OYEZ OYEZ OYEZ

It's official.

Closer to home, John Pacenti of DBR reports on alleged links between R. Allen Stanford, the Texas billionaire accused of running an $8 billion Ponzi scheme, and Tom Cash, former chief of DEA operations for South Florida. After leaving the DEA in 1994, Cash jumped to fancy private investigative firm Kroll as head of Latin American business. Two groups that hired Kroll to conduct due diligence on Stanford International Group are now crying foul, claiming the firm had a conflict of interest because it previously worked for Stanford’s companies.

From the lawsuit: “Kroll never disclosed Mr. Cash’s connection with Mr. Stanford and the obvious conflict that this relationship presented. Many of the warning signs related to Mr. Stanford’s political network on the island of Antigua and SIB [Stanford International Bank] would have been within Mr. Cash’s own personal knowledge, but Mr. Cash failed to provide this important information and instead highly praised Mr. Stanford and Stanford entities.”

We don’t get to hear Cash’s side of the story. He apparently resigned from Kroll last month and is unreachable in the South Pacific. However, the article quotes Miami defense lawyer Jane Moscowitz and former U.S. Attorney Kendall Coffey singing Cash’s praises.

As it happens, I know some folks who aren’t so fond of Mr. Cash. Earlier this year I quoted Cash in a Sun Sentinel article about the DEA moving its headquarters from Miami to the Weston. Cash thought it was pretty comical that his old agency was moving to the suburbs and predicted a possible backlash. “Most people do not believe we are desirable neighbors. We’re sort of next in line after pedophiles,” he said.

I thought it was a funny quote, but it didn’t make me any friends at the DEA. It turns out federal law enforcement agents don’t particularly like being compared to pedophiles. Lesson learned.

Health Care on Trial

Coming up Thursday. . . Is Florida’s government failing children on Medicaid? Judge Adalberto Jordan is hearing arguments tomorrow on whether a longstanding class action seeking better treatment for Medicaid children can proceed to trial. In June, Magistrate Judge Chris McAliley certified the class over the state’s objections. From the Report and Recommendation:

The Individual Plaintiffs, who live in diverse geographic areas within the state, offer a broad spectrum of experiences that collectively illustrate the alleged failures of Florida’s Medicaid system. . . .In the opinion of this Court, the prosecution of this case will benefit from the range of personal experiences.

Lawyers from Boies Schiller & Flexner will argue, pro bono, on behalf of the class. The Florida AG’s office and law firm Kenny Nachwalter represent the Florida agencies.

While we’re on the hot-button subject of government-run health care, Jay Weaver has this story about Medicare's proposed cap on payments to home health care agencies in Miami-Dade, which seem to be filing hundreds of millions of dollars in bogus bills for diabetic services.

Still want a public health care option?

Monday round up

Hi all and welcome to Monday! Vanessa Blum here, holding down the fort for DOM, while he welcomes his third daughter into the world. Is that guy a slacker or what?

1. First, in the name of shameless self promotion: Definitely check out my cover story in the DBR—a scintillating profile of Miami lawyer Stephen Zack, the first Hispanic attorney elected to head the ABA. Also from the DBR (this one’s John Pacenti’s): should biometric data, such as retina scans, be used to ID illegal immigrants?

2. Second, this isn’t a federal court story, but I can’t resist linking to Paula McMahon’s Saturday article from the Sun Sentinel: Is a severed head found in Broward County enough to trigger local jurisdiction?

Broward prosecutors said that even though it's unclear where the 41-year-old was killed, the only part of her body that was recovered was found here and that under Florida law, that is sufficient to prosecute the two men charged here with her murder.

The defense argued that her body wasn't recovered and that it's more likely she was killed in New York. They hope Circuit Judge Michael Gates will rule that Broward prosecutors don't have legal jurisdiction to prosecute the case.

That’s all for now folks. I’ll be here all week, so e-mail news to vanessabblum@gmail.com.

Friday news and notes

1. UBS got pushed one more week, till August 10. Looks like it might settle. From the WSJ blog:

In a major break in a massive tax-evasion investigation, UBS AG and the governments of Switzerland and the U.S. have reached a settlement that could force UBS to turn over identities of thousands of account holders, a Justice Department attorney told a U.S. District Court judge Friday morning. ...
Stuart Gibson, a Justice Department tax division attorney, didn’t detail the settlement in a conference call with Judge Alan Gold that included lawyers for UBS and the Swiss government.
A hearing scheduled for Monday in Miami was postponed until Aug. 10, at which point more details are expected to be released. The judge scheduled another conference call with parties in the case for next Friday.
The Internal Revenue Service has demanded the identities of 52,000 U.S. account holders at UBS. UBS and the Swiss government have claimed that turning over those names would violate Swiss bank secrecy provisions.

