Days after the March 10 crash of a Kenya-bound Ethiopian Airlines’ Boeing jet that killed all 157 people on board, strangers began calling or visiting bereaved families, saying they represented U.S. law firms.

They showed up uninvited at memorials and at homes full of weeping relatives. They cold-called. They left brochures. In one case a grieving husband was offered money for an appointment. One woman offered counselling and another said she was creating an emotional support group, without disclosing they were working for lawyers.

Reuters interviewed 37 relatives of the victims, or their representatives, and found that 31 complained of inappropriate approaches by those saying they represented U.S. law firms.

In some instances, the behaviour may have been illegal or unethical under U.S. laws and rules barring solicitation and deceptive practices, several legal ethics experts said.

Six firms were particularly aggressive in courting prospective clients after the Boeing plane nosedived into an Ethiopian field: Ribbeck Law Chartered and Global Aviation Law Group (GALG) of Chicago; The Witherspoon Law Group and Ramji Law Group from Texas; and Wheeler & Franks Law Firm PC and Eaves Law Firm of Mississippi.

Witherspoon, Wheeler and Eaves denied any wrongdoing. Ribbeck, GALG and Ramji did not respond to requests for comment.

Ribbeck Law and GALG have jointly filed two lawsuits against Boeing seeking “all damages available under the law” without being specific about the size of the claims. Three suits filed by Ramji have been dismissed. The other firms haven’t filed any suits.

By Thursday, there were 114 cases filed against Boeing in Chicago federal court on behalf of 112 crash victims, according to lead counsel for the plaintiffs, Robert Clifford. More than three dozen law firms are representing them. No trial date has been set.

Boeing declined to comment on the lawsuits.

An uninvited stranger turned up at Paul Njoroge’s family home in Kenya just hours after a memorial service for his wife, his three small children, and his mother-in-law, who all died in the crash.

Njoroge said the visitor gave him promotional materials for the law firm Wheeler and Franks.

“I said, I don’t know who directed you to this place. Everyone here is praying,” Njoroge told Reuters.

Two other families said they received visits around the time of memorial services from Wheeler’s lawyers or people who said they represented the firm.

James Ndeda, who Wheeler represented after he was injured in the 1998 embassy bombing in Kenya, said he visited Njoroge. The firm’s partners, Bill Wheeler and Jamie Franks, asked Ndeda to help the firm connect with crash victims’ families, Ndeda said. Wheeler sent him literature featuring his firm and another Mississippi firm, Eaves Law Firm.

Ndeda said he went to visit victims’ families either by himself, sent employees or accompanied Bill Wheeler or Jamie Franks, and sometimes Leo Jackson, an investigator with Eaves. Jackson declined to comment.

Wheeler and Franks, and Eaves, said in a joint emailed statement they only met families if invited.”The story you have been told is completely wrong,” they wrote. “We contacted no families without an invitation.”

They declined to answer further questions.

U.S. states have ethics rules that prohibit lawyers or anyone acting on their behalf from soliciting business by phone or in person, in most cases over any time period.

They also bar lawyers from giving anything of value to solicit a prospective client.

There is also a U.S. federal law that forbids lawyers from contacting victims’ families within 45 days but it appears to be only applicable to U.S. aviation accidents, according to two legal experts.

Contacted about the cases cited in this story, Robert Glen Waddle, director and counsel at the Mississippi Bar’s Consumer Assistance Programme, declined comment. Steven Splitt, spokesman at the disciplinary commission of the Illinois bar, and a spokeswoman for the Texas disciplinary board, also declined to comment.

U.S. disciplinary boards often don’t have the resources to investigate complaints from abroad, said Jim Grogan, former deputy administrator and chief counsel at the Illinois bar disciplinary commission.

“There are so many shadows in which people can act, especially abroad,” said Grogan.