Morgan Stanley Suspends More Employees 


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PlanetOut Gay & Lesbian News
5/29/99

Morgan Stanley Suspends Two

The rather mysterious case of Christian Curry and Morgan Stanley Dean
Witter took another turn this week as the Wall Street giant on May 27
suspended two of its in-house legal staff.  Non-gay Curry has filed a
$1.35-billion discrimination lawsuit against his former employer regarding
his April 1998 firing shortly after nude photos of him appeared in the gay
magazine "Playguy"; although Morgan Stanley attributed that termination to
abuse of his expense account, Curry prepared to sue the firm for
discrimination based on its perception of him as gay and on his being
African-American.

Then Curry was caught in a sting in which he was allegedly attempting to
hire a hacker -- actually an undercover detective -- to insert racist and
homophobic e-mail into Morgan Stanley's computer system to bolster his
lawsuit.  Curry was arrested, but last week all charges against him were
dropped when it was discovered that Morgan Stanley had paid $10,000 to the
"confidential informant," Joseph Luethke, who set Curry up for the sting.
Instead, the official investigation was redirected towards Morgan Stanley
and to Luethke, and Curry's lawsuit was filed with a laundry list of
additional charges surrounding his arrest.

In its latest official statement signed by Morgan Stanley chair Phillip
Purcell and chief executive officer John Mack, Morgan Stanley describes
the payment to Luethke as a "mistake in judgment that the firm deeply
regrets. If either of us had known about Luethke's request for money, no
payment would ever have been made." Purcell and Mack also "pledged the
firm's total commitment to cooperate in every way with that [District
Attorney's] Office's investigation of the Luethke matter." The firm has
also hired an outside legal firm to perform an internal investigation; the
two in-house lawyers have been suspended with pay during that
investigation (although not named by Morgan Stanley, they are believed to
be named defendants in Curry's lawsuit).

The statement said, "The point of our investigation is to learn the facts
as completely and as quickly as possible. We are sorry for any distress
this entire episode has caused our many clients and thousands of employees
around the world."  However, the fly in that ointment is Luethke, although
he is agreed by all parties involved to be at best an unreliable source of
information, has indicated that Purcell himself was involved in the sting.
Even stranger, according to a "New York Times" report, there is
documentation that earlier this year Luethke had actually been inquiring
how to return the $10,000 to Morgan Stanley. Neither the firm nor the
authorities believe their investigations will be completed in less than
several weeks.
 
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