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Are BigLaw Suicides Becoming More Common?

By Eric Lipman

That's the question posed by Steven Harper, recently retired Kirkland & Ellis partner and adjunct professor at Northwestern University Law School, in a column published in The American Lawyer. Harper cites several recent cases of partners and associates taking their own lives, including that of Stewart Dolin, who apparently threw himself in front of a train in Chicago last month. Wondering whether such tragic events are truly happening more frequently or simply getting more press coverage, Harper says that he "fear[s] it's the former." Some of Harper's "evidence" gives me a little pause, such as when he refers to the fact that none of the reports on the recent spate of suicides mentioned the deceased attorneys battling long-standing mental health issues. I'd suggest that may well be chalked up to a "don't speak ill of the dead" philosophy. While Harper studiously avoids blaming any particular firm for contributing to the deaths of its lawyers, he does cast some stones at the system itself: But as a general matter, firms adhering religiously to an M.B.A.-mentality of misguided metrics -- billings, billable hours and associate-partner leverage -- as fundamental criteria for lawyer evaluation have become less collegial and more unforgiving. Even in...

Full post as published by Legal Blog Watch on August 04, 2010 (boomark / email).