Talk:Weil, Gotshal & Manges

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[edit] Anonymous edit with questionable content

User: 38.228.47.11 made a questionable edit, and I have invited him/her to comment here by leaving a comment on his/her Talk page. The user entered the following quote attributed to John Martin described as a former District Judge, in the "Controversies" section which dealt with the Leslie Fay misconduct ruling and fine:

Former Southern District of New York Judge John Martin stated that Weil Gotshal's "lawyers conducted themselves in a fully appropriate and professional manner." [6]

The text as enterred by anonymous user 38.228.47.11 tends to contradict the clear message of the finding by another Federal Judge, that Weil Gotshal had engaged in misconduct related to the failure to make mandatory disclosure and corresponding false nature of each fee application wherein the firm's lawyers swore that it was "disinterested" (see conflict of interest). The entry clearly leaves the reader with the impression that reasonable minds could have disagreed as to the facts, and that a respected authority in the form John Martin did not find misconduct, or even murky conduct, but that the firm was above board. However, I checked the actual referenced source and found something very different in the actual article ^[1] here:

The firm went on to state that the trial testimony of one of its experts, former Southern District of New York Judge John Martin, now of counsel at Debevoise & Plimpton, established that Weil Gotshal's "lawyers conducted themselves in a fully appropriate and professional manner."

Here we see that first of all, John Martin was not acting as a Judge reviewing the dispute. But much worse we see that John Martin was not even acting as a disinterested party. In fact, John Martin was getting paid by either Weil Gotshal, or a law firm representing Weil Gotshal. John Martin was acting as an "expert", which is to say a hired gun giving testimoney in return for money. This is far far from a ruling disputed by another member of law enforcement of the judiciary, or from being any sort of arms length analysis. It seems to me that this entry is an example dishonest discourse and an abuse use of Wikipedia. Would the anonymous editor please come forward and explain your rationale? Was it a careless mistake, was it intentional? Let me know if you believe I am not fairly describing the flaws in the edit. Knowsetfree (talk) 22:52, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Update: Misleading and false PR spin deleted. See this page for a detailed discussion.  :--Knowsetfree (talk) 00:12, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Extensive content without identified reference

Wiki policy is not to trust the posting of content which is from an unverifiably source. Would the editor who added the "Public Service" and "Notable Deals" sections please come forward and identify your factual basis for these entries? Thanks. Knowsetfree (talk) 21:05, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Seriously, as discussed extensively here, anyone who wishes the extensive unreferenced conduct on the [Weil Gotshal] page to remain. Put up or shut up. Either provide reliable references to the awards, practise areas, and etc or they will be deleted. I have no objection to the content or presentation other than it is totally unreferenced. --Knowsetfree (talk) 00:10, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] "Controversies"

Weil Gotshal is a highly reputable, ethical law firm that conducts thousands of high profile matters in a highly professional manner for satisfied clients. It seems to me that devoting nearly half of this article to misconduct and malpractice reflects a lack of balance. First, articles about other law firms do not commonly include such sections, even though all firms of this size deal with issues of misconduct and malpractice from time to time. Second, there is no mention of the scores of highly publicized, successful matters in which the firm was instrumental. Please note that I am a member of Weil Gotshal who merely wants the article on this fine firm to be accurate and balanced. Milleri (talk) 15:05, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Hi Milleri, :Welcome to Wikipedia. Thank you for registering, it enables better communication. I've already got a fair amount of comments on my talk page (<- click to go there) regarding the periodic deletions of the misconduct section of the Weil, Gotshal & Manges article. Please see my talk page to see my full responce to your above comments. If you like, you can append your comment afterwards by editing the section. Note: it is preferred that people always sign their posts and I may likely delete any comment which is unsigned. It is easy to sign your posts, just but four tilde marks together "~". -- Knowsetfree (talk) 21:14, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

