Law.com – Smith, Gambrell & Russell and one of its former attorneys are caught up in the expensive brouhaha surrounding International Management Associates, a now-defunct investment firm which bilked pro football players, a former Scientific-Atlanta CEO and other well-heeled investors of some $150 million.
IMA’s bankruptcy trustee, William F. Perkins, told a federal court last month that the law firm and a former counsel from its Washington, D.C., office, C. Gladwyn Goins, represented IMA so poorly that they not only allowed the company’s founder, Kirk S. Wright, to embezzle from investors long after his wrongdoing could have been discovered but also "helped Wright to continue his criminal misconduct."
Those alleged legal missteps cost the company "tens of millions" of dollars, according to the complaint, which demands that the firm and its former counsel pay more than $80 million in damages, plus attorney fees and litigation costs.
