Harvey Myerson

• 1989: One of Trump's law firms, Myerson & Kuhn, filed for bankruptcy after having a fallout with Trump. “Myerson & Kuhn, an elite law firm built last year when one of the nation's largest firms went bankrupt, has itself filed for reorganization under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code. Founded by flamboyant litigator Harvey Myerson and former baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn, the firm one year ago boasted a staff of 160 lawyers, including big-name talent that it attracted with hefty salaries. But the firm's receipts never matched its ambitions, and Myerson & Kuhn has been cited as an example of how today's big firms can elude management control. […] Myerson launched the firm with a fanfare of publicity and a pledge that it would have first-year revenue of $50 million to $75 million. He described the organization as a ‘start-up superstar firm’ with a client list that included Shearson, the Trump Organization and Weyerhaeuser Co. But the firm never reached that revenue goal and had a falling out with Donald Trump, in addition to Shearson.” (Los Angeles Times, December 29, 1989)
• Harvey Myerson's legal partners accused him of diverting money from the law firm's official accounts to support a lavish lifestyle. “These are troubled days for the 50-year-old Mr. Myerson, who has just joined his fourth law firm in the last six years. In that time he, perhaps more than any other lawyer, has come to personify the two sides of modern corporate law practice: its glamour, visibility and profitability as well as its instability, riskiness and potential for treachery. Mr. Myerson staked everything he had for power, glory and success. His former partners claim he even dipped into the firm's funds to sustain his life style, thereby accelerating the firm's demise, a charge he denies.” (New York Times, February 25, 1990)
• Myerson played a critical role in the bankruptcy of two major law firms – Filey Kumble and Myerson Kuhn. “After many years of obscurity, Mr. Myerson rode quickly to the top of his profession, consuming partners, homes, Rolls-Royces, racing cars, raccoon coats and art as conspicuously as he ingested his beloved Philadelphia cheese steaks. But his failures, too, have been colossal. He was a partner in the two biggest law firms ever to file for bankruptcy: Finley, Kumble, Wagner, Underberg, Manley, Myerson & Casey, once the nation's fourth largest law firm, filed in 1987; and Myerson & Kuhn, which filed last December. […] In its bankruptcy filing, Myerson & Kuhn listed $11 million of debt - all but about $3 million of it covered by receivables. Mr. Myerson has agreed to shoulder $750,000 of the debt, far more than any of his partners. That is on top of the more than $1 million he's anteing up for Finley Kumble.” (New York Times, February 25, 1990)
• Myerson was the target of a federal investigation into allegations that he embezzled or misappropriated funds from his law firms. “Mr. Myerson's problems don't end there. Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn are investigating his billing and disbursement practices and have subpoenaed all of the Myerson & Kuhn's financial records. They have also questioned at least a dozen of the firm's former lawyers, as well as clients, bookkeepers, computer programmers, secretaries, limousine drivers and travel agents. At issue, according to one official connected to the case, is whether Mr. Myerson turned the firm into ‘his own personal candy store.’” (New York Times, February 25, 1990)
• One of Myerson's former legal partners described him as a "pathological liar." “‘I don't hate the guy, but I've called him a 'pathological liar' and I absolutely believe he's one,’ said Leon Marcus, the former partner in Myerson & Kuhn quoted by the American Lawyer. ‘He'll tell you a different story about the same thing today, tomorrow, Sunday and Monday, as if he's never told any of them before.’” (New York Times, February 25, 1990)
• Much like Trump, Myerson was adamant that his spectacular failures were actually successes and heaped calumnies on his critics. “But far from considering his defunct firm a multimillion-dollar debacle, Mr. Myerson said he accomplished the impossible: He created a ‘superstar’ firm of 170 lawyers almost overnight. Myerson & Kuhn could have been a contender, he maintains, but for some treacherous clients, a vicious press, bad luck and a pack of partners who glommed onto him when things were good and cut him off when they soured. He now refers to some of them with language like ‘sleazebag,’ ‘psychopath,’ ‘nut’ and ‘needs to be hospitalized.’ Mr. Myerson thinks of himself as a straight-shooting, tell-it-like-it-is guy. That makes the ‘pathological liar’ tag hard for him to take.” (New York Times, February 25, 1990)
