Is this a conflict of interest for the attorney?

[frank53]

What is the name of your state (multiple states)?

Five people from an organization were represented (they were all from different states) by a law firm in a complete nonsense case in federal court in yet a different state; the five were defendants. The law firm is very small; maybe 3 people, but at the time of representation it was only 2 lawyers. The case basically was withdrawn by the plaintiff when it was time to put up or shut up in court.

Now five years later this same law firm is representing another client who wants to sue the organization the five defendants work for.

To me that is a conflict of interest since two of the lawyers worked on the first case and were privy to confidential information on the organization. This is a small law firm with only one office, not Loeb & Loeb.

Opinions, please? Thanks

[garrula lingua]

Not enough info to analyze.

Were the 5 defendants working for the same company during both incidents ?

Who was the lawyer's otiginal client ?
Was the company the client, or were the 5 defendants the clients (possible conflict of int in representing multiple defendants) ?

Does the current lawsuit involve the same issues as the first lawsuit ?

Many attorneys would drop their representation if there was an appearance of impropriety (or accusation of such).
Have any of the 5 defendants written to the law firm alleging a breach of their attorney/client privilege by the law firm representing another entity against them ?

If the lawfirm doesn't recuse itself, the company can put the issue (th eco's objection to the firm's representation) in front of the Judge. If the Judge decides it's a conflict of interest which can't & isn't waived, s/he will order accordingly. At least it'll be on the record & is grounds for an appeal.