Even before the ink dries on his guilty plea, William S. Lerach is trying to rehabilitate his shattered image as the heroic defender of little guys suffering at the hands of nefarious corporate titans. In a lengthy Washington Post Sunday editorial lambasting corporate corruption as “a way of life in American executive suites,” Lerach carefully tucked away a brief acknowledgment of his active role in subverting the rule of law for more than two decades.
In fact, out of more than 1,500 words lambasting greedy Fortune 500 executives, Lerach devoted only four sentences to his Sept. 18 admission in federal court to having conspired, according to his plea deal, “beginning on or before 1981 and continuing through at least 2002 … to obstruct justice by corruptly influencing, obstructing and impeding, and endeavoring to influence, obstruct and impede the due administration of justice in lawsuits filed and litigated in the courts of the United States.”
According to federal investigators, Lerach was a key player in the Milberg Weiss law firm?s massive kickback scheme in at least 150 class-action lawsuits filed over more than two decades against many of the biggest names in American finance and securities. The kickback scheme resulted in an estimated $200 million in tainted legal fees going to Milberg Weiss. Besides Lerach, three other Milberg Weiss partners have also pleaded guilty, and yet another will be tried in 2008. Lerach split from Milberg Weiss and opened his own San Diego-based firm three years ago.
Lerach claims he is headed to prison because he, in his delicate words, merely “stepped over the line” in his “zeal to stand up against” corporate greed. Meanwhile, he adds, lots of Fortune 500 CEOs at companies like Citicorp., Morgan Stanley and Walt Disney keep their ill-gotten millions while thousands of regular Joes lose their jobs at those firms, thanks to boardroom incompetence and connivance, all made possible and even actively abetted by the SEC, Congress and the Justice Department.
Nobody disagrees that corporate bad guys caught with their hands in the till ought to face the full force of the law. What Lerach conveniently ignores is the fact that nobody within or without corporate boardrooms can be held accountable when the law itself is being systematically subverted and abused by people who pose as courtroom heroes while getting rich by obstructing the courts of justice. This fact will not be erased by Lerach?s artful clamoring about others? alleged sins or even by past or future campaign contributions perhaps given with an eye toward someday securing a pardon.
