Bloomberg Law reports that Willkie Farr & Gallagher Co-Chairman Gordon R. Caplan has been charged along with dozens of others, including Hollywood actors and executives, in a criminal conspiracy to bribe college admissions officials to gain admission for their children to top universities.

According to Bloomberg’s Melissa Heelan Stanzione, Caplan was arrested at 6:30 a.m. Tuesday and was released on $500,000 bail after appearing in Manhattan federal court.

Caplan has been charged with donating $75,000 to the Key Worldwide Foundation. “In an exchange detailed in court filings, two of the FBI’s cooperating witnesses agreed to proctor his daughter’s college entrance exam and correct the answers after she finished it,” Stanzione reports.

Another Bloomberg report contains a transcript of a discussion involving a call Caplan had with William Singer, the founder of a corrupt college counseling and test-prep business who would later become a cooperating witness:

“Look, I’m particularly interested in working with you guys and figuring out what’s best for [my daughter],” Caplan said, according to the criminal complaint, which details the conversation intercepted on a court-authorized wiretap.

Read the Bloomberg reports
here and here.

Ballard Spahr LLP has offered a $10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of the man who shot a Philadelphia associate of the firm.

The gunman shot 37-year-old Spencer Hill in the stomach during a botched robbery attempt as he headed home after a late night at the office, reports The Philadelphia Tribune.

He was in front of his home when the shooting occurred. He managed to make it inside his home where his wife called police. Doctors opted against operating, Hill said, indicating that it was safer to leave the bullet inside him than it would be to perform surgery to remove it.

Read the Tribune article.

Paul Manafort won leniency Thursday from a federal judge who sent him to prison for less than four years, but next week he’ll be sentenced in a second case by a less forgiving judge who could add another 10 years to his term, according to Bloomberg.

He faced as much as 24 years in prison for hiding $55 million offshore accounts, failing to pay $6 million in taxes, and defrauding banks.

But in a few days Manafort will be sentenced by U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson in Washington, where he pleaded guilty to two conspiracy charges and pledged to cooperate with Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, report Bloomberg’s David Voreacos and Andrew M. Harris.

Jackson already has been strict with Manafort, sending him to jail after he was accused of tampering with witnesses. Jackson has the option of ordering any new sentence to be served consecutively or concurrently.

Read the Bloomberg article.

Former West Virginia Supreme Court Justice Menis Ketchum admitted at his sentencing hearing Thursday on a fraud conviction that he was guilty. The federal judge hearing the case sentenced him to three years on probation and fined him $20,000.

West Virginia MetroNews Network reported Ketchum pleaded guilty last August to using a state vehicle and state gas card for personal trips to Virginia to play golf.

“Judge, I’m just plain guilty. I’m sorry but sorry is no excuse. I owe an apology to state judges. I’ve embarrassed them and caused havoc. They work hard and are underpaid. I apologize to them. I’m really sorry to my wife and three kids. They don’t deserve what I’ve done to them. I have no excuse,” Ketchum said.

Read the MetroNews article.

A Texas state district judge who was accused last year of trying to influence a jury verdict by saying God told him the defendant was innocent has been issued a public warning by the state agency that investigates judicial misconduct, reports the Austin American-Statesman.

Jack Robison acknowledged to the State Commission on Judicial Conduct that his conduct was improper, adding that it might have been caused by stress from treatment for a severe medical condition and the death of a close friend days before the trial began in January 2018, according to Statesman reporter Ryan Autullo.

The commission could have removed Robison from the bench.

“The commission revealed that it had received 18 complaints about Robison’s conduct, including from the Comal County criminal district attorney’s office, two jurors and numerous citizens who learned about the incident through media reports,” writes Autullo.

Read the Statesman article.

The Supreme Court has ruled that the Constitution places limits on the ability of states and localities to take and keep cash, cars, houses and other private property used to commit crimes, reports The New York Times.

Reporters Adam Liptak and Shaila Dewan explains that the practice, known as civil forfeiture, “is a popular way to raise revenue and is easily abused, and it has been the subject of widespread criticism across the political spectrum. The court’s decision will open the door to new legal arguments when the value of the property seized was out of proportion to the crimes involved.”

All nine justices found that the Excessive Fines Clause applies to the states under the 14th Amendment. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote that the historical and logical case for the conclusion is overwhelming.

Read the NY Times article.

Labor Secretary Alex Acosta

Federal prosecutors, under former Miami U.S. Attorney Alex Acosta, broke the law when they concealed a plea agreement from more than 30 underage victims who had been sexually abused by wealthy New York hedge fund manager Jeffrey Epstein, a federal judge ruled Thursday.

The Miami Herald reports that the federal judge stopped short of overturning Epstein’s plea deal, or issuing an order resolving the case.