2. Julie Kay special for the Herald on law firms cutting pay:

As law firms continue to lose money in a tough economy, their cost-cutting has moved from layoffs to a new strategy -- slashing lawyers' salaries.
Several firms in South Florida have instituted across-the-board salary cuts for lawyers in recent weeks -- the latest being Holland & Knight, one of South Florida's largest firms, which announced cuts of up to 10 percent Wednesday.
``Law firms have been forced to manage more carefully all of their expenses,'' Holland & Knight Managing Partner Steve Sonberg said in a statement. ``Like many other firms, Holland & Knight is reducing the base salaries of its associates, with limited exceptions.''
The reductions, Sonberg said, would range up to 10 percent. The firm is also chopping salaries of some non-lawyer ``senior counsel and other professionals,'' with an average overall reduction of 7 percent, he said.
Other firms to reduce lawyer salaries in recent weeks include Akerman Senterfitt, Squire Sanders and Ruden McClosky. Carl Schuster, managing partner at Ruden McClosky, said the across-the-board measure was in place until the end of the year when the firm hopes
to reinstate the original salaries.
He wouldn't disclose percentage cuts at the Fort Lauderdale firm.
Becker & Poliakoff cut lawyers' salaries 12 percent in 2008, but reinstated the original salaries three months later and repaid lawyers the difference, according to managing partner Alan Becker.

3. Next week I won't be able to blog, so we will be very very lucky to have the wonderful Vanessa Blum as our guest blogger. If anyone else wants to pitch in, let me know.

We're second...

... to Rhode Island?!!

I demand a recount.

Well, we're trying to be first, with 41 arrests today. Here's the Herald coverage of all the mortgage fraud stuff going on.

So, will UBS settle? Trial is "looming" Monday. Judge Gold will have one last status conference this Friday.

BLT has a number of interesting posts, including this one on 11th Circuit nominee Beverly Martin. Looks like she will be confirmed...

Effective closing or a lemon in the Representative Jefferson case? We'll find out shortly. Here's the BLT coverage:

Lemons have an odd way of sprouting in the legal lexicon. Lemon laws protect car buyers. The Lemon test helps govern the separation of church and state. And today, lawyers for ex-Rep. William Jefferson (D-La.) introduced what might be called "the lemon defense."
In closing arguments this afternoon in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Washington defense attorney Robert Trout told the jury that the FBI had targeted Jefferson in a sting operation, in which the bureau tried to catch him paying bribe money to the vice president of Nigeria. But when the money turned up in Jefferson’s freezer instead of the vice president’s house, Trout said, investigators realized they had "a lemon of a case."
"They decided they wanted to make lemonade out of lemons," the Trout Cacheris name partner continued on. “And before you can do that, you’ve got to squeeze a lot of lemons. And so they squeezed some lemons."
The "lemons" squeezed by the FBI, Trout said, were the witnesses who would eventually testify that they bribed Jefferson to use his congressional connections to set up business deals in Africa.

SDFLA Fantasy Football League?

Miguel de la O wants to start a fantasy football league for the Southern District of Florida. Winner gets bragging rights. If there is enough interest, the league will start. Email Miguel at delao13@gmail.com if you are interested. Spots are reserved for Rumpole and SFLawyers if they are interested.

News and Notes

1. Another UBS defendants bites the dust. (Via AP)

2. Feds drop all charges against lawyer Carlos Loumiet (Via DBR)

3. Sotomayor is a step closer. (Via Herald)

4. Female Herald reporter accused of sexual harassment. (Via Washington Post)

Great piece on the Chief

John Pacenti covers Judge Moreno here

From the intro:

When socialite Paris Hilton came to town for a civil trial, she was upstaged by none other than Chief U.S. District Judge Federico Moreno.

Pragmatic, smart and funny, the Miami jurist stopped seasoned attorneys who were litigating the question of whether Hilton adequately promoted her film box office bomb "Pledge This!," to ask incisive questions. Since it was a bench trial, Moreno was serving as a jury of one and had no need for rote legal arguments.

Despite his good humor, Moreno is a stickler for proper courtroom decorum. He gently chastised an out-of-town attorney representing Hilton repeatedly for failing to stand up when addressing him. He prompted an out-of-town attorney in another case to borrow a tie before speaking at the courtroom lectern. Given the judge's jocularity and ready smile, the attorney asked if he was kidding.

The judge wasn't.

Moreno said his insistence on decorum is based on respect for the institution.

"I think a federal courthouse, or any courthouse for that matter, is a secular temple," he said. "We dress in robes because it's a secular temple. People dress in suits, and I think people behave better when they are dressed better."