Lawyer Who ‘Worked’ 1,286 Days in a Year: ‘Common Practice’

Legal Ethics

Lawyer Who ‘Worked’ 1,286 Days in a Year: ‘Common Practice’

Posted Feb 15, 2008, 05:40 pm CDT
By Martha Neil

Updated: A lawyer who was reported as simultaneously working as a full-time employee for five different Long Island school districts in order to qualify for a government pension and other benefits says such arrangements were common practice.

Lawrence W. Reich actually was in private practice and representing the five districts as their legal counsel, reports Newsday. However, the arrangement—under which he was credited, for example, with working 1,286 days in 1999 as a full-time employee for the five districts—"enabl[ed] him to earn a public pension of nearly $62,000 and health benefits for life," the newspaper writes.

At the same time, his law firm earned legal fees of $2.5 million. Both school district officials and Reich's law firm, Ingerman Smith of Northport, N.Y., were aware of the arrangement, according to Newsday.

State auditors and several lawyers interviewed by the newspaper have questioned the practice, which may violate an Internal Revenue Service rule against being paid as an employee and as an independent contractor for the same job, according to Newsday.

But Reich says he has done nothing wrong. "I followed essentially a practice that was very common among my colleagues in the industry," he tells Newsday. Additionally, he notes, "I don't file these papers" submitted by the school districts on his behalf. "I don't have the faintest idea what they're filing for me."

As discussed in a Feb. 19 ABAJournal.com post, a follow-up Newsday article says that new issues have been raised for Reich as a result of the initial Newsday story about the situation.

And a subsequent Feb. 21 ABAJournal.com post discusses parallel federal and state investigations that are now ongoing over Reich's reported multiple employment.

Updated at 1:30 p.m., Feb. 19 and 4:50 p.m., Feb. 21.

Comments

Report Abuse

Posted by Sharon Steckler - 2 months, 4 weeks, 15 hours, 5 minutes ago

Oh, please. This reminds of the joke where the lawyer’s car crashes off a bridge into a river on a dark and rainy night. After he drowns, he finds himself at the pearly gates meeting St. Peter. As any good lawyer, he tries to plead his case. “Please, St. Peter, I’m too young to be here. I’m only 42 and have a wife and children to support.” St. Peter looks at his book and says, “According to your billables, you’re 91.”
Posted by msg - 2 months, 3 weeks, 6 days, 18 hours, 55 minutes ago

Another reason why people and business hate lawyers. Why can’t we seem to get that? Why can’t we police ourselves? And we are worried about law students who had substance abuse problems and now who have finally got their lifes together and have to punish them with a provisional or conditional bar admission. Come on get it together! This is exactly what is wrong with the elite among our profession!
Posted by theglassishalf - 2 months, 3 weeks, 6 days, 12 hours, 45 minutes ago

He worked as council for five districts. He didn’t claim x# of billable hours. So long as he performed well for each district and could handle the workload, I don’t really see the issue. Perhaps the state should amend its retirement policies.
Posted by Gary - 2 months, 3 weeks, 6 days, 7 hours, 16 minutes ago

What doesn’t seem to compute is that this character earned full-time pay for doing 5 jobs, which all of us know is not within the realm of the physical world. He got paid very handsomely for it and earns a more than generous pension.

At the same time there are people who actually work 3 jobs, that is: going there and do 3 jobs, who don’t make enough to make ends meet. Admittedly, these are not high-profile jobs by any means. The point is: they have to work these jobs in the certain knowledge that they’ll be under water come the end of the month,

This indicate a fundamental bias against physical labor which is worth so little that no amount of work is enough to earn decent pay versus another type of job that is esteemed so highly that it can never earn enough.

The obscene social inequality on display here indicates conditions that are so badly skewed in favor of one class of employee that no amount of hard work can offset it. Somebody has to be physically present on three jobs and be sure not to make enough money while someone else can have ‘5 jobs’ that do not require his physical presence and yet he makes full-time pay every time.

Either the system is changed so that the person who has to hold 3 jobs to make ends meet is allowed to earn living wages doing one job, which is what civil society should look like, or there will come a time of revolution where the lawyer working 5 jobs is relieved of his belongings with or without the use of physical force, to restore the imbalance.

Commenting has expired on this post.

ABA Journal - Law News Now

Legal Ethics