I saw an article the other day that the trustee for the defunct Howrey law firm was trying to figure out what to do with 220,000 boxes of closed files belonging to 10,000 clients. Not a pretty picture. And, except for the sheer volume, not all that uncommon a problem.
Disciplinary counsel frequently has faced a similar challenge when dealing with the group of lawyers we called the dead, disabled and disappeared. A lot of very kind and patient volunteers have had to wade through boxes and barrels of files belonging to these folks once a trustee is appointed for their practices and the problem of cleaning up their detritus becomes that of the bar. If there were ever such thing as civil sainthood, I would nominate these trustee folks in a heartbeat.
