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Berenson Bares E-mail's Details
New York Times reporter Alex Berenson's appearance this weekend on the NPR radio program On the Media was intended to set the record straight on the misdirected law firm e-mail that reportedly led to a NYT scoop on a possible $1 billion settlement between Eli Lilly and federal prosecutors. Instead, it only seems to have further stirred debate.
To recap: A week ago, Conde Nast Portfolio reported that the NYT got the story when an Eli Lilly lawyer at the law firm Pepper Hamilton mistakenly sent reporter Berenson an e-mail containing confidential information on the talks that had been meant for Sidley Austin lawyer Bradford Berenson (the reporter's second cousin). By midweek came reports on several blogs (here and here) that the story was not true, with Berenson himself disclaiming it on one and a NYT spokesperson doing the same on another.
In his On the Media interview, Berenson said the e-mail, which came while he was traveling in Russia, caught his eye for its subject line, "Eager to Catch Up." The entire e-mail said only:
Tom and I were racing to other meetings when we left the EDPA and I'm just back. Looking for Tom so we can have a call. We'll call you as soon as I have him. Preview: They're in the stratosphere on number and Meehan wants a deal.
That was it, Berenson said (although he described it as part of a string of five e-mails), but his reaction nevertheless was, "Wow, this was a mistake."
Because he'd already been covering the story and knew that the talks were ongoing, Berenson was able to translate the e-mail's shorthand to mean that the Eastern District of Pennsylvania was discussing a settlement deal that the Pepper Hamilton lawyer thought was a lot more than was appropriate and that the reference to Meehan was to U.S. Attorney Patrick L. Meehan in Philadelphia.
When he got back to New York, he called the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, which called the Pepper Hamilton lawyer, who called him and asked him not to mention the e-mail. "That seemed reasonable to me," Berenson said. "I didn't see any need to shove Pepper Hamilton's nose in it." That was where he left it until Portfolio called. In Portfolio's retelling, it made the e-mail sound like a big blunder. "That's not the truth," Berenson said, "and that's one of the reasons I'm talking to you today, because I do want to set the record straight."
But did he? Gawker listened to the interview and concluded, "It turns out Portfolio wasn't so wrong after all!" And Mark Obbie at LawBeat comments, "In setting the record straight, he essentially confirms [Portfolio's] account and contradicts his employer." After all, Berenson himself described his reaction to the e-mail as "wow" and began following up as soon as he was back at his desk. The bottom line is that, even though we can debate forever the scale of the blunder, it was a blunder nonetheless and one that opened the door to Berenson and invited him to snoop around.
Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on February 11, 2008 at 01:23 PM | Permalink
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