The Barber Ranen Blowup: 'The Worst Emails I've Ever Seen'

A deep dive into a sordid saga, including new comments and context from Lewis Brisbois.

John Barber (left) and Jeff Ranen, founding partners of Barber Ranen.

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“Let’s be honest. Attorneys are attorneys. Law firms are law firms. Most blend into one another, while nonetheless proclaiming themselves better than the next.”

“Every once in a while, you find an attorney, even a whole firm, which does seem different….”

As promised by the now-defunct website of their soon-to-be-defunct firm, John Barber and Jeffrey Ranen definitely are different. The prominent employment lawyers—longtime partners at the Am Law 100 firm of Lewis Brisbois, before leaving to launch Barber Ranen—stand out as authors of amazingly awful emails.

“I've been in crisis management for 20 years,” one public-relations professional told me. “These are the worst emails I have ever seen.”

I’ve been chronicling Biglaw for almost two decades, and taking the emails collectively, I’d agree. The messages manage to use the c-word, the f-word, and the n-word, as well as “Jew” as a verb, multiple times. The rank disrespect for such a wide range of groups is breathtaking. If Chambers had a ranking for “Offensive Emails: The Elite,” John Barber and Jeff Ranen would be Band 1.

The Barber Ranen email scandal has transfixed the legal profession; like rubberneckers at the scene of a horrible car crash, we can’t look away. As of this writing, stories about the emails top the most-read lists for the American Lawyer, Law360, and the ABA Journal.

As I like to do, I’m here to offer a deep dive into the drama. I gather and synthesize what’s already out there, provide reporting of my own, and add my own insights, with the goal of giving you a single, comprehensive read. So let’s dig in, shall we?

What’s The Deal With Lewis Brisbois?

For those of you who missed the story in the New York Post or the last installment of Judicial Notice, let me get you up to speed. Warning: some of what follows is offensive (but unlike John Barber and Jeff Ranen, I’ve redacted any slurs).

John Barber, 55, and Jeff Ranen, 45, were longtime partners at Lewis Brisbois—at least 25 years for Barber, 20 for Ranen. They also were in leadership: Barber and Ranen served as chair and vice chair of the Lewis Brisbois employment practices group, respectively, and both sat on the management committee.

You might not be familiar with it, but Lewis Brisbois is an Am Law 100 firm—one of the 100 largest firms in the United States, ranked by revenue. It generated gross revenue of $702 million in 2022, making it #70 in the American Lawyer’s latest Am Law 100 ranking. It’s also a very large firm by headcount. In the National Law Journal’s 2022 NLJ 500 ranking of firms, which is based on number of lawyers rather than financial metrics, Lewis Brisbois ranked #15, with 1,613 lawyers in the United States.

Given its size in terms of both revenue and headcount, why isn’t Lewis Brisbois more well-known? For example, why isn’t it in the Vault 100, the 100 most prestigious law firms in the country, even though many firms that are smaller do belong to that club?

Prestige correlates with profitability, and Lewis Brisbois is not, on a per-lawyer basis, super-profitable. According to the American Lawyer, the firm’s profit per equity partner is $1,015,000—an eye-popping sum for the average American, but only #88 in the Am Law 100. As for revenue per lawyer, another key financial metric, Lewis Brisbois is #100.

I wouldn’t hold any of this against Lewis Brisbois. The financial metrics largely reflect the firm’s focus on areas that have historically been on the less-profitable side in Biglaw. Although it touts its expertise in more than 40 specialties, Lewis Brisbois is most well-known as a leading firm for insurance-defense litigation, which has some of the lowest billing rates of any practice area. It’s also prominent in employment law, another practice area that’s rate-challenged.

The Birth Of Barber Ranen

Employment law, despite having relatively low billing rates and profitability by Biglaw standards, is at least more profitable than insurance defense. So it wasn’t a shock when John Barber and Jeff Ranen left Lewis Brisbois in April to start their own firm, Barber Ranen. When partners at a firm have a practice whose profitability is greater than that of the rest of the firm, they have an economic incentive to break away and start their own shop. This lets them keep more of their profits, without having to “subsidize” less lucrative groups.

