In this NY Times op-ed, Joseph Nocera tees off on the lead Enron class action securities fraud plaintiffs’ lawyer, William Lerach, who has his share of troubles these days (noted here and here). After noting Larry Ribstein’s compliment of Mr. Lerach’s complaint against Enron and its investment banks (although I suspect that’s not all Professor Ribstein observed to Mr. Nocera regarding Mr. Lerach and securities fraud class actions), Mr. Nocera lays the wood to Mr. Lerach:

While I have no way of knowing whether Mr. Lerach is innocent of the charges he may soon face – or whether the investigation is politically inspired – I do know that Mr. Lerach is hardly a candidate for canonization. For much of his career, he made his living playing a dirty game.
He would watch for the stocks of companies to drop, especially volatile high-technology stocks that missed their earnings estimate, and then he would round up a small shareholder like Mr. Lazar and race to the courthouse to be first in line to file a suit seeking class-action status. And then, usually with little else to go on, he would essentially torture the company with discovery motions and deposition requests and legal filings until it finally settled to make him go away.
And he was so gleeful about it! And so taunting! And so vindictive! He sued 3Com five times. Intel, too. He would tell executives of the companies he was suing, “I’m going to take away every penny you own.” Once when Alan Shugart, the C.E.O. of Seagate Technology, which was being sued by Mr. Lerach, started a campaign against “abusive litigation,” Mr. Lerach sent him a note that said, “Dear Al: More is coming.”
John Doerr, the Silicon Valley venture capitalist, has called Mr. Lerach “a cunning economic terrorist.”

Then, after noting the changes that the 1995 Private Securities Litigation Reform Act mandated in pursuing securities fraud class actions, Mr. Nocera finds that Mr. Lerach has just placed old wine in a new bottle in pursuing securities fraud class action lawsuits:

[E]ven now, Mr. Lerach’s firm files a lot of lawsuits that seem to be based on not much more than some bad news and a big drop in the stock price. Eastman Kodak, OfficeMax, DreamWorks SKG and dozens more companies are facing that kind of lawsuit from him. He also has a new version of the small shareholders he used to have in his hip pocket: various plumbers’ and pipe fitters’ unions in places like Tennessee and Kentucky.
Mr. Lerach gave an unapologetic shrug when I asked him about these suits. “We like to have a lot of cases,” he said. “That’s our business model. It keeps you sharp. It’s good training for your young lawyers.” He described some of his competitors in the plaintiffs’ bar, the ones who stick to big institutional clients and only file lawsuits against the likes of American International Group and WorldCom – as “living off the low-hanging fruit.”
With that, Mr. Lerach hopped out of the car and walked into the hotel. The old dog knows some new tricks. He really does. His problem now is that he can’t stop using the old ones.

Be that as it may, absent clear evidence of criminal wrongdoing, the government’s attempt to criminalize the way in which Mr. Lerach pursues class action securities fraud cases is as misdirected as the government’s prosecution of agency costs in cases such as Enron.
Update: Professor Ribstein verifies my above speculation regarding his conversation with Mr. Nocera.