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Sonnenschein Law Firm Can't Represent Ex-BDO Chairman, FederalJudge Says
A federal judge disqualified the law firm Sonnenschein, Nath & Rosenthal LLP from defending BDO Seidman’s former chairman, Denis Field, who is charged with participating in a scheme to sell illegal tax shelters.
U.S. District Judge William H. Pauley today ruled that because Sonnenschein represents Adrian Dicker, a former BDO partner who is expected to testify for the prosecution, it can’t also defend Field.
“The simultaneous representation of a defendant and a cooperating witness undermines the integrity of these proceedings,” Pauley wrote in an opinion today.
Field, who is charged with participating in a tax fraud conspiracy from 1994 to 2005, has pleaded not guilty and is fighting the charges.
Field’s Sonnenschein lawyer, Mark A. Flessner, didn’t immediately return a voicemail message seeking comment on the ruling. Dicker, who served on BDO’s board from 1999 until October 2003, pleaded guilty in a separate proceeding and is cooperating with prosecutors, Pauley said.
Pauley rejected arguments by Sonnenschein that it is representing Field only for purposes of determining whether the government improperly interfered with his right to counsel by pressuring BDO to stop paying his legal fees.
In 2007, U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan dismissed charges against all but four defendants in a case that targeted 17 former KPMG LLP executives and two others for allegedly selling illegal tax shelters that cost the U.S. Treasury $2 billion. In that decision, which was upheld by a federal appeals court, Kaplan ruled that prosecutors violated the defendants’ rights by causing KPMG to withhold legal fees.
The case is U.S. v. Daugerdas, 09-CR-581, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan).
To contact the reporters on this story: Bob Van Voris in New York federal court at rvanvoris@bloomberg.net; Patricia Hurtado in Manhattan at pathurtado@bloomberg.net.
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