Paper cuts: a horror story

I remember one of my toughest nights as a trainee lawyer.

I was reviewing a suite of asset financing documents. There were thousands of pages and they were organised as an US style closing bundle. This means the pages were all heaped together and not bound, separated by pieces of coloured paper.

So imagine a tottering column of ten thousand pages.

There was only one original, which the client had previously lost, and then found again.

Back then, this was the largest law firm in the world and we all felt it. Time was short and I spent days and nights reviewing the pile. My normal go home time was 2 a.m.

Then disaster struck.

I came in one morning and a third of the pile was missing.

I checked in the whole room. I checked in my recycling bin. There was only one conclusion – someone had stolen my pile.

I told my supervising partner. He said “find the documents”.

I went through the department’s recycling bins on our floor. Nothing. I went to through the firm’s recycling bins, huge dumpsters in the basement. Nothing.

My supervising partner said “find the documents”.

I sent an email to the whole department asking if anyone had picked up my documents – an absolutely mortifying email to send. And - tumbleweed.

The supervising partner, well, you can imagine what he said.

At this point I was looking at my career like a derailed train on fire heading towards a cliff. I questioned myself and thought perhaps I was going mad.

To be fair, I had taken some precautions. When the pile arrived I photocopied and scanned it, so whilst the original was gone, the information had been preserved. I also avoided having any liquids around the pile to avoid coffee risk.

Nonetheless, it felt like a career ending situation.

But paper doesn't walk. Someone had taken my pile.

One day I went to one of the review rooms. In the corner was a stack of documents.

With coloured paper in-between.

One of the other trainees had been also reviewing the pile. They had left the documents in the review room and gone on holiday.

Relief is relief – I breathed out, add the coloured documents to the pile, and went on with my life.

Lessons learned:

1.????? Lock up your treasures every night.

2.????? The unlikely happens ever so often.

3.????? Reality leaves a trail. ?Follow the good evidence, not what people think.