What was surprising was how Barber Ranen picked up around 130 lawyers from Lewis Brisbois, within just a few short weeks of Barber and Ranen leaving. It’s rare to see that many defections in such a short period of time. The fiduciary duties that partners owe to each other limit the ability of departing partners to poach talent and clients from their soon-to-be-former firms. This is why, when Biglaw partners break off to launch a boutique, it often takes a while for associates and clients to follow (unless the split is a negotiated departure).

So the partners remaining at Lewis Brisbois were presumably angry at—and suspicious towards—Barber and Ranen. How did the duo manage to recruit so many Lewis Brisbois lawyers—and, per the American Lawyer, clients—so quickly? In breaking off from Lewis Brisbois, did Barber Ranen cut ethical corners? (Barber, cut—geddit?)

Then John Barber and Jeff Ranen poured salt in the wound of their departure—twice. First, in their public statements about the launch of their new firm, Barber and Ranen threw not-so-subtle shade on Lewis Brisbois, despite having collectively spent almost 50 years there. They told Staci Zaretsky of Above the Law that they wanted to “build something that’s reflective of our values,” which include “empathy, collaboration, and compassion,” as they told the Los Angeles Business Journal. Were these values in short supply at Lewis Brisbois?

Second, shortly after Barber Ranen’s launch, a 2019 whistleblower letter by former Lewis Brisbois COO Robert Kamins somehow showed up in the news. In his letter, Kamins alleged “potential embezzlement of firm assets, fraudulent use of software without the legally required licenses, kickbacks from vendors, potential misappropriation of partnership assets and client trust funds, breaches of fiduciary duty, and failure to comply with reporting requirements.” Kamins also claimed that name partner Robert “Bob” Lewis treated the firm like his personal fiefdom, “appear[ing] to spread financial perks to those close to him without consent or knowledge of the partnership,” and hiring one of his sons, Craig Lewis, as a vendor.

And where was Robert Kamins working at the time his whistleblower letter mysteriously came to light? He was the acting chief operating officer of a law firm… named Barber Ranen. As a Lewis Brisbois spokesperson told Law.com, “Lewis Brisbois finds it troubling that these four-year-old allegations have resurfaced at the same time that, according to a legal-media outlet, Mr. Kamins is working with the Barber Ranen law firm.”

The Emails: They’re Real, And They’re… Spectacular

Speaking of damaging information suddenly surfacing in the media… on Saturday, the New York Post reported on a slew of incredibly offensive emails sent by John Barber and Jeff Ranen, back when they were at Lewis Brisbois. There’s so much horrific stuff in the messages, so I’m grateful to Debra Cassens Weiss of the ABA Journal for this concise compilation:

• Ranen reported to Barber that someone had asked a question about the need to pay overtime when an employee works six hours one day and 10 hours the next day. “Kill her by anal penetration,” Barber had replied in June 2012.

• After someone wrote in March 2022 that a judge hates being called “Barbs,” Barber replied, “But loves ‘Babs,’ and ‘Sugar T**s.”

• After a Lewis Brisbois partner told Barber in November 2013 that people were upset during a mediation because a witness frequently used the N-word, Barber used the full slur when he replied, “Got it. N*****. Don’t use.”

• Barber responded to an email about a baby shower with the full N-word in the subject line against spelled out in full.

• Ranen used the anti-LGBTQ slur beginning with an “F.” Once he asked in November 2014, “What’s this f****t’s problem?” In April 2015, he told a partner, “Don’t be a f****t.”

• Ranen referred to looters as “savages” when he wrote in May 2020, “F**king looters came within a mile and a half. I can’t even imagine what it was like living in Larchmont in 1992 when the savages decimated Koreatown.”

