ABA Section of Business Law
Snap judgments
Cognitors? Yeah, right
It may not be the stuff of the Jets and the Sharks in West Side Story, but it appears the turf war between accountants and lawyers is heating up, as CPAs try to keep legal professionals from encroaching on their territory.
According to the New York Times, the disagreement stems from the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants' plan to create a new finance-expertise credential that non-CPAs could earn.
While the AICPA's proposed name for this new level of accreditation - cognitor - may sound a little silly, AICPA officials told the Times that there's nothing trivial about the need for uniform certification standards for lawyers and consultants already dabbling in financial advising. Clients, they say, need to know the level of expertise they're getting for their buck.
Many CPAs, however, disagree. In fact, the New York and Illinois
state societies of Certified Public Accountants officially oppose
the proposed credential. The Times reports that 85 percent of the
New York chapter's members who responded to a survey on the issue
said they opposed establishing a new credential.
That just goes to show that, when you're an accountant, you're an
accountant all the way, from your first calculator until you make
CPA.
Taking money to the laundry
In a bold move that surely has left the American financial community quaking, the New York Times op-ed page recently called on American banks to clean up their act and stop helping offshore companies and banks launder money.
According to the Times, a U.S. Senate subcommittee report found that leading American financial institutions have made it easier for foreign banks to launder money. In fact, Bank of America, Citibank and J.P. Morgan Chase officials admitted at a recent Senate hearing that they had not done enough to monitor accounts now known to have laundered millions for organized crime.
Citing the Asian and Russian financial crises, the Times noted the disastrous effects money laundering can have on global economic stability. Therefore, banks should act now to stop money laundering before Congress inundates the industry with further regulation.
Tune in next week when a Times reader asks arsonists to keep themselves out of trouble by not setting any more fires.
Keep loss of love out of court
Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned - unless, of course, it's a scorned woman with a litigation-hungry lawyer.
In a recent Cook County Circuit Court case in Chicago, Kindra Shaw may have lost her claim for $1 million in punitive damages from her wayward beau, but the legal fees and paperwork alone must have been enough to make the defendant Don Juan rue his roving eye.
The defense counsel in the case, Kindra Shaw v. Werner Zahn, however, saw the decision as a definitive statement that the laws of love shouldn't be enforced in a courtroom:
"This finding supports the sensible idea that adults should be free to conduct themselves like adults in a consensual intimate relationship. . . . tort law does not and should not pick the winners and losers in such relationships," P. Andrew Fleming said.
Cyber business, cyber court?
Virtual litigation may be only a mouse-click away in Michigan if the state makes good on Gov. John Engler's plan to attract high-tech companies' business there, the New York Times reports.
In fact, once the governor's proposed "cybercourt" is up and running, high-tech business cases could be handled entirely by computer. Using the latest technology, the parties in a case could file briefs online, use streaming video to show evidence and deliver arguments using teleconferencing capabilities.
Engler's hope is that a tech-friendly legal system will draw big
business to the Wolverine state by helping the courts keep up with
the fast-paced tech industry.
"At a time when you can go from idea to IPO at warp speed,
we need to have a way to get through the court system at a faster
rate," Engler said. "You literally can have companies
be formed, have a relatively short life cycle, and go out of business
in the time it takes to get through court."
If only Engler had made use of the same can-do attitude and secured the state's electoral votes for President Bush last fall, he might have garnered a larger platform from which to promote his cybercourt concept.
Mail-order lawyers?
In a uniquely 21st Century twist on the mail-order bride, Japan is shelling out big bucks to lure American lawyers to the island nation, which has found itself in the unusual situation of having too few lawyers.
While some in the states would relish such a lawyer-free zone, not so for the Japanese, who have seen the number of lawsuits skyrocket in recent years. In fact, the Los Angeles Times reports, lawyers who move to rural Japanese communities to help handle the legal load are being guaranteed an income of as much as $150,000 a year.
Legal professionals daydreaming of a quiet life in the Japanese
countryside, however, should be warned that the workload is substantial.
"The first day I arrived in my office, there were 15 people
waiting. It's been a veritable flood ever since," said Masaki
Kunihiro, a lawyer who thought he'd have it easy after moving to
the Japanese coast last year to provide legal services to the locals.
Kunihiro isn't likely to see his workload let up soon, either, especially considering that Japan only has 4 percent as many lawyers as the United States. In fact, the Times reports, in Japan there is roughly one lawyer per 7,155 people while in the United States that number is one for every 295 people.
Hey, forget groceries!
Gone are the days of months-long backpacking forays into the Himalayas in search of morsels of wisdom dispensed by an old man living on the side of a mountain. Today's wisdom seekers can simply pick up a copy of Jeffrey E. Garten's The Mind of the CEO to find the insight they crave.
Well, maybe not wisdom, but surely some interesting commentary on the state of the world from people who haven't done their own grocery shopping in the last decade.
A recent New York Times review of Garten's book found that while he concluded that none of the 40 CEOs he interviewed fully understood the responsibility they have and the real power they wield in an industrialized, global economy, Garten never fully expounds on this criticism.
Further, the Times said that average readers would find it hard to get through the detailed business information in the book and, considering that the Times also reported that almost 25 percent of Americans think businesses have too much influence, it's unlikely that a vast cross-section of the country would find the book a good resource.
Perhaps on his next quest for insight on the state of the world, Garten should instead find himself a good Sherpa and leave the catered conference rooms behind.
Crooks, register here
The National Coalition for the Prevention of Economic Crime and the National White Collar Crime Center may have been on to something when they made the globalization of fraud a focus of their Economic Crime Summit, but how could they really be sure if the participants were legit?
It seems to us that the recent gathering in Los Angeles would have been the perfect time for a modern-day con artist to test his skills and learn a thing or two about his trade.
According to Allan Trosclair, executive director of the national Coalition for the Prevention of Economic Crime, "the proliferation of knowledge and technology has created a new breed of criminal. The challenge for security professionals is finding timely and appropriate educational opportunities to broaden their knowledge base and to heighten their awareness of new criminal enterprises."
And the challenge for the "new breed of criminal" would have been to keep a poker face through such summit seminars as "Advances in Technology Used by Today's Fraudsters" and "Consumer Fraud Education: What Works and What Doesn't."
- Heather Brewer