The judge said prosecutors not only violated the Crime Victims’ Rights Act by not informing the victims, they also misled the girls into believing that the FBI’s sex trafficking case against Epstein was still ongoing — when in fact, prosecutors had secretly closed it after sealing the plea bargain from the public record, according to the Herald‘s Julie K. Brown.

Acosta now serves as U.S. Labor Secretary. A White House spokeswoman said the administration is looking into the plea deal.

Read the Miami Herald article.

The Dallas Morning News is reporting that Dallas city and county officials are trying to block the release of investigative files related to the unsolved slaying of a prominent Dallas lawyer in 2016.

“Ira Tobolowsky, 68, was found dead inside his burning garage at his North Dallas home on May 13, 2016. The medical examiner’s office ruled his death a homicide — he died of blunt force injuries, smoke inhalation and burns,” according to the News‘ Dana Branham.

Michael Tobolowsky, the son of the victim, obtained an order from a district judge for the city to release documents from the Dallas Police Department and the Dallas County medical examiner so he can investigate the death of his father, potentially for a wrongful-death lawsuit. He claims the case has gone cold.

Dallas police are appealing the order, claiming the release would ruin any change of corroborating future witness statements.

Related:

• Family of Slain Lawyer Think They’ve Identified Murderer. So Why Can’t the Cops Solve the Case?

• Dallas Lawyer Was Spied on Before He Was Killed, Police Suspected

Read the Dallas News article.

CNBC is reporting that a federal judge has ordered longtime Republican operative Roger Stone to court on Thursday to explain why he should not have his criminal release bond modified or even revoked because of his recent Instagram post showing the judge next to what appeared to be a rifle scope’s crosshairs.

CNBC’s Dan Mangan writes that Stone could be sent to jail if his $250,000 signature bond is yanked by the judge, Amy Berman Jackson, who is presiding over the criminal case filed against him by special counsel Robert Mueller.

Stone’s Instagram account on Monday posted and then quickly deleted a photo of Jackson that had a rifle scope’s crosshairs above her head.

Read the CNBC article.

For the second time in as many weeks, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. has sided with liberal Supreme Court justices to disagree with how lower courts have interpreted Supreme Court precedent, reports The Washington Post.

“On Tuesday, Roberts was pointed in saying the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has ‘misapplied’ a 2017 ruling that instructed that court to reconsider its analysis of whether death-row inmate Bobby James Moore was intellectually disabled, and thus ineligible for execution.” writes the Post‘s Robert Barnes.

And less than two weeks ago Roberts joined in blocking a Louisiana law that tightened restrictions on abortion providers.

Read the Post article.

Gene Levoff — who was senior director of corporate law and corporate secretary until September 2018 — has been charged by the SEC with trading “on material nonpublic information about Apple’s earnings three times during 2015 and 2016,” according to the lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court of New Jersey, reports Forbes.

Forbes contributor Peter Cohan writes that the 44-year-old Levoff worked at Apple from 2008 until he was terminated in September 2018. At the time of his termination, he reported directly to the general counsel.

Fortune reports that the SEC alleged Levoff traded on advance knowledge of revenue-and-earnings figures multiple times dating back to 2011, with the illegal investments leading to about $227,000 in profits while allowing him to avoid $377,000 in losses.

Read the Fortune article.

Read the Forbes article.

Former West Virginia Supreme Court justice Allen Loughry, author of a book chronicling political corruption, was sentenced Wednesday to 24 months in federal prison on 10 federal charges including mail fraud and wire fraud, reports the Charleston Gazette-Mail.

Loughry also was placed on three years supervisory release, fined $10,000 and ordered to pay $1,273 in restitution, according to the Gazette-Mail‘s Phil Kabler.

The charges against Loughry, who resigned from the court last October, included misuse of state vehicles and credit cards for personal travel; lying to federal investigators about that travel, as well as about having a state-owned antique desk in his home; and defrauding a legal institute by accepting a travel reimbursement when he had used a state vehicle for the trip.

Read the Gazette-Mail article.

U.S. District Judge Lynn N. Hughes.

A federal judge banished a female prosecutor from his Houston courtroom last month, sparking a rare standoff between the new U.S. Attorney and a jurist with a history of sniping at lawyers, government officials and litigants, reports the Houston Chronicle.

“U.S. District Judge Lynn N. Hughes, a 77-year-old appointed by President Ronald Reagan, has been criticized in the past for making comments perceived as racist or sexist in court, write the Chronicle‘s Gabrielle Banks and Lise Olsen.

Hughes has twice ejected Assistant U.S. Attorney Tina Ansari before trials, claiming she lacked ability and integrity, records show.

Ansari was involved in a 2017 court session in which Hughes said, “It was a lot simpler when you guys wore dark suits, white shirts and navy ties… We didn’t let girls do it in the old days.” The 5th U.S. Circuit of Appeals found his remarks to be “demeaning, inappropriate and beneath the dignity of a federal judge.”

Read the Houston Chronicle article.

