Lawyers Won 10x Fee Payoff By Avoiding Competition, Objector Claims
ByAn appeal of the fees in a $75 million robo-dialing case settlement offers a fascinating look into the finances of class-action law firms, including how they can use undisclosed “side deals” among themselves to diminish competition and drive up their fees to more than $3,600 an hour.
The filing by the Center for Class Action Fairness says the San Francisco law firm Lieff Cabraser reaped supercompetitive rates in a lawsuit against Capital One Financial COF -0.27%by splitting the work among five other law firms and spreading its own risk of financial loss across a number of similar cases. The two tactics allowed Lieff Cabraser and its co-counsel to earn an average of $1,275 an hour for 38 lawsuits filed under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, a burgeoning area for litigation given the statutory damages of up to $1,500 per violation and good odds of negotiating a settlement…
Lawyers Won 10x Fee Payoff By Avoiding Competition, Objector Claims
