A recent Law 360 by Sydney Price, “Attys Get $37M For Landing Forex Rigging Deals,” reports that a New York federal judge awarded $36.8 million in attorney fees to counsel for investors who accused a group of banks of rigging foreign exchange markets, about $10.4 million less than the lawyers wanted, for securing nearly $186 million in settlements for their clients.  U.S. District Judge Lewis A. Kaplan said in a letter that class counsel sought legal fees of $47.2 million, which represents 25.4% of the settlement fund, and litigation expenses of $845,471.57.  Judge Kaplan decided to apply a lodestar method to evaluate the payout, which removed some billable hours counsel included in its request.

Counsel submitted a proposed lodestar of $29.9 million for over 53,000 hours worked.  This calculation included over 3,000 hours by four non-lawyer analysts, including a derivatives expert.  Judge Kaplan said counsel did not provide enough data on the rates charged by these analysts to include them in his final calculation. The litigation expenses of $845,471.57 were granted without objections.

"After approximately six years of hard-fought litigation, counsel obtained eight class action settlements and twelve settling defendants, creating a common fund of $185,875,000," Judge Kaplan said.  "This was a good result for the class and counsel deserve to be compensated adequately."  The attorneys previously noted that no other firms attempted to represent the class in the case, contending that was "likely because of the ... high risks" the investors knew they would face in the matter.

The suit accused the banks of coordinating a "horizontal conspiracy to manipulate prices in favor of the defendants' derivatives trading positions" and cites investigations by Australia's securities regulator, which showed certain banks had worked together to fix derivative contract prices.

The parties reached a final settlement in the case last May. Credit Suisse had agreed to pay $8.88 million, and a group of five other banks, comprising BNP Paribas, Deutsche Bank, the Royal Bank of Canada, the Royal Bank of Scotland and UBS, had agreed to pay a total of $40 million to end the claims they face in the matter.

The settlement sum also includes $137 million in settlements reached earlier in the matter, including December 2021 agreements that Australia and New Zealand Banking and Commonwealth Bank of Australia would each pay $35 million, National Australia Bank would pay $27 million and Morgan Stanley would pay $7 million.  Westpac Banking Corp. agreed to pay $25 million in March 2021, and JPMorgan struck a $7 million settlement deal in November 2018.

A recent Law 360 by George Woolston, “NJ Firm Keeps Victory In Retainer Fee Billing Challenge,” reports that the New Jersey state appeals court has backed Arbus Maybruch & Goode LLC's win in an ex-client's suit alleging it failed to disclose the incremental billing structure of its retainer fee, reasoning in a published decision that the firm's bimonthly invoices showed the terms were spelled out.  A three-judge panel affirmed a Monmouth County trial judge's decision to award summary judgment to the firm on breach of contract claims against Daniel Cohen and his company Cohen Capital Management over $142,000 in unpaid attorney fees and costs.

Cohen challenged the lower court's decision, claiming that the New Jersey firm's fee and retainer agreements were illegal and unethical under the state's rules of professional conduct for attorneys, according to the opinion. Cohen argued that attorneys are required to include language defining what unit of incremental billing the attorneys planned to use in retainer agreements, despite hourly rates and initial deposits being otherwise clearly defined.  The firm had been billing Cohen in increments of one-tenth of an hour, according to the opinion.

In its review of two retainer agreements between the firm and Cohen and the relevant rules and case law, the panel found "no rule as rigorous as the one defendants urge us to adopt" and reached the same conclusion as the trial court — the firm's legal fees were reasonably presented and agreed to by the parties.

"The fees awarded here were based upon a reasonable hourly rate, as determined by the trial judge, who made detailed findings regarding the type of matter involved, the rates charged by other New Jersey attorneys possessing similar experience in like matters, and regional considerations regarding the amount billed," Judge Maritza Berdote Byrne wrote for the panel.  The panel also found Cohen's argument that he was not aware of the firm's incremental billing was not supported by the record in the case.

