Judicial Notice (08.19.23): Stinky Cheese
A Harvard Law grad gone bad, a law school #MeToo scandal, an ugly spat between two firms, and other legal news from the week that was.
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August isn’t very exciting—we’ve become positively European in how we’ve turned it into an extended vacation—and it’s even less exciting when you have a newborn. One of our bigger outings was going to the pediatrician for Chase’s one-month checkup, and I’m happy to report that he’s doing well (although I can’t wait until we can sleep train). Our new addition to the family also explains why I won’t be at ILTACON this year; if you’re going, please drop by the booth of my friends at ShareFile (more info here, plus a disclosure—I’m doing a sponsored event with them in September).
I did record a new episode of Movers, Shakers & Rainmakers. My co-host Zach Sandberg and I interviewed an old friend of mine, Daren Firestone of Levy Firestone Muse, focusing on his interesting practice representing whistleblowers, especially in the cryptocurrency space.
Now, on to the news—and gossip….
Lawyer of the Week: Kenneth Chesebro.
Meet Kenneth Chesebro. The 62-year-old Harvard Law School alum—known during his HLS days as “The Cheese,” a nod to his Wisconsin roots (his name is actually pronounced “CHEZ-bro”)—has had quite the career. He’s gone from successful appellate advocate to cryptocurrency millionaire to criminal defendant, one of 19 individuals indicted this week by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis for conspiring to steal the 2020 election. As a certain someone might say, SAD!
Long overshadowed by more notorious Trumpworld lawyers like Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, and Sidney Powell, Chesebro is having his moment in the sun. He first made news as Co-Conspirator 5 in Special Counsel Jack Smith’s election-theft prosecution, accused of serving as a legal architect of ex-president Donald Trump’s “fake electors” scheme. Then this week, The Cheese got indicted by Fani Willis, named in seven counts of her 41-count, 98-page indictment—including conspiracy to commit forgery, conspiracy to file false documents, and violation of Georgia’s anti-racketeering act (Georgia’s state version of federal RICO).
The latest news, via CNN and the New York Times, is that Chesebro was hanging out with conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, right outside the Capitol, on January 6. Although there’s no indication that Chesebro entered the Capitol or engaged in violence, it’s not a great look—which might be why Chesebro invoked the Fifth Amendment when asked by the January 6 Committee about his whereabouts on that fateful day.
As described in the Washington Post and Air Mail, Chesebro has a surprising backstory. Unlike many other Trump lawyers, longtime conservatives who fell off the right side of the earth, Chesebro started out on the left—and stayed that way for decades, a registered Democrat until 2016. And not only that, he was a research assistant and protégé of Professor Laurence Tribe—the legendary liberal legal academic, with whom he worked for 20 years. They collaborated on cases concerning class-action claims and punitive damages, as well as—wait for it—Bush v. Gore.
So how did The Cheese go bad?
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