I just stumbled on this article and I think that the first person posting may have a point. I am not intimately familiar with this law firm, but this article is short and there may be a WP:WEIGHT problem here because of the prominence given to the misconduct and malpractice sections. Question is, does this represent the available sourcing on this law firm from WP:RS sourches? If it does, there is no problem. If it does not, then there is a WEIGHT problem. I don't know the answer. I would suggest the person questioning the POV of this article provide additional information on the firm that can be considered in that regard.--Samiharris (talk) 21:36, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Hi Samiharris. Thanks for joining the discussion. You "stumbling" upon the article here, you have missed the long history of edits to this article by anonymous users, which predates the recent admission by the "first person posting" Milleri that he/she is a member of the law firm. I would urge any editor to view all comments on this page in context with the more complete and verifiable history that is recorded here. You will see that Weil, Gotshal is not the only law firm which has anonymous users making deletions to misconduct section. Could you clarify what problem you have with the sources identified in the article? I'm surprised that you would bring it up, because clearly Milleri has identified himself as a member of the firm (belatedly) and Milleri does not dispute any of the facts. So, it is not clear to me if you are disputing the factual basis. As to balance, we are talking about a few sentences for each topic, so I don't see how weighting could be a potential problem. On the subject of weighting consider how much of the article is reporting positive informational facts and how much is reporting negative facts? Consider the broad range of articles on Wikipedia including George Bush, Martha Stewart, Michael Nifong, Barry Bonds, Pete Rose. Most article have pros and cons. In fact, Milleri's said that the controversies were normal for law firms of that size. We should not censure fact because it is unflattering. -- Knowsetfree (talk) 00:46, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

I haven't cut anything out, but as a preliminary fix I combined the two sections as one section with the less POV header "Controversies." My comments above still apply, as this section is approx. one third of the article, which seems somewhat large.--Samiharris (talk) 21:53, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Hi Samiharris, The is a much more extensive history of edits to these two sections. The misconduct section and the malpractise section have nothing to do with each other. I could see including them under a section, but don't see the value of losing the distinctive sections. FYI, there are a number of other law firms with misconduct sections, so there is value in having a consistent section title. Furthermore, Milleri seemed to imply that there are a number of other law firms in a similar circumstance, or that firms of this size would be expected to have misconduct filings against them. I've asked Milleri to provide relevant references so we'll have to wait and see. -- Knowsetfree (talk) 00:46, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

I haven't reviewed the history of the edits. Personally, I don't think it matters in NPOV whether or not other firms have similar problems. The issue, I think, is solely whether the weight given to the malpractice/misconduct issues falls afoul of WP:WEIGHT, which reads in relevant part: "An article should not give undue weight to any aspects of the subject, but should strive to treat each aspect with a weight appropriate to its significance to the subject. Note that undue weight can be given in several ways, including, but not limited to, depth of detail, quantity of text, prominence of placement, and juxtaposition of statements." One way of dealing with this dispute between yourself and Milleri is to ask for third opinions,or to post on the relevant board dealing with NPOV disputes. However, I think the thing to do is to bulk up the article generally, given the size and prominence of the firm. In an article of such limited size, it is untoward to have half of it taken up with criticism. Something tells me that this is how administrators would rule, if it came to that.--Samiharris (talk) 15:08, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Here is a neutral reference that may illuminate the situation: http://www.cobar.org/index.cfm/ID/156/subID/361/Consumer's-Guide-to-Legal-Malpractice-Insurance/. This reference says that "in any given year, a minimum of five to six insured lawyers out of every 100 in private practice will experience a malpractice claim". According to these data, it would be normal for a firm the size of Weil Gotshal to have over 60 claims per year, with or without merit. This is a tiny fraction of the number of matters the firm conducts each year. It seems to me that a balanced article on a firm of this type would be include issues of malpractice and misconduct in accurate proportion to its positive contributions. To the extent the material is factual, I don't object to its inclusion. It simply needs to be proportional. Milleri (talk) 15:30, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Hi Milleri, glad you are still participating in the discussion. However, you have ignored my responces to your entry on my talk page. Not sure that I could have made it any easier for you. There is a long history associated with this page and that is why it is saved on my talk page, and why I referred you there. Also, your being a member of the firm is really something special. Can you at least answer this from the discussion:

• "Please note that I am a member of Weil Gotshal" Is it ordinary for a lawyer of your firm to argue about the ethical practices and reputation of your firm anonymously? Wouldn't it be more ethical for a lawyer to identity himself/herself when trying to defend or promote a cause in the public domain? Particularly when that cause has to do with the reputation of your firm? For how many of the anonymous edits attempting to censor what you consider undesirable facts were you responsible?

