Recruiter Loses Appeal in Fee Suit Against Blank Rome

A New York appeals court has ruled e-mails exchanged between a legal recruiter and Blank Rome were not an enforceable contract requiring the law firm to pay a recruiting fee of $730,000.

The recruiter Mark Bruce International Inc. had claimed Blank Rome should pay the money in connection with the law firm's merger with Healy & Baillie, a 28-lawyer maritime firm in New York, the New York Law Journal reports.

The appeals court opinion said the "exchange of e-mails, which did not set forth the fee for plaintiff's services or an objective standard to determine it, was too indefinite to be enforceable."

A Mark Bruce recruiter had suggested the merger 10 months before its fruition. Blank Rome later merged with the smaller firm with the help of a different recruiter, which got the $730,000 fee sought by Mark Bruce.