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Good morning. Among the winners from the Fox/Dominion settlement: the nearly 31 lawyers and nine law firms that worked on the lengthy case. Plus, Donald Trump “wishes” he could attend next week’s trial over columnist E. Jean Carroll’s lawsuit, but his lawyer says he may not; and Johnson & Johnson will find out today if thousands of lawsuits over its talc products will be stayed as part of its subsidiary’s second bankruptcy. We’re just getting started — scroll on!
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The $787.5 million settlement that ended Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation lawsuit against Fox Corp also marks the end of a lucrative, two-year battle for the sprawling teams of highly-paid lawyers on both sides, reports Andrew Goudsward.
Fox’s legal team included Dan Webb of Winston & Strawn and Paul Clement of Clement & Murphy. Dominion was represented by a Susman Godfrey team led by Davida Brook, Justin Nelson and Stephen Shackelford, in addition to Thomas Clare of Clare Locke and others. Delaware Superior Court Judge Eric Davis complimented the legal teams in court after the settlement, saying he had not seen “as good of lawyering” in 13 years on the bench.
Attorneys for Fox and Dominion did not publicly disclose their rates or how they were being paid. But Dominion accumulated about $18.5 million in out-of-pocket legal costs just from November 2020 through October 2022, according to court filings.
Susman Godfrey was hired on a contingency, or success-fee, basis, according to a source familiar with the fee arrangement. The firm gave Dominion a “substantial discount” because it viewed the case as pursuing accountability for election falsehoods, the source said. But it was not immediately clear how large a share of the settlement the firm would receive in legal fees. A spokesperson for Dominion declined to comment.
Past examples of contingency fee arrangements show how lucrative they can be if a case is successful. Susman Godfrey and another plaintiffs’ firm earned about $106 million in 2018 under a contingency fee arrangement in a class action that secured $590 million in combined settlements with major banks accused of manipulating the Libor benchmark interest rate, according to court documents.
Read more about the Fox/Dominion deal:
Fox case just one front in Dominion’s larger legal battle
Dominion Voting owner says held Fox accountable even without apology
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Hughes Hubbard’s former intellectual property group head is pursuing an age-bias claim at the EEOC, according to newly unsealed records in Manhattan federal court. James Dabney said that after he retired in 2022, the law firm slashed his monthly pension benefit before suspending it altogether. The firm said it “remains committed to resolving the issues” with Dabney. (Reuters)
- Donald Trump’s lawyer Joe Tacopina said the former president “wishes to appear” at next week’s trial involving the writer E. Jean Carroll, who has accused him of rape, but the former president may not be able to because of security issues his appearance would cause. Tacopina, in a letter to U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan in Manhattan, said the judge should instruct jurors not to hold it against him if he stays away. (Reuters)
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The general counsel to Israel’s NSO Group in a letter sent last week lobbied against a proposed American Bar Association resolution calling for a moratorium on the purchase, sale or use of commercial spyware. NSO General Counsel Shmuel Sunray argued that companies with an “established” human rights compliance program — which NSO says it has — should be exempted from any such ban. Meanwhile, British officials are sounding the alarm over the widespread abuse of surveillance software and hackers-for-hire. (Reuters)
- Lawyers from Baker Botts will represent food distributor Sysco in various antitrust matters in U.S. courts, after attorneys from Boies Schiller withdrew. Sysco moved to bring in new lawyers amid the company’s fight with litigation funder Burford Capital, which has said it thinks Sysco is agreeing to settle its court claims for too little. Burford had advanced more than $140 million to Sysco since 2019 to support the antitrust litigation. The funder has secured an arbitration order blocking Sysco from finalizing settlements.
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That’s how many closed Facebook groups run by Amazon.com drivers that the e-commerce company is accused of illegally monitoring, according to a proposed nationwide class action that cites a leaked document identifying the groups. The 9th Circuit ruled Amazon must face the lawsuit after finding an agreement that driver Drickey Jackson signed requiring him to bring work-related disputes in arbitration rather than court did not apply to his 2020 lawsuit. Amazon, which has denied wrongdoing, did not respond to requests for comment.
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When Fox Corp agreed to pay $787.5 million to settle defamation claims by Dominion Voting Systems, it gave shareholder lawyers exactly what they needed to sue Rupert Murdoch and the rest of the Fox board: tangible evidence of the consequences of Fox’s reporting on election fraud claims by supporters of former President Donald Trump in the aftermath of the 2020 election. One shareholder derivative suit is already on file, and after talking to four plaintiffs lawyers about the Dominion settlement, Alison Frankel predicts more complaints will soon follow. Frankel explains the ups and downs of derivative suits accusing corporate boards of botching their oversight duties and hypothesizes about Fox directors’ potential arguments that their actions were justifiable.
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“We have failed you and we are truly, deeply sorry.”
