Dan Jamieson at Investment News reports that Jesup & Lamont is tangling with FINRA over what it considers to be unfair treatment of the firm. The general counsel of Jesup is a former litigator from Greenberg Traurig and someone that I have known for a long time. In fact, now that I think about it, we’ve known each other since before either one of us graduated from law school.

Anyway…Jesup keeps poking FINRA in the eye. According to the article, Jesup called the police to report that FINRA auditors from the Boca Raton office were trespassing. Let’s just say that this wouldn’t have been my first move. On the other hand, ff you’re trying to move your firm to the top of FINRA’s hit list, this would be the preferred method. I am certain that FINRA auditors enjoy being regarded as trespassers.

The late Jim Croce wrote a song called “You don’t mess around with Jim.” The refrain is “You don’t tug on Superman’s cape,You don’t spit into the wind. You don’t pull the mask off the old Lone Ranger
And you don’t mess around with Jim.” While FINRA would not regard itself as coming from the planet Krypton or a masked crusader for justice, a surefire way to get FINRA to torture a firm is to make FINRA think that you don’t respect the organization. And given FINRA’s newfound interest in catching bad acts, it would not surprise me if Jesup ends up on the receiving end of one or more FINRA disciplinary actions. I’ve seen it before.

That’s the view of one Lawyer from Jupiter, Palm Beach County, Florida. Marc Dobin.