The family of a man who died in police custody in China has accused Dentons of a conflict of interest by representing both sides.

Police detained 29-year-old Beijing resident Lei Yang on suspicion of soliciting prostitutes in May this year. He died on the evening of his arrest, but the police denied that they were to blame for his death. However, Lei's family have filed a complaint against the police for use of excessive force, saying that his corpse had bruising on the body and head.

Dentons lawyer Peng Jiyue, a friend of Lei's family, initially assisted them with the matter. His involvement included seeing Lei's body in the hospital, accompanying the family to the police station when they filed the complaint, and also attending the local prosecutor with the family. He also spoke to the local media on behalf of the family about their grievances, such as the police withholding witness statements. 

Lei's family were therefore less than pleased when they discovered that another Dentons lawyer, Zhai Jian, was representing the police. The family have accused Dentons of a conflict of interest and say they are disadvantaged since the firm will hold detailed information from their side. But Zhai told local media that no conflict arose since the family had not formally engaged Peng given that there was no contract.

 
Lei Yang

In a carefully worded statement, a Dentons spokesman said that "Dentons was never engaged to represent Mr. Lei''s family and did not receive confidential information about the matter, and we have at all times behaved consistently with our ethical obligations."  He added that the "reports of a conflict of interest are incorrect." 
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Comments

Anonymous 08 July 16 18:44

Wow. So as long as you don't accept payment from a plaintiff, say, you can appear to act on their behalf and then your partner can be paid to represent the defendant? Denton's needs to be sent to mandatory ethics classes.

Anonymous 13 July 16 18:25

Surely that's the kind of big ticket cross-border deals Dentons leadership had in mind when they pushed for the merger with Dacheng..