On Doing Your Own Investigation: President of the American Bar Association

February 3, 1997
3801 Connecticut Avenue, NW #136
Washington, DC 20008-4530

Jerome J. Shestak, Esq.
Wolf, Block, Schorr & Solis-Cohen
Philadelphia, PA 19102-2678

RE: Akin, Gump, Strauss, Hauer & Feld Homicide/Violence Risk Assessment

Dear Mr. Shestak:

During the period March 1988 to October 1991 I was employed as a legal assistant in the Washington, DC office of the law firm of Akin, Gump, Strauss, Hauer & Feld ("Akin Gump"). Attorney managers at Akin Gump terminated my employment effective October 29, 1991 upon determining, in consultation with a psychiatrist, that a complaint of harassment I had lodged against several co-workers was attributable to a psychiatric symptom ("ideas of reference") prominent in the psychotic disorders and typically associated with a risk of violent behavior. See Freedman v. D.C. Dept. of Human Rights, D.C. Superior Court no. MPA 95-14 (final order issued June 10, 1996) (name of state court judge redacted at the implicit direction of the Justice Department). In the period immediately after my job termination senior Akin Gump managers determined that it was advisable to secure the office of my direct supervisor against a possible homicidal assault, which it was feared I might commit.

I have been under investigation by the U.S. Secret Service as a potential security risk to President William J. Clinton, and was interrogated at the Washington Field Office by Special Agent Philip C. Leadroot as recently as February 1996.

The enclosed computer disc contains a document of purely psychological interest that I prepared that is consistent with assertions relating to my mental state made by the District of Columbia Office of Corporation Counsel in Brief of Respondent in Opposition to Petition for Review of no Probable Cause Determination by Department of Human Rights, Freedman v. D.C. Department of Human Rights, D.C. Superior Court no. MPA 95-14. Rest assured, I have provided a copy of the document to federal authorities.

The document, which has been determined by the George Washington University Medical Center Department of Psychiatry to be the product of a psychotic mental state, contains references to the brother (now deceased) of a current member of the firm of Wolf, Block, Schorr & Solis-Cohen, and may, therefore, be a matter of concern to the firm.

Incidentally, I am a graduate of the Temple University School of Law, where I was a student of Professor Burton Caine, who, you may know, was formerly a member of the firm Wolf, Block, Schorr, & Solis-Cohen.

Sincerely,

Gary Freedman