A report by a special committee of The World Bank Group, released Monday, questions Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher’s review of World Bank president Paul Wolfowitz’s transfer of his girlfriend, Shaha Riza, to a high-paying job at the U.S. Department of State. That transfer has mushroomed into a scandal threatening to cost Wolfowitz his job.
Documents released by the bank show that Wolfowitz asked Gibson to review the deal in the summer of 2005. A Gibson Dunn team, including Theodore Olson and Eugene Scalia, concluded that the contract was “a reasonable resolution of the perceived underlying conflict of interest.” But on Monday a special committee of the bank charged with investigating the scandal concluded that the limited and after-the-fact review by Gibson “is squarely at odds with the high degree of … concern for the interests of” the World Bank, which is required by the institution’s rules. Gibson Dunn declined to comment.