• The lawyers mocked a lawyer from an opposing firm for his past service in the Israeli Defense Forces. “He’s a f**. Israeli Defense Force hand-to-hand combat instructor? Yawn. I’ll kick his ass,” Barber wrote. “His bio gave me a stiffy. Does that make me a homo?” Ranen replied.

• Ranen refers to an opposing counsel as “the Gypsy king” and uses the phrase “dirty gypsy.” In July 2012, he declares, “Gypsy is my new word to describe about half of the minorities in California. Generally with an Amo, Persian or Middle Eastern flair.” In the same email chain, Ranen said a lawyer is “a surprisingly tough negotiator due to his Persian background.”

• Ranen wrote, “Sorry. I worry about things. Part of being half Jewish.” In a March 2012 email about an invoice, he wrote, “This is the reason why people don’t like Jews.” In a September 2017 email soliciting suggestions for a private investigation company, Ranen wrote, “How about someone who’s not a Jew?”

• After Ranen wrote in July 2014 that he brought in bagels and cream cheese with lox spread, Barber replied, “Jew c***.”

I wasn’t sure the emails were real. But assuming they were, I suggested in Judicial Notice that it was ironic for Barber and Ranen to have written them, given (1) the lawyers’ profession of values like “empathy” and “compassion,” and (2) their focus on defense-side employment litigation and counseling—i.e., defending employers in discrimination lawsuits, plus keeping them out of litigation in the first place.

Prominent progressive Jeff Hauser, executive director of the Revolving Door Project, told me he was not at all surprised: “If you believe, like me, that there is a lot of hate out there, including within elite circles... it's actually unsurprising, and thus unironic, that someone who chooses to defend people accused of racism and bigotry would themselves be racist and bigoted.”

I’d respectfully disagree with Hauser—I’d say that most defense-side employment lawyers I know are not racist and bigoted, just as most criminal-defense lawyers I know are not criminals themselves. But whether or not one found the emails surprising, they did turn out to be real—and to have real consequences.

What Next For Barber, Ranen, And Barber Ranen?

Shortly after the emails came to light, Barber and Ranen resigned from the firm with their names on the door. In their resignation announcement, they confirmed the authenticity of the emails. Here’s an excerpt from their statement (reprinted in full at the end of this post):

We want to apologize. To everyone. To our families, our friends, our colleagues, and the public who had to read the thoughtless, hurtful and inappropriate words we used and sentiments expressed in the emails recently released by our former law firm…. [W]e are resigning from Barber Ranen effective immediately in order to allow our friends and colleagues to continue on without the cloud of our conduct hanging over them.

As for the remaining partners at Barber Ranen, CEO Tim Graves made the following statement on their behalf, which was posted on the firm’s website (the website has since been taken down, but it’s still available via Google Cache):

Effective immediately, the firm has requested and accepted the resignations of John Barber and Jeffrey Ranen. The remaining Equity Partners express their disappointment and disdain for the language Mr. Barber and Mr. Ranen used. We will form a new firm. We ask for the support of our friends and colleagues while we heal and plan our path forward.

Good luck to the remaining lawyers at the firm formerly known as Barber Ranen. John Barber and Jeff Ranen were significant rainmakers at Lewis Brisbois, which is what put them in a position to leave and launch Barber Ranen. Will clients stick with the successor firm, or is the stench of scandal too strong? Stay tuned. [UPDATE (6/14/2023, 5:55 p.m.): The new firm name is Daugherty Lordan, after partners Melissa Daugherty and Joe Lordan.]

As for Barber and Ranen themselves, they said they “will be taking time away” to reflect and reform—and it’s going to have to be a lot of “time away.” The fact that they’re employment lawyers makes reentry even harder. If they were, say, M&A lawyers, that might be one thing. But if you’re an employer accused or racism, sexism, homophobia, or antisemitism, do you really want to hire lawyers who are now notorious for emails using racist, sexist, homophobic, or antisemitic language?