"Further, based upon the parties' course of dealing, where defendants availed themselves of AMG's legal services for more than two years without objecting to any invoices or raising the incremental billing issue, defendants' claim suggests an improper motive," Judge Berdote Byrne wrote.

Arbus Maybruch & Goode represented Cohen and his company for more than two years, starting in 2018, in a negligent construction suit as well as in a separate lawsuit against Cohen by a law firm seeking unpaid attorney fees, according to the appellate opinion.  In July 2020, the firm ended its representation of Cohen and a month later filed its breach of contract suit over the unpaid attorney fees.  According to the opinion, the first time Cohen argued that the agreements did not permit billing on an "incremental" basis was in its answer to the lawsuit, filed in Oct. 2020.

A recent Law 360 by Irene Spezzamonte, “Workers for Virgin, Alaska Seek $10M Fees in $31M Wage Suit,” reports that a group of flight attendants asked a California federal court to grant their attorneys $10 million in fees after they were able to reach a $31 million deal to solve their suit claiming Virgin America and Alaska Airlines cheated them out of pay.  The workers asked the court to sign off on the fees, as well as on more than $600,000 in expenses. 

The workers added that those amounts are reasonable after their attorneys put in about 7,300 hours of work during the eight-year litigation on claims that Virgin America Inc. and Alaska Airlines Inc. violated California labor laws.  "Plaintiffs and class counsel have litigated this matter for nearly eight years against unyielding defendants vigorously represented by skilled counsel," the workers said.  "Every single step of this litigation was hard-fought and fraught with risk."

In January, U.S. District Judge Jon S. Tigar entered a judgment order against the airlines, which are both a part of Alaska Air Group, directing them to shell out the settlement aimed at resolving claims they failed to pay overtime, meal and rest periods and did not provide workers with accurate wage statements.  The settlement also ended claims under California's Private Attorneys General Act.

In that order, Judge Tigar also asked the parties to separately file a motion for the attorney fees, service awards for the three named plaintiffs and to address the plan of allocation, triggering the filing.  The flight attendants said that the $10 million in attorney fees, which the airlines agreed to pay, are reasonable given the amount of time and work their counsel put into the litigation.  Of that amount, about $6 million will come directly from the airlines while the remaining $4 million will come from the $31 million common fund, the workers said.

The fees represent overall 33% of the settlement, but the $6 million the airlines will pitch in will be credited against the $31 million total, resulting in a 13% total of the deal, the workers added.  The $600,000 in expenses will also come from two sources: $40,000 from the airlines in the form of a reimbursement for the plaintiffs' taxable costs and the remainder from the common fund.

The workers also seek $25,000 to each of the three named plaintiffs, saying that "over the past eight years, plaintiffs have provided invaluable assistance and guidance to class counsel with respect to understanding the airline industry" and the airlines' practices and policies.  Additionally, each service award of $25,000 represents less than .001% of the final common fund judgment, the workers said.

A recent Law 360 by Piper Hudspeth Blackburn, “CSX Hits Back at $14M Atty Fee Bid in Norfolk Southern Case,” reports that CSX Transportation Inc. has urged a Virginia federal judge not to award Norfolk Southern Railway Co. and a smaller railroad $14 million in attorney fees for beating back its antitrust claims, arguing that Virginia's state law does not allow it.  In a memorandum, CSX also said that no contractual provision between the parties allows an award for attorney fees as Virginia law requires, and the Sherman Act does not mandate that a defendant obtain a fee award for prevailing on a suit.

According to CSX, Virginia law mandates that successful claims be supported by "a statutory or contractual right" to attorney fees.  Therefore, if at all possible, the only claims Norfolk Southern and Norfolk & Portsmouth Belt Line Railroad Co. can seek are those related to their defense of CSX's injunctive-relief request under the Virginia's business conspiracy law, CSX added.

