The legal career of David Boies has been almost unanimously referred to as that of a highly successful professional, a superstar attorney with exceptional attention to detail who has handled a selection of cases that have catapulted him and his firm to the top. Boies has represented high-profile clients ranging from Harvey Weinstein to the more progressive liberals like Al Gore and Michael Moore; from popular organizations like the NBA and the New York Yankees; to powerful entities such as the Department of Justice and the Silicon Valley darlings like Theranos.
However, contradicting all the accolades, there are equally valid aspects of Boies that, at least from this observer’s perspective, place him in collusion with some of his powerful and nearly untouchable clients who end up being fraudulent.
A prime example is Boies’ involvement with Venezuelan Wilmer Ruperti. There is no way to paint Ruperti as a legitimate businessman. On the contrary, Ruperti is so corrupt that even entities tied to the Russian state have sued him for corruption! Unusual figures similar to Ruperti have emerged in Venezuela since Hugo Chávez took the presidency in 1999. An extraordinary windfall of billions facilitated corruption at levels unseen in history, even in a place as corrupt as Venezuela.
Most “bright minds” would have avoided engaging with Ruperti, thanks to their attention to detail. Yet not Boies, whose first involvement related to Venezuela was defending the cocaine-trafficking nephews of Nicolás Maduro. I recall an exchange with Drew Sullivan from OCCRP regarding nominations for the most corrupt leader in the world (Putin, Duterte, the Castro brothers, Mugabe, etc.) and commenting: just name another leader whose alleged nephews have been involved in shipping hundreds of kilos of cocaine to the United States. Maduro’s nephews grew up mostly with Maduro and his wife, the First Lady of Venezuela, Cilia Flores. However, it’s very unlikely that Boies’ defense of Maduro’s drug-dealer nephews will appear on Wikipedia anytime soon.
Boies was retained, and Ruperti paid him. It makes no sense to question whether Boies ever conducted any due diligence with Ruperti. It really didn’t matter. What it shows is that money triumphs over morality for Boies, who has a rather lengthy track record of favoring businesses controlled by his family, partners, and criminals, or both.
The Wall Street Journal reported in 2005 that Boies’ law firm continued sending clients to Legal & Scientific Analysis Group, a firm where Boies’ sons were partners with Bill Duker. An employee of Duker, William F. Chandler, later registered Spectrum Consulting, a forensic accounting firm utilized and represented by Boies. Spectrum Consulting, in turn, operated from Duker’s address in Albany and counts David L. Evans among its associates. The businesses controlled by Duker continued receiving referrals from Boies worth hundreds of thousands/millions of dollars, even though they knew Duker had been caught stealing from taxpayers. In the latest instance, Boies presented Evans for his deposition in recent court filings as a representative of ALGAMEX, the Duker-controlled foreman aimed at providing PDVSA with litigation funding.
Carlos Spinelli, another con artist who defrauded hundreds of thousands of clients, transitioned from being disbarred to becoming the Administrator of the Corporate Department at Boies, Schiller & Flexner. With such fitting credentials, it didn’t take long to join Duker at Rational Enterprise.
However, Boies’ arrogance is what elevates him to another league.
Any lawyer who dives into the dark pit of Venezuela is either a rogue, like his clients, or a fool. No amount of rationalization, especially when considering Boies’ already stellar career, can explain such involvement. There’s no interest in cozying up to chavismo for a guy like Boies, absolutely none. But Boies must have thought he could profit from the debacle, that he could negotiate the release of the drug-dealer nephews in exchange for an unjustly imprisoned American missionary in Venezuela. Boies probably believed that making deals in the U.S. was the same as doing so in Venezuela.
More revealing is Boies’ choice of partners for his Venezuelan venture: Bill Duker, David L. Evans, Carlos Spinelli Noseda, Edward P. Swyer, Vincent Andrews Stephens, William F. Chandler (?)… A network of former partners, colleagues, employees, and collaborators, established over decades, whom Boies has kept at a sufficient distance to provide plausible deniability, is at the core of this matter.