If I were in their shoes, and assuming I had the financial wherewithal, I’d retire from Biglaw completely, devoting my remaining years on the planet to public service. If they’re serious about “explor[ing] the ways in which we can most effectively demonstrate our contrition and commitment to a world characterized by inclusion, kindness, and grace,” significant pro bono work or non-legal community service is definitely in order. It will be interesting to see where they end up.

What About Lewis Brisbois?

Lewis Brisbois finds itself in a challenging position. While some partners might be enjoying tons of schadenfreude at the expense of Barber and Ranen, this whole episode has also raised questions about Lewis Brisbois. Recall that the offensive emails—sent between the years 2008 and 2002 2022, according to Zack Needles on the Legal Speak podcast—were all sent while Barber and Ranen were partners, as well as leaders, at Lewis Brisbois. It’s not a great look for the firm to have harbored the authors of such offensive emails—for decades.

In addition, some of my readers have criticized Lewis Brisbois for releasing the emails. While nobody would (or could) defend the content of the emails, some have suggested that it was petty and vengeful of Lewis Brisbois to have leaked the emails to the media (although “leaked” isn’t exactly the right word, since the sharing of emails with the media was not at all covert).

I raised this issue, plus others, with a Lewis Brisbois spokesperson. He offered several responses.

First, he stated that the firm didn’t sua sponte go rummaging through Barber’s and Ranen’s emails after they departed, with the goal of digging up dirt. Instead, as Lewis Brisbois has told other media outlets, the management committee received a complaint about Barber and Ranen after they left. In order to investigate this complaint—which specifically urged the committee to look into emails, he said—the management committee reviewed emails going back six months. After seeing problematic emails, they extended the review to twelve months back, then further and further back in time as they saw more and more offensive emails. (I did ask for additional information about the alleged complaint—e.g., was it from a lawyer or a staffer, what else did it say—but the firm rested on its original comment.)

Second, in response to my question about whether Lewis Brisbois knowingly harbored partners spewing such offensive comments, he denied this. The spokesperson stated that the firm was unaware of any discriminatory conduct by Barber and Ranen prior to discovering these emails, and no discrimination complaints about them were lodged with human resources (HR).

Third, addressing my suggestion that the firm might look vindictive for sharing the emails with the media, he said that while Lewis Brisbois understood this risk, the management committee felt it had to do something, simply given the extreme and outrageous nature of the messages. Imagine if the management committee had simply sat on the emails, he said. What would happen a month from now, a few months from now, or a year from now, if complaints about Barber and Ranen surfaced from a Lewis Brisbois client, current employee, or former employee?

Bringing the emails to the attention of the HR department of Barber Ranen wouldn’t work; the new firm has (or had) their names on the door. After consulting with the Lewis Brisbois HR team and even outside ethicists, the management committee decided that being transparent and sharing the emails with the media was the least-bad option.

So that’s the public position of Lewis Brisbois on the Barber Ranen emails. Biglaw being what it is, however, some readers have expressed skepticism to me.

For example, one reader pointed out that one allegation in the Kamins whistleblower letter is that Lewis Brisbois engaged in “privacy-intrusive tactics,” i.e., it spied on some employees. According to Kamins, this was done primarily through Tommy Lewis—the chief technology officer and deputy chief information officer of the firm, according to his LinkedIn profile, as well as a son of name partner Bob Lewis. If this allegation is accurate, this reader said, it would not be shocking for Lewis Brisbois to have poked around Barber’s and Ranen’s email accounts after they left.

Here are thoughts from a different reader, a former managing partner at another firm:

The emails are horrible, obviously, but how it evolved also is interesting to me, and no one is really writing about it. There’s zero chance that others at LB were unaware of these kinds of emails before now, and also zero chance that Messrs. Barber and Ranen communicated this way only with each other. It seems pretty clear that after B&R abandoned the LB firm to start their own firm, and took (i.e., stole) all the clients, LB decided to fight back however it could.

The emails surely got leaked to the media by LB itself, to achieve exactly what happened: destruction of B&R themselves, and probably the demise of their new firm, at least in its current incarnation. That’s pretty cold. But I don’t believe for a second that there aren’t lots of other similar emails that went to and from partners who are still at LB. It’s just that LB controls the flow of leaks.

