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Last week federal prosecutors seized 16 mobile phones from Donald Trump lawyer Michael Cohen, making many of us wonder, what kind of lawyer needs 16 phones, all potentially work-related? So we asked some lawyers.



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Employment lawyer Yosef Peretz thinks 16 phones sounds sketchy:

16 cell phones are insanely unreasonable for someone in our profession if they are all active. But it appears to be that Cohen was some sort of an avid recorder as he claims to have recorded a lot of his conversations. Even so, 16 phones is high, super high for an attorney who’s not dealing drugs (and I’m not even saying that Cohen is dealing).

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Civil rights lawyer Hillary Benham-Baker agreed:

I think it’s super weird. I have only one cell phone. I’ve known several attorneys who have 2—a personal and work one. I’ve never known any lawyers with more than that.


A couple of lawyers told us on background that honestly, phones can stack up. Some of Cohen’s phones were BlackBerries, which means the haul could include a lot of old phones that Cohen just never got rid of. Lots of people have one or two old phones in the house. If you juggle four phones at a time and you keep three old generations around, you end up with 16 phones.

But juggling four phones in the first place? Business attorney Roman Fichman sees plenty of above-board purposes:

There are legitimate business and practice reasons why lawyers would need multiple mobile phones: With less landlines in use, multiple mobiles are replacing multi-line setups.



Lawyers who practice in different distinct practice areas often use different tel numbers to reroute calls appropriately.



A local number is generally preferable, so lawyers who practice in different states or within a state, prefer a local number for that state/city/county.



Many lawyers keep older phones because of existing data in them that they may not know how to move or wish not to.



Lawyers who travel may prefer certain carriers that are better in certain cities vs. other cities.



Finally, lawyers who travel internationally often have dedicated phones for the country they are going to (e.g. if going to China then for security reason a lawyer may wish to have a blank phone in the event the phone is subject to search or in the event cell data is tapped).




So if you catch your lawyer hoarding over a dozen phones, maybe they’re in a Better Call Saul scenario and maybe they just have a lot of far-flung clients, doing business in multiple states or countries. Like secret real estate deals in seven states, or secret trips to Prague.



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