-- Knowsetfree (talk) 20:17, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

I didn't make any anonymous edits, and I don't know who did. Milleri (talk) 12:34, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

Hi Milleri, thanks for your answer that you did not do any of the anonymous edits to the page, and I will take you at your word. While it wasn't asked, your volunteering that you don't know anyone who made any of the anonymous edits was very much appreciated. Knowsetfree (talk) 18:03, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

The material from cobar.org really beg the question as to whether excess emphasis is given to malpractice and malfeasance in this article. But I suspect that you are right in that it is out of proportion, given the prominence of the firm.--Samiharris (talk) 16:47, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Hi Samiharris. Does the cobar.org material beg the question? Let's take a look at Milleri's own "neutral reference" and his stated argument. He claims that Weil Gotshal should have more than 60 malpractice claims against it every year. Why don't you ask Milleri to give us the case numbers for the more than 60 claims from last year. It would already be public information, every lawsuit is public. Just the 60+ lawsuits filed against the firm in 2006, it would take 30 seconds to print out from their case tracking software. Not to get too sarcastic, but perhaps Milleri was knowingly arguing a point which he knew to be false. If he did that in a court room, he/she could get a finding of misconduct against him/her by the judge.

-- Knowsetfree (talk) 20:25, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

The issue is very simple: is the "controversies" section excessively large, in light of the WP:RS sourcing available? No one has yet made the claim that the press coverage of this firm is quite as negative as is implied in this entry, which is one-third devoted to malpractice suits and wrongdoing. Can someone shed some light on this, one way or the other? --Samiharris (talk) 21:51, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

By the way, just to show you how open my mind is on this subject, I did a Google News check [1], and I found that yes, malpractice suits against the firm are indeed prominently featured. However, I still have my WEIGHT doubts and have asked an uninvolved administrator to take a look at this article. From skimming the Google News list, I see that there is a Refco suit that nobody has mentioned and many other things that deserve to be included. This law firm is definitely in the news. Bottom line: this article needs considerable work and expansion on both positive and negative aspects. --Samiharris (talk) 22:28, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Samiharris asked me to look at this article and give my opinion. To begin with, I think that lawsuits which are settled out of court with no admission of wrongdoing are not major events, unless they have very large sums of money involved. The Bolton case is noteworthy only because a celebrity was involved. Second, very large law firms have these issues of conflict more frequently than small firms, for the obvious reason that they have more lawyers and more clients, some of whom sue each other. Third, the material includes an unrelated assertion that the firm being one of the richest in the country (that should probably be in the intro). Fourth, Law.com is probably a reliable source but it is going to cover legal firms with much more detail than the general media would. A search of their archive shows that they have 2,683 articles that mention the firm.[2] Picking out two articles, that cover a suit which was settled, does appear to give that matter excess weight. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 22:50, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, Will. I hadn't noticed about the suits being settled, as that is an important point. Given the significance of the firm and its involvement in major cases and employment of notable attorneys such as Harvey R. Miller, a well known bankruptcy lawyer, I think it is plain that this article needs significant work.--Samiharris (talk) 23:00, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Hi Will, thank you for joining the discussion. Please note, that the history of the edits to the misconduct section is much longer than shown here on this page. Some of the history is logged with requests for comment to many of the anon's on my talk page. Please give those comments a read, there are two sections on edits to this article, and more on another law firm which also had a misconduct section. Samiharris had a good point about the open mind, which led to his finding additional information and I concur that this firms controversies section needs additional work, possibly expansion. Like Samiharris, I was drawn to this article because of the disputed deletions of the misconduct section - and a number of other wiki editors have also reversed these section deletions. I asked the anons for support or comment, didn't get any. On my own I did some research and found out about the Michael Bolton malpractice issue, so I created that section. I wrote the Bolton topic not just because he was newsworthy, but because of the nature of malpractise claim, it was based upon conflict of interest in representing adverse parties without their knowledge or consent. Such an issue is not merely a cause to sue for malpractise, it is a glaring violation of the ABA's model code of professional conduct. In some contexts, an undisclosed conflict of interest it is also criminal. This is the same issue which led to the misconduct order against the firm. At a minimum, a report to the state Bar should have been filed by any attorney aware of the dispute and discipline administered (State Bar workings are confidential), even if not against the Weil, Gotshal firm for having the conflict, then against Bolton's firm for bringing a lawsuit that was not based upon fact. But I find it inconceivable that the firm would not have had the suit immediately dismissed if the asserted facts were false. Thus, the relevent connection between Bolton and the Judge's order is that conflict of interest is a problem for the firm, and I think there is even a quote admitting as much by one of their members. In retrospect, the article needs to point out this serious link in the controvery section. My having merely put the facts up there without explanation I see would not necessarily be enough to make the impact of the facts meaningful to the average wiki reader. Ironically, I only found the Bolton item because the string of anons, one of whom has belatedly admitted to being a member of the firm, kept trying to delete the misconduct item without discussion. Like me, Samiharris has found other facts when trying to verify the deleting editors agenda with this Refco news, which I'm going to read about. Very likely, given its size and newsworthiness, it should be mentioned in the article. As far as balance goes, we know wiki is not to be used for promotion. Wiki would be wholly unbalanced if we allow law firms to post positive things like the Recognition section while excluding things like the misconduct section. The malpractice section is newsworthy for other reasons as described. Also, I went to great lengths on my talk page to describe the logical fallacy employed by Milleri to attempt to conflate the misconduct and malpractice issues into one discussion, and then attempt to delete both items after only discussing the malpractice topic. This is clearly a dishonest tactic as the misconduct order and fine by the judge is orders of magnitude more significant than any claim of malpractice. Let's also consider Milleri's standard for "balance", are we to apply such a standard equally to baseball players, politicians, musicians, actors, organizations, and every other business? -- 69.113.18.103 (talk) 00:30, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

