Legal News

Prison Throws Penalty Flag Over Lerach?s Football-Ticket Offer

By Dan Slater

In the 1994 movie “Shawshank Redemption,” Morgan Freeman’s character, Red, tells Andy Dufresne, played by Timothy Robbins, “I’m known to locate certain things from time to time. They seem to fall into my hands. Maybe it’s ’cause I’m Irish.”

Bill Lerach — the plaintiffs lawyer who’s serving out a two-year sentence at a minimum-security prison camp after pleading guilty to participating in a scheme to pay kickbacks to lead plaintiffs — seems to have taken a page out of Red’s book. The Recorder’s Dan Levine reports that, earlier this summer, Lerach was placed in administrative segregation — locked down for 23 hours a day — after he allegedly offered a corrections officer the use of his San Diego Chargers season tickets.

The Recorder notes that, should a formal administrative proceeding go against him, Lerach would likely be forbidden from returning to the camp, and would instead be placed in a higher-security facility. He could also lose any “good time” he had accumulated toward early release.

Apparently, a little more than a month after Lerach checked into Lompoc, he was chatting with a corrections officer when the conversation turned to sports. The guard indicated he was a San Diego Chargers fan, and Lerach said he could use the season tickets if he wanted. The guard reported the conversation to Lompoc authorities, which kicked off a disciplinary investigation against Lerach.

A Bureau of Prisons spokeswoman declined to comment. Lerach’s lawyer, John Keker of Keker & Van Nest, was not available to speak on Monday afternoon.

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on September 09, 2008 (boomark / email).