Overlawyered » feeing frenzy

Attorneys’ fees roundup

Walter Olson — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 04:07:52 +0000

We’re worth it: lawyers in credit card case want judge to award them $720 million [Alison Frankel, Reuters] Johnson & Johnson will fight $181 million payday for private lawyers in Arkansas Risperdal case [Legal NewsLine]
British Columbia, Canada: “Lawyer Ordered To Pay Costs Personally For ‘Shoddy Piece Of Counsel Work’” [Erik Magraken] Ontario client questions lawyer’s fee [Law Times]
Sixth Circuit: attorneys fees statute not intended to cover dry cleaning and mini-blinds [Legal Ethics Forum]
Indiana lawmaker goes back to drawing board on loser-pays bill [Indiana Law Blog]
‘Shocked’ by $3M legal fee in fatal car-crash case, judge tells lawyers to pay plaintiff lawyer $50K [ABA Journal]
Seth Katsuya Endo, “Should Evidence of Settlement Negotiations Affect Attorneys’ Fees Awards?” [SSRN via Legal Ethics Forum] /li>
In Israel, more of a discretionary loser-pays arrangement [Eisenberg et al, SSRN via @tedfrank]
British cabbie beats ticket, recovers only some of his legal costs. Still better than he’d do here, right? [Daily Mail]
Turnaround guru Wilbur Ross: current structure of bankruptcy fees encourages lawyer “hyperactivity” [Reuters]

Tags: attorneys' fees, bankruptcy, Canada, feeing frenzy, Israel, loser pays, Sixth Circuit, United Kingdom

Attorneys’ fees roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

“Fee Request Found ‘Grossly Inflated’ Denied in Entirety”

Walter Olson — Thu, 04 Oct 2012 19:02:36 +0000

“Four law firms that submitted a “grossly inflated” $2.7 million fee request after winning $12,500 for their client should go away empty-handed, a federal judge has ruled. Eastern District Judge Joanna Seybert, sitting in Central Islip, condemned the fee application submitted by real estate investor Robert Toussie’s attorneys, including $2.65 million for Chadbourne & Parke, as ‘outrageously excessive’ and done in ‘bad faith.’” [NYLJ]

Tags: attorneys' fees, feeing frenzy, Long Island

“Fee Request Found ‘Grossly Inflated’ Denied in Entirety” is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Draining of disabled and elderly persons’ estates

Walter Olson — Fri, 17 Aug 2012 11:09:31 +0000

The San Jose Mercury-News has an investigative series. Among the highlights: “At some point, this endless wasting of Danny Reed’s trust assets must stop,” said Judge Franklin Bondonno, throwing out $30,000 in fees billed to the special needs trust of a 37-year-old brain-damaged man, and regretting that he could not reach $145,000 previously billed. The “judge — in a highly unusual gesture — implored a higher court to overturn his decision.” Among recurring problems: “fee on fee” billing in which lawyers charge fees to persons under conservatorship for the legal effort expended in defending earlier fee bills. [editorial and links to articles in the series]

Tags: Bay Area, feeing frenzy, wills and trusts

Draining of disabled and elderly persons’ estates is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

July 5 roundup

Walter Olson — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 04:13:14 +0000

“After drunken driver kills son, mother billed for cleanup” [Greenville News, S.C.]
Cities, states and school districts in California will be among losers if Sacramento lawmakers pass bill authorizing phantom damages [Capitol Weekly; more on phantom damages]
New from Treasury Dept.: steep exit fees for many corporations departing U.S. domicile [Future of Capitalism, TaxProf]
Jonathan Lee Riches is back filing his hallucinatory lawsuits again, and courts don’t care to stop him [Above the Law] More: Lowering the Bar.
Funny 1988 letter from Wyoming lawyer to California lawyer about fees [Letters of Note via Abnormal Use]
L.A. family is considering adding another valedictorian lawsuit to our annals [L.A. Times, earlier]
Effort to compensate Japanese nuclear accident victims is proceeding without much litigation [WaPo]

Tags: California, feeing frenzy, Japan, Jonathan Lee Riches, Los Angeles, schools, Wyoming

July 5 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Before hiring a criminal defense lawyer…

Walter Olson — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 13:16:50 +0000

…consider this cautionary tale [Brian Tannebaum].

