14   scenario a lawyer knows a client's conduct is ongoing

15   or is proposed, the client's conduct is using the

16   lawyer's services, and if the lawyer does not prevent

17   it or disclose it, why is the lawyer not going to

18   have coconspirator liability? And is that what you

19   want?

20         CHAIRMAN CHEEK: And as an adjunct to that,

21   isn't making it mandatory enhancing the lawyer's

22   power to change conduct?

23         MR. LUNDY: Well, there are several reasons

24   that I think mandatory is not a good idea even in


1    those limited circumstances. One is that in the

2    context of a major securities offering, for example,
3    it is never or almost never clear to a lawyer what

4    all the facts are. Any individual lawyer working on

5    a matter may know only a small part of what is going

6    on. As we indicated in the testimony, many would be

7    under tremendous time pressure maybe dealing with

8    dozens of different people within the company and

9    outside of the company.

10         And so it will not be clear, almost never be

11   clear, but after the fact in those few cases where

12   the client was in fact committing a fraud, it will be

13   easy for the lawyers for the investors who lost money

14   or the people who bought the business or anybody else

15   who lost money as a result of the securities offering

16   or transaction to make the argument that the lawyer

17   should have prevented this.

18         The lawyer didn't have discretion under

19   their rules and they were required by their ethics

20   rules to disclose and they didn't do it. So they

21   should be liable for the damages since the company is

22   now insolvent or the people in the company are in

23   Guatemala or someplace where they can't be reached,

24   but the lawyer is there and the lawyer's insurance

1    company is there and if you have a mandatory

2    disclosure rule, you have a much tougher argument for

3    the lawyer as to why they didn't disclose. It will

4    all be judged with the benefit of hindsight, not

5    really what the lawyer knew in the middle of the

6    transaction but with the benefit of what discovery --

7    three or four years worth of discovery has determined

8    the course of the liability litigation.

9          MR. CREAMER: Let me just add under the

10   current rules and I think we all agree that if the

11   lawyer knows during the course of a deal that

12   the client is using the lawyer's services to

13   perpetuate the crime of fraud or perpetrate a crime

14   or fraud, that lawyer cannot go forward and must

15   withdraw. And if they have the option to disclose,

16   they may or may not use that discretion.

17   I don't accept the notion that discretion means

18   never. There may be circumstances where the lawyer

19   would disclose. But one thing is clear, even under

20   the current rules, is if the lawyer has to get out of

21   that transaction and cannot go forward if they know,

22   as Joe suggests, that the conduct is illegal or

23   fraudulent.

24         So I think that rule already is enough to

1    change behavior for those people whose behavior is

2    changeable.

3         MR. JACOBS: Where I come from nearly

4    ceasing service but without disclosure or some other

5    rejection of the act would not eliminate

6    coconspirator liability.

7         MR. LUNDY: Wouldn't it depend to some

8    extent at what stage withdrawal occurred?

9         MR. JACOBS: But your premise is that

10   lawyers aren't going to have much clarity on this

11   until it is too late. You say they never really know

12   quite enough.

13         MR. LUNDY: In some cases they won't. In

14   some they will.

15         MR. JACOBS: If you are, I don't know when

16   they will ever withdraw.

17         MR. LUNDY: I will tell you of the calls we

18   get from lawyers in our member firms about how to

19   handle difficult ethical and lawyer liability issues

20   and a number of them relate to do we now have to

21   withdraw? Or we've decided we have to withdraw, do

22   you agree with that? So lawyers do withdraw, at

23   least ALAS-insured lawyers do.

24         MS. COOPER RAMO: And what would you in your

1    now -- think about the issue of -- upon the decision

2    to withdraw is there any further obligation for the

3    lawyer to tell anyone why he is withdrawing and is

4    there a difference in a publicly held company and a

5    nonpublicly held company?

6         CHAIRMAN CHEEK: Within the corporate entity

7    or out?

8         MR. CREAMER: We will continue to think

9    about that question but we will remind everybody that

10   in the current rules there is the comment to Rule 1.6

11   concerning the noisy withdrawal. I know you are

12   familiar with it, it says if you -- if you do

13   withdraw, you may withdraw any opinions that you have

14   given to that to date or any -- retract any

15   statements that you have made to third parties.

16   Normally, from what we hear at least, that if you do

17   withdraw from one of these deals and you do make a

18   noisy withdrawal, that's a pretty public statement

19   and most people get it, that that's what is

20   happening.

21         MR. MUNDHEIM: But when you are being pushed

22   and consider whether there is a requirement of
23   disclosure and the analysis suggests the requirement

24   of disclosure occurs when you otherwise would also


1    make a decision to withdraw. And if that's the way

2    to alert the public to something of serious damage.

3    It seems to me an awful lot of water between having

4    made the decision to withdraw and say but you ought

5    to be able to do that quietly.

6          MR. CREAMER: Under the current rules you

7    can do it quietly or noisily.

8          MR. MUNDHEIM: I think the Commission, the

9    task force is saying since it's that small set of

10   circumstances where you would have already made the

11   determination to withdraw that it -- the question

12   then is raised that in addition to withdrawing, you

13   have to notify. It also gives you a much better

14   lever inside the corporation to see conduct is either

15   rectified or not undertaken.

16         MR. CREAMER: Let me think about it further.

17   One thing that comes to mind is that if those are the

18   rules and we're dealing with sophisticated people,

19   there may be in that regime a lot of things that the

20   lawyers never told them because the target population
21   of clients for your concerns may very well turn out

22   to be people who will tell the lawyers what they

23   think the lawyers need to know to get the job done

24   but not enough to cause the lawyers to have to quit.