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—Boy Scouts CEO Roger Mosby, who lauded the bravery of the men who had spoken out about being abused as children by troop leaders, saying their advocacy would protect current and future Scouts from the kinds of predation that they suffered. The Boy Scouts emerged from bankruptcy after battling appeals over its $2.46 billion settlement of decades of sexual abuse claims.The settlement was supported by 86% of abuse claimants and the Boy Scouts’ two largest insurers, which funded a large part of the settlement but faced challenges from a separate group of insurers and claimants. The 3rd Circuit declined to put the settlement on hold while the challengers’ appeals proceed.
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New Jersey U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Michael Kaplan, presiding over LTL Management’s second bankruptcy bid after an appeals court declared the first improper, is expected to rule on the Johnson & Johnson subsidiary’s request to pause tens of thousands of talc-related lawsuits again and to give the company a second shot at a bankruptcy settlement. Plaintiffs in the cases contend the products at issue caused various forms of cancer. Kaplan agreed to protect J&J from lawsuits during LTL’s first bankruptcy, saying at the time it offered the best way to fairly resolve all of the talc lawsuits together. J&J has said its baby powder and other talc products are safe and do not cause cancer.
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The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee is expected to vote on the nomination of former New Hampshire attorney general Michael Delaney to a serve on the Boston-based 1st Circuit appeals court. His nomination has hit turbulence, as some Democratic senators said they were concerned about his involvement in a prior court case involving abortion. Responding to senators’ questions about the case, Delaney said he had “extremely limited involvement” as a top state lawyer in defending a New Hampshire law, since repealed, that required parents be notified before their minor child had an abortion. Delaney has the backing of New Hampshire’s Democratic senators, Maggie Hassan and Jeanne Shaheen.
Court calendars are subject to last-minute docket changes.
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- GenBioPro, maker of the only U.S. generic version of the abortion pill mifepristone, filed a lawsuit against the FDA and other agencies in Baltimore federal court seeking to ensure that it can continue selling its pill amid ongoing legal challenges. The privately held, Nevada-based company, represented in the case by Arnold & Porter, currently supplies a majority of the mifepristone used for medication abortion in the United States. (Reuters)
- Veterans and members of the military urged a judge to dismiss 3M’s bid to use the bankruptcy of its subsidiary Aearo Technologies to shield itself from nearly 260,000 lawsuits over military-issue earplugs that former users allege were defective and damaged their hearing ability. 3M and Aearo say the earplug litigation has spiraled out of control. But attorney Adam Silverstein, who represents veterans suing 3M over hearing loss, said at a court hearing in Indianapolis that filing for bankruptcy, like “pulling a fire alarm,” should be reserved for urgent threats. (Reuters)
- Tesla settled a lawsuit against its former engineer Alexander Yatskov, whom it had accused of stealing trade secrets related to its AI-training supercomputer Dojo. A joint filing in San Francisco federal court said the terms of the settlement were confidential but that Yatskov would make a monetary payment to the company. (Reuters)
- Neighbors of Seattle-Tacoma International Airport filed a proposed class action against the airport’s operator and two airlines over jet pollution they said is making them sick and damaging their properties. The residents asked for one order forcing the Port of Seattle, Alaska Airlines and Delta Airlines to establish a fund for medical monitoring to help screen for diseases and another forcing the defendants to pay to clean up their properties, which an attorney representing them estimated could cost over $1 billion. (Reuters)
- Amgen convinced the Federal Circuit to uphold patents that barred generic versions of its blockbuster psoriasis drug Otezla proposed by Zydus Pharmaceuticals and Novartis’ Sandoz. The court affirmed a New Jersey federal court’s ruling that Amgen patents covering the drug were valid and that the proposed generics would infringe them, blocking proposed Otezla generics until 2028. (Reuters)
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Wilson Sonsini brought on Chicago-based regulatory partner Andrea Linna from McGuireWoods, where she was co-leader of the digital health, technology and innovation practice. (Reuters)
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O’Melveny hired London-based corporate finance partner Gregory Campbell from Gibson Dunn. (Reuters)
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McDermott added partner Fabio Cozzi as the firm’s new Milan head of litigation. He arrives from Willkie Farr. (Reuters)
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Bracewell picked up Holland & Knight partner Carrie Douglas for the firm’s San Antonio office. Douglas is a partner in Bracewell’s healthcare and life sciences practice. (Bracewell)
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Fox Rothschild added litigation partner Rory Greebel in the firm’s New York office. Greebel was previously at Wilson Elser. (Fox Rothschild)
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McDermott brought on employment litigation partner James Nicholas in Boston. He arrives at the firm from Foley & Lardner. (McDermott)
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Holland & Hart added oil and gas lawyer Matt Salzman as a Denver-based partner. He was previously at Stinson. (Holland & Hart)
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