Bloomberg is reporting that Jeff Bezos’s allegations that he was blackmailed by American Media Inc. could upend the non-prosecution agreement the publisher of the National Enquirer struck last year with federal prosecutors in New York over its illegal aid to the Trump campaign.

Bloomberg’s Edvard Pettersson explains:

“Under the Sept. 20 agreement, the tabloid publisher was supposed to refrain from all illegal activity for a three-year period. The agreement says that if New York-based AMI commits any crime, it can be prosecuted for the ones it was granted immunity against, including perjury and obstruction of justice.”

Robert Schwartz, an attorney with Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP in Los Angeles, said AMI may claim that the emails are between lawyers who are trying to resolve a dispute.

Read the Bloomberg article.

The ABA Journal reports that a disbarred Georgia attorney facing 15 years in jail for defrauding clients out of their settlement checks remains on the run after police suspect that he stabbed his 77-year-old mother to death over the weekend.

“Richard Merritt, a former personal injury and medical malpractice lawyer from Smyrna, Georgia, was ordered to report to the Cobb County Jail on Friday after pleading guilty in January to more than 30 counts of felony, including theft, forgery and elder-exploitation charges related to crimes committed against 17 former clients.” writes the Journal‘s Amanda Robert.

Merritt had been free “to get his affairs in order,” according to a local TV station.

Read the ABA Journal article.

Bloomberg Law is reporting that a former Hunton Andrews Kurth partner is stuck with securities fraud and conspiracy convictions after his drunken brag led to insider trading before a Pfizer merger, the Second Circuit said Jan. 10.

Robert Schulman was a Washington-based partner with Hunton & Williams, now Hunton Andrews Kurth, working on a patent dispute involving King Pharmaceuticals when he learned of the potential merger of King and Pfizer in August 2010.

He made reference to that deal to his investment adviser, Tibor Klein, at a dinner less than two weeks later. Klein “purchased 65,150 King shares for $585,217 in various accounts” and made a profit in less than two months when the merger became public, the opinion said.

Read the Bloomberg Law article.

Cleveland.com reports that Emily McNeeley, general counsel for Cuyahoga County’s troubled IT Department and one of several people named in subpoenas related to an ongoing corruption investigation, has resigned from her $95,000-a-year job,

The county reported the resignation Tuesday, according to Cleveland.com’s Courtney Astolfi.

McNeeley was placed on unpaid leave in April after corruption investigators repeatedly named her, and her boss, IT Director Scot Rourke, in subpoenas served on the county. The cases refer to potential conflicts of interest, the report says.

Read the Cleveland.com article.

Image by Kate Gardiner

A federal criminal complaint unsealed Thursday charged Chicago alderman Edward Burke with attempted extortion for allegedly using his position as alderman to try to steer business to his private law firm from a company seeking to renovate a fast-food restaurant in his ward, the Chicago Tribune reports.

The charge carries a maximum of 20 years in prison on conviction.

“The complaint details Burke’s repeated attempts to pressure the executives into hiring his law firm, Klafter & Burke, including during a June 2017 lunch meeting at the swanky Beverly Country Club at 87th Street and South Western Avenue. The FBI had the meeting under surveillance,” writes the Tribune‘s Jason Meisner.

Read the Chicago Tribune article.

Thousands of people are demanding the resignation of a Texas state district judge in Waco who accepted a plea deal for an accused rapist that sentenced the student to probation rather than prison, reports The Dallas Morning News.

Reporter Sarah Sarder explains:

“Judge Ralph Strother of the 19th District Court of Texas approved the plea deal for Jacob Walter Anderson. The plea deal includes three years of probation, a $400 fine and an order to seek unspecified counseling. Former Baylor fraternity president Jacob Walter Anderson, 23, of Garland was allowed to plead no contest Monday to a charge of unlawful restraint. Anderson will not be required to register as a sex offender.”

As of Friday morning, the online petition calling for Strother to be removed from office had more than 30,000 signatures.

Read the Morning News article.

Indictments unsealed Tuesday in New York State Supreme Court described a wide-ranging scheme involving three companies to steal at least $15 million from Bloomberg L.P., the giant financial information and media company, through bribes, kickbacks and bid rigging.

Manhattan district attorney Cyrus R. Vance described it as a “brazen” scheme lasting more than a decade.

The New York Times reports that the district attorney and state police said the case involves possible fraud, theft and bribery charges involving senior New York executives in Bloomberg’s global construction and facilities department.

Times reporter Charles V. Bagli explains how — according to investigators — contractors and executives exchanged texts that used code words to coordinate the scheme:

“Among the conspirators, ‘sandwich’ was code for bribes or kickbacks, prosecutors said. The contractor wanted to know if the executive, Vito Nigro of Turner Construction, was satisfied with the thick envelope stuffed with cash that had been delivered to his office the prior day, according to the indictment.”

Read the NY Times article.