This is, of course, speculative, and I’m unaware of specific facts supporting this reader’s suspicions. But the situation does serve as a warning to current Lewis Brisbois who are thinking about leaving: CHECK YOU EMAIL, to quote an early Above the Law meme (now in Urban Dictionary), and make sure there are no skeletons left in the closet before you leave Lewis Brisbois.

In fairness to Lewis Brisbois, it should be noted that a significant number of lawyers have left in recent months without similar scandal. As noted by Law.com, more than 150 lawyers have departed since the start of 2023, including 32 lawyers in data privacy and cybersecurity who decamped for Constangy Brooks. While 32 is much smaller than the 130 who went to Barber Ranen, privacy and cyber are hot, higher-end practice areas—so that was a significant loss too.

To its credit, Lewis Brisbois has made changes in the wake of the Barber Ranen and Constangy defections. Most notably, Bob Lewis stepped down as chair, after 43 years in leadership. The firm disbanded its executive committee and expanded its management committee, from nine partners to 13 15. In light of all the recent drama, this seems smart. As leading law firm consultant Bruce MacEwen told Bloomberg Law, “You’ve got to do something to tell the remaining partners, ‘We’re on it.’” [UPDATE (4:35 p.m.): I corrected the number of people on the management committee, which I obtained from the Bloomberg piece, after hearing from a Lewis Brisbois spokesperson.]

From the point of view of succession planning, it’s a wise idea for Bob Lewis to hand over the reins to the next generation, as Zack Needles noted on Legal Speak. Lewis Brisbois is one of only a handful of firms in the Am Law 100 where a name partner is still actively practicing. And at the small number of firms where name partners still come into the office, those partners—like Marty Lipton and Herb Wachtell of Wachtell Lipton, and John Quinn of Quinn Emanuel—previously transferred leadership to others.

As for the future of Lewis Brisbois, here’s what I’d identify as a weird silver lining to this cloud of controversy: the firm is now far more well-known than it was before this whole episode. And a nice thing about the way that memory works is that the name “Lewis Brisbois” will stick in the heads of some people long after they’ve forgotten how it got there in the first place. So I can see why, from a PR perspective, Lewis Brisbois decided to “release the kraken” on Barber Ranen.

Aside from utterly destroying the deserters, Lewis Brisbois has greatly increased its name recognition. A year from now—or maybe two or three years from now, those emails were pretty terrible—many people will have forgotten about John Barber and Jeff Ranen. But if you say “Lewis Brisbois”—and “Brisbois” is pronounced “BRIZ-boy,” in case you’re wondering (you’re welcome)—some number of folks will say, “Oh, I’ve heard of them….”

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STATEMENT FROM JOHN BARBER AND JEFF RANEN

We want to apologize. To everyone. To our families, our friends, our colleagues, and the public who had to read the thoughtless, hurtful and inappropriate words we used and sentiments expressed in the emails recently released by our former law firm. The last 72 hours have been the most difficult of our lives, as we have had to acknowledge and reckon with those emails. They are not, in any way, reflections of the contents of our hearts, or our true values. When we started this firm, we announced to the world the purest and truest description of who we are as men and leaders. We stand by those sentiments and insist they are the true measure of our character. Nonetheless, we know that words have power and whether spoken in private or public, they matter. We are ashamed of the words we wrote, and we are deeply sorry.

We have to be better, more vigilant and protective of our values and unfailingly consistent in representing those values in public and in private. We promise we will be. But that said, we understand that there are consequences for our actions. Therefore, we are resigning from Barber Ranen effective immediately in order to allow our friends and colleagues to continue on without the cloud of our conduct hanging over them. We will be taking time away to explore the ways in which we can most effectively demonstrate our contrition and commitment to a world characterized by inclusion, kindness and grace, all qualities we failed to demonstrate in our private correspondence.

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