Partners Feud Over $103M Payday at Heins Mills in Minn.

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Partners Feud Over $103M Payday at Heins Mills in Minn.

Posted May 19, 2008, 10:21 am CST
By Martha Neil

A $103 million payday at a Minneapolis law firm has proven to be cause for unhappiness rather than celebration.

Current and former partners at Heins Mills & Olson are now feuding over how to split the pot, which represents attorney fees in a $2.65 billion settlement against AOL Time Warner in 2005 concerning misleading statements, reports the Star Tribune.

Former partners, including Alan Gilbert and Brian Williams, say the $4 million share each got wasn't enough. A trial is scheduled next month in Hennepin County District Court over the lawsuit Williams filed to try to get a bigger piece of the pie.

Heins and his wife, Stacey Mills, who is also a partner in the firm, got $48 million and $32 million, respectively. However, he says a substantial chunk of that money went to reimburse the firm for its costs in the case, the Minneapolis-St.Paul newspaper reports.

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Posted by anonymous - 6 months, 2 weeks, 1 day, 21 hours, 32 minutes ago

This feud highlights the greed in our profession and is totally shameful.
Posted by The Dude - 6 months, 1 week, 5 days, 21 hours, 3 minutes ago

I don’t know…two partners get $80 million, the rest get $4 Million apiece? I’d sue too.
Posted by Kathy Hunt - 6 months, 1 week, 5 days, 19 hours, 53 minutes ago

How greedy of all of them. All need a wake up call and made to give to charity instead of being so selfish. How sad for them
Posted by TDR - 6 months, 1 week, 5 days, 19 hours, 18 minutes ago

This article seems light on fact. WHY isn’t $4M not enough and WHY did the two partners get $80M? It does seem to smack of a bunch of greed-heads. But I feel like I haven’t been given enough info to develop a really decent opinion.

I will say this… $4m pay out? I’m out of here, you will find me on the beach somewhere…forever and ever.
Posted by Mike - 6 months, 1 week, 5 days, 18 hours, 57 minutes ago

Are any of the comments above from real lawyers? Did any of you take “Contracts” in law school. Stop the PC nonsense about “greed” and wake up. The suit is obviously about breach of a prior agreement respecting apportioned cuts of the revenue from that settlement. Duh!
Posted by Oh Mikey You're Sooo Smurt. - 6 months, 1 week, 5 days, 18 hours, 28 minutes ago

Doh!
Posted by Bird Smack - 6 months, 1 week, 5 days, 18 hours, 25 minutes ago

MIke, you might be right, but you might be wrong, about a prior agreement. You’re assuming there was one and I can imagine that there might not have been. To me, it’s not a “duh.“ The only “duh” is, they should have had a written agreement apportioning fee percentages.

Well, I guess there’s one more: the ABA article is light on fact. Duh! What else is new?
Posted by Mike Germain - 6 months, 1 week, 5 days, 14 hours, 46 minutes ago

Touche! Good point Bird Smack
Posted by Tony McManus - 6 months, 1 week, 1 day, 17 hours, 6 minutes ago

Mike:
it’s greed, starting with AOL, all the way down to the lawyers…
and guess who’s paying for it? It’s kind of a “trickle up” theory of economics. The people at the bottom make their monthly payments and it ends up in the lawyers’ pockets.

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