Prentice v. OfficeMax North America, Inc.
United States District Court for the Virgin Islands
2021 WL 2386123 (2021)

- Written by Kate Douglas, JD
Facts
While working for the law firm Ogletree, Deakins, Nash, Smoak & Stewart, LLC (Ogletree), attorney Talib Ellison represented OfficeMax North America, Inc. (OfficeMax) (defendant) in litigation. The Law Offices of Lee J. Rohn & Associates, LLC (Rohn) represented Benjamin Prentice (plaintiff). While the litigation was pending but before the parties engaged in discovery, Ellison quit working for Ogletree and accepted a position with Rohn. Rohn did not notify Ogletree about Ellison’s employment for over a month. OfficeMax never consented to Ellison representing Prentice. OfficeMax moved to disqualify Prentice’s counsel. Prentice presented no evidence that Rohn appropriately screened Ellison from participating in the subject litigation. The magistrate judge found that Ellison was disqualified from representing Prentice. The magistrate further found that Ellison’s conflicts were imputed to Rohn and that Rohn was also disqualified. Therefore, the magistrate granted OfficeMax’s motion and afforded Prentice 30 days to find new counsel. Prentice objected to the magistrate’s order, thereby bringing the matter before the United States District Court for the Virgin Islands.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Mannion, J.)
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