• Myerson spent the first 20 years of his career in obscurity, but was launched into prominence after representing Trump in his unsuccessful antitrust lawsuit against the National Football League. “A 1964 graduate of Columbia Law School, Mr. Myerson spent his first 20 years of practice at two old-line law firms: Hughes, Hubbard & Reed, and Webster & Sheffield. Despite advance billing as a ‘world-class litigator,’ Mr. Myerson was greeted at Finley Kumble in 1984 with great skepticism. ‘Nobody ever heard of the guy,’ one partner grumbled at the time. ‘He ain't no Arthur Liman.’ But Mr. Myerson brought in clients like Shearson, the New York State's Urban Development Corporation and Mr. Trump, through whom Mr. Myerson landed his most celebrated case, representing the United States Football League in its Pyrrhic legal victory against the N.F.L.” (New York Times, February 25, 1990)
• During bankruptcy proceedings from Myerson's firm, he established a new law firm that included one partner who had been the American Ambassador to Switzerland and another who had been general counsel to the Office of Management and Budget. “Even before Finley Kumble filed for bankruptcy, Mr. Myerson was planning his next venture, a firm whose nucleus would be his ‘boys’ -the young men drawn by his distinctive mix of good work, fast times and macho camaraderie. All he felt he needed was an establishment name. Mr. Myerson wooed Mr. Kuhn, who was languishing at Willkie, Farr & Gallagher, by upping his salary to $500,000 a year, from a rather lowly $175,000. […] Among those he won over were Stephen Cabot, a Philadelphia labor lawyer; Faith Ryan Whittlesey, the former American Ambassador to Switzerland, and Michael Horowitz, former counsel to the Federal Office of Management and Budget.” (New York Times, February 25, 1990)
• Trump ultimately dropped Myerson, accusing his firm of padding its legal bills. “By early 1989, cash was low and some partners started missing their draws. But the crunch came in April, when the Myerson & Kuhn's largest client, Shearson, claimed the firm was padding its legal bills. (A similar charge drove Mr. Trump to drop Mr. Myerson.) Shearson demanded a $2 million refund, and the law firm pledged half that. Mr. Myerson insists his firm did nothing wrong, and would not have settled had it been able to afford to fight. In any case, publicity from the dispute, particularly in The Wall Street Journal, scared off clients and triggered investigations by bar association disciplinary officials in Manhattan and the United States Attorney's office in Brooklyn.” (New York Times, February 25, 1990)
• Partners at Myerson Kuhn accused Myerson of using corporate funds to finance lavish expenditures and writing himself a check from the law firm's bank account. “As the firm's finances foundered, Mr. Myerson's relations with his colleagues degenerated. Former partners say he engaged in serial deception. They claim he took money from the firm, and upon being discovered, insisted it was for firm expenses; then, after acknowledging that the funds - $518,000 as of last May - were cash advances, failed to reimburse the firm. Some expenses particularly set off his partners: limousine bills, flights on the Concorde and particularly the $86,000 he spent for a diamond ring at Cartier. Tensions rose anew when partners charged that Mr. Myerson placed a check for $125,000 made out to Myerson & Kuhn in his own account. According to his former partners, Mr. Myerson initially said he had returned the check, unendorsed, then admitted he'd deemed it a loan and cashed it. Mr. Myerson insists he did nothing wrong. Responsible at one time more than 70 percent of the firm's billings, he says, Myerson & Kuhn actually owed him money.” (New York Times, February 25, 1990)
• The other name partner at Myerson Kuhn, a former baseball commissioner named Bowie Kuhn, fled New York to escape creditors, including Marine Midland Bank (which was also a major creditor of Donald Trump). “The quest for Bowie Kuhn continues. Lawyers for the creditors of Myerson & Kuhn, the former baseball commissioner's bankrupt law firm, have been trying to track him down. But the only peep from Mr. Kuhn has come in a press release, which described his move to the Sunshine State. […] The creditors offer a different explanation for the sudden sale of his house in New Jersey and relocation to Florida, where residences cannot be seized in bankruptcies: Mr. Kuhn is running from his troubles. Earlier this month, one of those creditors, Marine Midland Bank, put a lien on Mr. Kuhn's $1.3 million summer home in Quogue, L.I. Two other creditors, Shearson Lehman Hutton Inc. and J. Walter Thompson Inc. are also looking for him.” (New York Times, February 25, 1990)