I definitely have a greater understanding for your position (I assume you're User:Knowsetfree), having reviewed the recent Google News. However, I am sure you would agree that Will, who is an experienced administrator, has some good points. My take on this article is that yes, there absolutely must be a controversies section, but that it needs to be more proportional to the rest of the article. Right now the article is weirdly schizophrenic, with promotional "recognition" section taken from company press releases, followed by a lengthy controversies section. The only possible solution is to substantially build up this article using the material out there. Clearly the Refco and other major controversies need to be added. The article now is truncated and really needs work. There are plenty of major lawyers and lawsuits involved in this firm, and the biggest ones need to be in the article. Assuming that comes to pass, NPOV would absolutely mandate a proportional Controversies section with proper sourcing and well selected cases.--Samiharris (talk) 03:55, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Hi Samiharris, Yes I agree that Will has good points but I don't agree with any conclusion that would censor from any article on any law firm a judge's order of misconduct, particularly if we look at the Leslie Fay case in which Weil Gotshal & Manges was found guilty. The misconduct was not something on the order of "too many pages" in a brief, showing up late, using a bad word when angry, not wearing a tie in court, interrupting the judge, typo's, minor errors, etc. The finding of misconduct related to an act which was prohibited by law, which was a crime. (See Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman aritcle as an example of the severity of failures to make mandatory disclosure, as well as criminal and financial penalties.) Also, this is not a case of a lawyer fine $250, or to pay court costs, or even $10,000. This was not a six figure fine. The penalty was on the order of a Million dollars. As rare as fines are against lawfirms, this was one of the largest on record. Do you know of any other law firm that was fined by a federal judge over $100,000? The severity of the Leslie Fay misconduct is huge, no article on this law firm would be complete without featuring it. Granted, the profes$ional media which exists on ad revenues and their interconnections with PR firms, and profit motive which tries to avoid offending parties who would sue, certainly does not provide much attention to the offenses. But that is one of the reasons why Wiki is better. Your going to have to give your "weirdly schizophrenic" criticism another go of it because it doesn't seem to make sense. By all means, add content about Refco. Knowsetfree (talk) 18:39, 17 April 2008 (UTC)