To the editor: I read about Tom Girardi with amazement (“Tom Girardi, dishonored legal titan, ex -husband of 'Real Housewives', sentenced to 7 years in prison.” June 3). There were more than 200 complaints to the Bar Association of the State of California. However, the bar was mine, with “lunches soaked in wine”, while the money was stolen from customers just below the nose. In contrast, lawyers in the United Kingdom must have complete external audits of their books. Customer money is audited to the last penny. And the auditors themselves are audited by examiners of the equivalent of the bar. Therefore, corruption is rare.
The bar here has woken up to make some minor reforms. Good luck. The lawyers are not holy, free of temptation. More surveillance is needed. I suggest external audits of lawyer books for certified public counters retained by the bar, to ignore conflicts of interest. As for the abandonment of duty, the heads must roll.
Raymond Freeman, Thousand Oaks
