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Milberg’S Monopoly: Restoring Honesty And Competition To The Plaintiffs’ Bar, James P. Mcdonald

Duke Law Journal

When the renowned plaintiffs' firm Milberg Weiss was indicted in 2006 for paying kickbacks to clients, most commentators saw the scandal as the product of five dishonest lawyers. This Note argues that the causes were more complex than the moral shortcomings of a few attorneys; rather, the kickbacks were but one symptom of a deeply flawed system for selecting lead counsel in securities class action lawsuits. Although the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 attempted to curb abusive behavior by the plaintiffs' bar, its focus on reforming plaintiff behavior meant that attorneys were left relatively free to continue using …