Business Development

Weil Earned $54M from GM Before Bankruptcy Filing

General Motors has paid three law firms $80 million for work leading up to its bankruptcy filing. The biggest fee earner was Weil, Gotshal & Manges, which racked up $54 million in fees and expenses in the six months leading up to the filing, the Wall Street Journal (sub. req.)…

Jun 16, 2009 11:20 AM CDT

Bose McKinney Agrees to Pay Hefty Legal Bill in ‘Chameleon’ Sanctions Case

A well-known Indiana-based law firm has agreed to pay part of a litigation opponent’s estimated seven-figure legal tab after a June 5 order by a federal judge sanctioning Bose McKinney & Evans and its former client in an environmental contamination case for failing to disclose material in discovery. Under the…

Jun 15, 2009 10:23 PM CDT

Paraplegic Ferry Victim OK with Paying Lawyer $2.5M in Additional Fees

A former fish market worker who was paralyzed in the 2003 Staten Island Ferry crash really liked his lawyer—and doesn’t mind giving him an extra $2.5 million. Testifying Wednesday, James McMillan told a federal magistrate in Brooklyn that he doesn’t support a judge’s ruling reducing his lawyer’s cut from one-third…

Jun 5, 2009 1:49 PM CDT

How In-House Counsel ‘Value’ Challenge is Changing One Law Firm

Some law firm leaders are eying a potential paradigm shift in major-firm legal practice with dread. Others are stepping forward to embrace it. Among the latter group is Gregg Melinson, the national marketing partner of Drinker Biddle & Reath. After the Association of Corporate Counsel issued its Value Challenge in…

May 29, 2009 12:46 AM CDT

Did 5 Detroit Lawyers Craft $8.4M Pact to Conceal Ex-Mayor’s Perjury?

Five lawyers who helped craft a controversial $8.4 million settlement by the city of Detroit that papered over then-mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s perjury in police whistle-blower litigation are now facing ethics charges. They include not only top in-house attorneys and outside counsel for the city but plaintiffs lawyer Mike Stefani, who…

May 20, 2009 5:40 PM CDT

Legal Tab for Former Sen. Ted Stevens is at Least $1M

Former Sen. Ted Stevens owes his lawyers at Williams and Connolly between $1 million and $5 million for defending him on corruption charges. Financial disclosure forms requiring senators to reveal their debts reveal the amount due as of Jan. 3, the Anchorage Daily News reports. The actual legal bill could…

May 15, 2009 2:49 PM CDT

Remove Minn. Judge Who Cut Legal Bill By Referring Cases, Board Recommends

A Minnesota judge said he would have referred 19 divorce cases to Collins Buckley Sauntry & Haugh for mediation regardless of whether he personally benefitted, because the law firm does good work. But the Minnesota Board on Judicial Standards says Goodhue County District Judge Timothy Blakely should be removed from…

May 12, 2009 5:44 PM CDT

Chadbourne Accused of Overbilling for Research; Other Claims in Pipeline

An unjust enrichment lawsuit claims Chadbourne & Parke billed a client $20,000 for online legal research that cost the law firm only $5,000. San Diego lawyer Patricia Meyer, who represents the Texas businessman suing Chadbourne, tells the National Law Journal that at least a dozen other law firms are also…

May 8, 2009 1:26 PM CDT

Georgia Funds Shortage Leads to Lawyer Shortage in State Criminal Cases

An ongoing state funding shortage has left a number of indigent criminal defendants in Georgia without lawyers. A chronic problem of unpaid state legal bills, especially in expensive capital cases in which Georgia’s public defenders are conflicted out of the representation, has made private lawyers unwilling to take on such…

May 7, 2009 6:04 PM CDT

4th Circuit Nixes Attorney Fee Award to Defendant in Terrorism Tort Case

In an unusual award of attorney fees to a prevailing defendant in a civil rights case, a federal court said a Muslim family whose Virginia home was lawfully searched had to pay about $41,000 to an individual they accused of conspiring with federal agents to fabricate evidence supporting the search.…

May 7, 2009 5:43 PM CDT

Study Claims Bankruptcy Lawyers Are Billing Illegally

A new study claims bankruptcy lawyers are billing their clients illegally by failing to get court approval before collecting fees. The study found that the lawyers bill bankrupt companies for about 80 percent of their fees without first submitting the charges to a judge as required by the U.S. Bankruptcy…

May 7, 2009 1:00 PM CDT

Heavyweight Clients Help Ex-Irell & Manella Litigators Launch Own Firm

Bankrolled by a book of business including major corporate clients, a trio of litigation partners has left the Los Angeles office of Irell & Manella to form a new firm that is already looking to grow bigger. The new Kendall Brill & Klieger partnership includes Viacom Inc., CBS and Clear…

May 5, 2009 10:04 PM CDT

Craps-Style Strategizing Helps Push Boies Schiller into Ranks of Top 100 Firms

A contingency case has helped catapult Boies, Schiller & Flexner into the American Lawyer’s list of the nation’s top 100 law firms. Revenues at Boies Schiller increased by 18 percent in 2008, reaching $295 million, the American Lawyer reports. Profits per partner were $3 million, the third-highest on the Am…

May 5, 2009 2:10 PM CDT

Pay Problems

Firms scramble as clients push for write-offs, discounts and payment plans

May 2, 2009 12:50 AM CDT

Ex-Client’s Overbilling Suit Attaches Seeming Proskauer Internal Memo

A lawsuit brought by Swedish heiress Kristin Lindholm over a stolen Andy Warhol silkscreen has concluded unhappily for both attorney and client. Lindholm never got the $12 million work of art back, although the dealer who sold it served time for theft. And now she is suing Proskauer Rose, which…

Apr 28, 2009 11:57 PM CDT