However, CSX also noted that the railway companies did not cite "a single decision" in the history of the Virginia statute "in which a court has awarded a prevailing defendant attorneys' fees."  The years-long litigation ended in April, when U.S. District Judge Mark S. Davis sided with Norfolk Southern and Belt Line and dismissed the suit, finding that CSX's claims were time-barred.

The companies filed separate motions on May 3 in an effort to get the court to order CSX to pay their court costs and attorney fees.  While Norfolk Southern estimates its costs and fees at around $11 million, the Belt Line put forth a much lower estimate of $3 million.  Belt Line argued that CSX must pay because Virginia law says prevailing defendants in a conspiracy case where plaintiffs requested injunctive relief are entitled to costs and attorney fees.

"Whether CSX sought money damages or injunctive relief, its core set of facts was identical for all claims, and therefore the Belt Line's entitlement to costs and attorneys' fees encompasses its efforts to overcome them all," the interchange railroad said.  However, CSX disagreed Wednesday, claiming that the statute does not mandate that losing plaintiffs pay attorney fees.  Instead, CSX said, the law requires only "a potential discretionary fee award for those fees specifically attributable to the state-conspiracy injunctive-relief remedy."

A recent Law 360 by Abby Wargo, “United Flight Attendants’ Attys Seek $18.1M Cut of $54M Deal,” reports that counsel for a class of United Airlines flight attendants who accused the airline of issuing deficient wage statements asked a California federal judge to approve an $18.1 million fee award after an "intense battle" that led to a $54 million settlement.  Kirk D. Hanson and Jeffrey C. Jackson of Jackson Hanson LLP, who are representing the flight attendants, called the eight-year wage suit "an intense battle from beginning to end," according to their motion for attorney fees, and they should be properly compensated considering the difficulty of achieving success.  They also requested an additional $90,000 in expenses.

A federal judge in February had preliminarily approved the $53.5 million settlement, which the motion says has since accrued interest and now totals $54.4 million, but asked the flight attendants' attorneys to justify their request for a third of the settlement, as it exceeds the state benchmark.  The final approval hearing will be in June.

The attorneys said the settlement, which will provide each class member with an average of $3,230 even after attorney fees and costs are deducted, is an exceptional outcome for the plaintiffs, as it exceeds 80% of the highest recovery they could have received through trial.  The typical individual recovery range in a wage and hour class action is 10% to 27%, they said.  Additionally, they said other state and federal courts routinely approve attorney fees equaling one-third of settlement funds.

Also proper are the $20,000 service awards for each named plaintiff, Felicia Vidrio and Paul Bradley, the attorneys said, because they took on significant risks in representing the class and would have been on the hook for attorney fees had they lost.  Their time and effort in assisting their attorneys should be recognized, according to the motion.

Even more important than the monetary awards, the attorneys said, is that United changed the format of its wage statements for California-based flight attendants to comply with state statute.  The wage statements now show all hours worked during a pay period and the hourly pay rate, the motion says.  "This is arguably the most important win in this case because it will continue on indefinitely and allow the flight attendants to quickly and easily verify the correct payment of their wages," the attorneys said in the motion.

These outcomes would never have been possible if the plaintiffs and their attorneys had given up, the motion says, because "at every turn in this litigation United mounted a vigorous defense."  The workers and their attorneys said that by reversing summary judgment and reviving their case after trips to both the Ninth Circuit and California Supreme Court, they set precedent clarifying how state labor law applies to interstate transportation workers.

Under the terms of the settlement, the non-reversionary $54 million fund includes attorney fees, $20,000 service awards for both class representatives, and a Private Attorneys General Act settlement of $300,000, with about $35 million going to the settlement class on a pro rata basis.  Members of the class are defined as all flight attendants employed by United and based at a California airport between August 2014 and March 31, 2023. Any remaining funds will be given to a cy pres recipient, Legal Aid at Work, according to the deal.

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