Legal News

Dole disciplinary action results in suspension for Walter Lack, reprimand for Thomas Girardi

By Richard Binder

Walter Lack, of the Los Angeles firm Engstrom, Lipscomb & Lack, has been suspended for six months from practicing in front of the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. The penalty was handed down because of the fraudulent appellate briefs his firm filed in litigation against Dole Food Co.

Lack's frequent co-counsel, Thomas Girardi of Girardi & Keese, received only a formal reprimand. The three-judge Ninth Circuit panel called his conduct "at most reckless."  

Girardi and Lack represented hundreds of plaintiffs who claim to have been sickened by pesticides. But lawyers in Central America filed a complaint against Dole Food Corp. -- which doesn't exist -- instead of Dole Food Co. They then secured a $489 million default judgment against that nonexistent entity. According to findings from 9th Circuit Judge A. Wallace Tashima, Lack and his subordinates relied on a series of documents and representations they knew to be false to mask the error and prosecute the claim against Dole Food Co.

Full story at The Recorder.

Full post as published by Legal Pad | LA on July 13, 2010 (boomark / email).