1    And what I think Joe and I are concerned about in

2    that scenario, which is not an unbelievable one, when

3    the money is gone and the investors are suing, then

4    the plaintiffs can say you should have known

5    something was wrong and you had a duty to disclose as

6    well because we now know the people were crooks. It

7    may or may not wash later on that the clients

8    withheld information from you. That's a real

9    concern. I think that you can have clever clients

10   turn the tables on lawyers in these scenarios.

11         MR. KELLER: Can I ask a question, which in

12   all candor, may help you respond to Bob, I'll put it

13   in the form of a question so I don't have to comment.

14   Do you see a difference in the circumstances and

15   willingness therefore frequency in which lawyers are

16   prepared to withdraw because of their concern as to

17   what is going on compared to the circumstance in
18   which the lawyer concludes that they need to blow the

19   whistle externally and if you mandate a noisy

20   withdrawal do you see that affecting -- if you will,

21   if there is a difference, the frequency which lawyers

22   will withdraw and extricate themselves from what they

23   view as a problematic decision.

24         If you don't understand my question, I'll


1    make a statement.

2         MS. RAMO: They want to make a noisy

3    withdrawal.

4         CHAIRMAN CHEEK: Thank you.

5         MR. KELLER: What I was trying to say is

6    I think in factoring in the balancing points here, we

7    have to realize that it is easier for lawyers who

8    withdraw to withdraw quietly when they see

9    problematic circumstances or circumstances that

10   trouble them as opposed to having to reach compared

11   to the judgment that there is, in fact, wrongdoing

12   which justifies a mandatory disclosure and that if

13   you make the withdrawal itself, mandate that to be

14   noisy, then you have eliminated it, practicability

15   that now exists for lawyers to extricate themselves
16   from situations where they may have doubt as to its

17   rightness or wrongness but they, on an aspirational

18   basis, do not want to put themselves in the position

19   of proceeding with what may be a problematic

20   situation.

21         MR. LUNDY: I would say this if you go to a

22   mandatory rule as Sarbanes-Oxley 3.07 does in a

23   certain respect it does raise --

24         MR. KELLER: Only internally.


1         MR. LUNDY: Correct. It raises a question

2    what about the lawyer's right to withdraw from a

3    representation. Maybe when the lawyer has less than

4    actual knowledge. Maybe only a suspicion. Maybe

5    only a reasonable belief that something is wrong.

6    Where does the reporting up the line under

7    Sarbanes-Oxley or to regulatory authorities, if it is

8    a mandatory disclosure rule in order to prevent,

9    where does that come in relation to the lawyer's

10   traditional right to withdraw from the representation

11   and just become undesirable because of suspicions

12   about the client's conduct, integrity, whatever
13   that's --

14         MR. CREAMER: Are you suggesting we make all

15   of these withdrawals noisy?

16         MR. KELLER: No. No.

17         MR. McCALLUM: He was showing you a way

18   out, Bob. Say you agree with Stan.

19         MR. KELLER: I was trying to identify a

20   reason why we might not want to, the consequence of

21   doing so is a better way of putting it.

22         MR. MUNDHEIM: I still understand that

23   there are circumstances when you ought to be able to

24   withdraw and say nothing. So unpleasant to work with


1    this bunch.

2          CHAIRMAN CHEEK: Any other questions? Thank

3    you both for participating. And that ends our

4    testimony for the day. If there are any comments

5    anybody in the audience has or any questions that you

6    may have we will open the floor to that. Any closing

7    thoughts?

8          PROFESSOR THOMAS MORGAN: I think you're

9    focusing on the question of knowledge is clearly of

10   concern to the task force and an important question.
11   I was going to volunteer to send you a letter within

12   the next couple of weeks.

13         I think one of the things as I have listened

14   to this last series of questions, the more you soften

15   or broaden the concept of what is known, the less

16   likely it is you ought to have a mandatory reporting

17   standard for what you "know." Because if you assume

18   that what you know for purposes of mandatory

19   reporting is something that you really know and have

20   no doubt about, it's a different question than if it

21   is something that you're turning a blind eye toward

22   or whatever. I think you have to struggle with this

23   and I suspect that where you will wind up is where

24   Mr. Creamer and Mr. Lundy were and where I am in my


1    testimony and that is ultimately there has to be some

2    kind of situation in which it would be unreasonable

3    to do anything but disclose. But that is a different

4    question than saying that you are going to define the

5    conditions of mandatory disclosure and make it on a

6    case-by-case basis.

7         I would offer some suggestions and others
8    may want to do the same thing.

9          CHAIRMAN CHEEK: Yes.

10         MR. KELLER: If the professor is

11   volunteering to do something, could I ask if he do

12   something as a follow up to one of his suggestions

13   that we leave with the SEC defining rules of conduct

14   in representing public companies. I'm not endorsing

15   that but rather is there a liability consequence that

16   flows from that so that is a lawyer liable to the

17   client if they were to violate the rules of practice

18   that would disqualify them from practicing before the

19   SEC or is that liability limited only to violating

20   the state law rules under which they are licensed and

21   would the consequence be and if you shifted it to the

22   SEC maybe you can address -- maybe you're not

23   addressing but trying somewhat greater flexibility

24   solving the civil liability question.


1          PROFESSOR THOMAS MORGAN: I'll be happy to

2    provide that, I'll be sorry I ever raised that.

3          CHAIRMAN CHEEK: We also welcome from each

4    of you and anyone else, any thoughts you may have in

5    light of the SEC rule proposals that come out which
6    may be as soon mid October or so and it would be very

7    relevant for us to have that.

8         Thank you all very much.


10           (Whereupon, at 2:23 p.m., the

11           hearing ceased.)