A former employee of scandal-plagued software giant Computer Associates who claims she was fired for cooperating with an internal investigation may sue the law firm hired by the company to represent her for legal malpractice based on alleged conflicts of interest, a Long Island judge has ruled.
Irene Salvatore, a former vice president in Islandia, N.Y.-based Computer Associates' accounting department, claimed in a suit filed last year that 512-lawyer Manhattan firm Kaye Scholer and partner Jane Parver failed to advise her of options besides cooperating with an inquiry into alleged accounting fraud at the company or that her cooperation might affect her employment.
She was fired from Computer Associates in April 2004, not long after she was questioned by the lawyers from both Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz and Sullivan & Cromwell who were conducting the investigation.
Suffolk Supreme Court Justice Elizabeth Hazlitt Emerson last week denied Kaye Scholer's motion to dismiss in Salvatore v. Kumar, 8565/05.
Noting that Kaye Scholer had an attorney-client relationship with Salvatore at the same time that its bills were being paid by Computer Associates, Emerson said Salvatore had alleged sufficient facts concerning a possible conflict of interest to survive the motion to dismiss.
Kaye Scholer is representing itself in the matter. Aaron Rubenstein, the chairman of the firm's litigation department said yesterday that the malpractice claims were frivolous.
"We expect them to be dismissed on appeal," he said.
The legal malpractice claims are the sole remaining ones in the suit, in which Salvatore was joined by two other terminated Computer Associates employees, as Emerson dismissed wrongful termination, conspiracy, defamation and promissory estoppel claims filed against Computer Associates itself and Sanjay Kumar, the former chairman and chief executive officer.
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