Tags: defense lawyers, ethics, feeing frenzy, Florida, lawyers

Before hiring a criminal defense lawyer… is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

“Nine ways lawyers inflate their bills”

Walter Olson — Fri, 13 May 2011 05:04:42 +0000

Some law firms set up a separate business to run their conference rooms, enabling them to charge the rooms out for client meetings rather than treat them as overhead. And watch out for hefty charges for the time spent preparing the client’s bill itself. [Dan Fisher, Forbes]

Tags: feeing frenzy, lawyers

“Nine ways lawyers inflate their bills” is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Flak for Cobell fees, cont’d

Walter Olson — Mon, 28 Feb 2011 05:21:23 +0000

Criticism continues to mount (“shameful,” “excessive”) over lawyers’ effort to nab $223 million in fees for representing Indian tribes’ interest in the long-running Cobell litigation over management of trust funds. [BLT (quoting former Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D.), and more (DoJ); PoL; earlier here and here (Kilpatrick Stockton lawyer Keith Harper considered for Tenth Circuit appointment)]

Tags: feeing frenzy, Indian tribes

Flak for Cobell fees, cont’d is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

CCAF amicus brief in fen-phen fees case

Ted Frank — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 18:22:22 +0000

Overlawyered readers are well aware of the sorry history of the fen-phen litigation; those that aren’t are advised to check out Professor Lester Brickman’s summary.

In April 2008, the Diet Drugs MDL district court awarded $567 million the class counsel in that case, basing the award in part on representations by class counsel about future class recovery. A year later, a plaintiff’s attorney requested the court reopen the question of the fee award because the class counsel had exaggerated those estimates. The district court refused, holding that the one-year delay in bringing the Rule 60(b) motion was not a “reasonable time.” There has been an appeal to the Third Circuit, and, today, the Center for Class Action Fairness filed an amicus brief in support of the appeal that itself provides a short overview of the history of the fen-phen MDL. Many thanks to Chris Arfaa for his generous help in filing the brief.

Tags: attorneys' fees, CCAF, class action settlements, feeing frenzy, fen-phen, mass tort fraud, pharmaceuticals, procedure

CCAF amicus brief in fen-phen fees case is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

K&L Gates blasted for high fees, “unnecessary lawyering”

Walter Olson — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 05:25:32 +0000

Massachusetts’s highest court thought it a bit much that fees and costs would eat up $800,000 from an estate valued at $1.2 million, or two-thirds of the value at stake. [Robert Ambrogi, Legal Blog Watch; Above the Law]

Incidentally, Robert Ambrogi is hanging up his keyboard after an impressive four-year tenure at Law.com’s Legal Blog Watch, but he’ll continue to maintain his other sites. He has kind words for this site as one to “follow religiously”, too.

Tags: accolades, feeing frenzy, legal blogs, Massachusetts, wills and trusts

K&L Gates blasted for high fees, “unnecessary lawyering” is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

November 23 roundup

Walter Olson — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 12:55:37 +0000

“Ten Ways Lawyers Rip Off Clients” [Lawrence Delevingne and Gus Lubin, Business Insider]
White House visitor logs contain more entries for trial lawyer lobbyist Linda Lipsen (5x) than for Hillary Clinton (3x) (h/t ShopFloor)
Time magazine has a cover story on child overprotectiveness [Free-Range Kids]
“Why so many talented people give up on moving to the US”: one immigrant’s 7 year journey through the legal paperwork [Pete Warden]
Speaking for the whole New York profession? “New York Bar Association president decries tort reform proposals” [Rizo, Legal NewsLine]
Chamber of Commerce “needs to develop thicker skin” in response to Yes Men parody [LA Times]
New York: “Judges collect pension and regular pay, and it’s perfectly legal” [Jonathan Bandler, Journal News]
Cook County “out $14K for toilet paper injury” [Chicago Sun-Times]

Tags: AAJ, bar associations, Chicago, child protection, feeing frenzy, immigration law, judges, New York, politics, tort reform, workers' compensation

November 23 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system