Bill Duker, a long-time partner of Boies, is a convicted felon. Carlos Spinelli, an employee of both Boies and Duker, was caught overcharging/stealing from clients’ funds. Just like Duker. David L. Evans, an associate of Duker, is supposed to be a forensic accountant, lecturing on the subject while feeling comfortable collaborating with a partner who defrauded the U.S. government. Edward P. Swyer, another partner of Duker and trustee of the PDVSA US Litigation Trust, shows no concern about the man’s past.
This group seems to feel at home in the company of Ruperti, who achieved a remarkable feat by convincing the protege of Rafael Ramírez, Nelson Martínez (now in prison) and Cilia Flores’ favored prosecutor, Rafael Muñoz Pedrosa, to accept a scam called the PDVSA US Litigation Trust, through which Boies would launch fraud lawsuits against the largest trading houses in the world.
Bloomberg recently ran a piece on Trafigura, one of the defendants in Boies’ civil action in Florida. Trafigura, similar to Glencore, Vitol, Lukoil, etc., represents the type of companies that have thrived over the last decade or two by actively seeking business in the terminally corrupt yet resource-rich developing world. None of these companies have grown to their current size by winning transparent, fair, and competitive bids but by outshining the competition. Thus, Boies is easily aligning with the most corrupt administration in the Western Hemisphere and its associates to fight against the largest and most corrupt trading houses in the world. David (Boies) v Goliath 2.0.
Boies brought to this fight his A-team of corrupt friends, former partners, and associates. Duker is set to finance the litigation behind a vehicle called ALGAMEX. Ruperti might be cooking something up. The question is, can Duker and Ruperti outspend Trafigura, Glencore, Vitol, etc.? Or are there more powerful but hidden actors involved? PDVSA, the Venezuelan oil conglomerate, isn’t helping with funds. In fact, PDVSA is forming business and financial partnerships with the same companies Boies is suing. To further undermine Boies’ infallible position, he distorted and accused the vice president of PDVSA, Ysmel Serrano, as one of the corrupt parties involved in accepting bribes.
Boies underestimated the situation, gambled, or—worse—displayed significant incompetence. While preparing to launch his civil action in Florida to extract billions from the defendants in settlements, another lawyer associated with Ruperti filed a criminal complaint in Geneva. This stripped Boies of crucial evidence. How does one explain that “Mr. Attention to Detail” allowed that to happen? Or was he kept in the dark about the Swiss action?
There’s an agreement somewhere, between PDVSA and Boies (PDVSATRUST-0000285-289), to share the possible profits of the civil action. However, what about the Swiss law firm? Because there must be some kind of mandate somewhere that dictates the terms of engagement there too. When such property is seized in a criminal proceeding, it is generally returned to the aggrieved party, in this case, Venezuela. If Switzerland were to do so, how would that leave Boies’ profit-sharing arrangement with PDVSA? How would Duker recover the funds invested in litigation? Additionally, if Switzerland were to provide voluntary evidence for the investigations against PDVSA in the U.S. jurisdiction and if the Department of Justice were to start another criminal inquiry, how could Boies benefit? Did Boies overlook this consideration and the Swiss counterpart controlled by Ruperti?
Some people believe Boies has everything under control, and this is just another display of his cunning and supreme knowledge of U.S. jurisprudence. I completely disagree, because it’s one thing to know how to play the U.S. legal system and media, and another entirely to play with the chavistas, their totally corrupt Swiss business counterparts, prosecutors, and the law enforcement of Switzerland and the United States.
Regardless, Boies is in an unsustainable position. Whatever agreement he signed makes no sense to the Venezuelans involved. Ruperti, the one with the highest international exposure, can—and has in the past—reneged on agreements. According to PDVSA, half the world is behind any asset that could be linked to it, given Venezuela’s outstanding debt of approximately $180 billion.
It’s doubtful that Boies’ reputation will emerge unscathed from this. Just like the Fusion GPS case before it, any involvement with chavismo and the Venezuelan “businessmen” ends badly. One certainty exists in this case: the more parties face off in court, the more due diligence and discovery take place, the worse it will be for Boies, Ruperti, and PDVSA. And if the Department of Justice takes over the case, well, there will be no place for Boies to hide.