A recent Law 360 story by Aaron West, “Flint Water Crisis Firms Agree To End Settlement Fee Dispute”, reports that three law firms that negotiated a $626 million settlement related to the Flint, Michigan, water crisis reached a settlement of their own after McAlpine PC agreed to end claims that Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PC and Pitt McGehee Palmer Bonanni & Rivers PC unfairly cut it out of their original co-counsel agreement.
The Michigan-based firms agreed to dismiss the lawsuit without prejudice or costs, according to an order signed by U.S. District Judge Judith E. Levy. The judge's order follows the defendant firms urging the court in October to dismiss McAlpine's lawsuit against them after it "sat on its hands for years" before bringing a claim over the settlement split, according to court documents.
The dispute, which McAlpine initially filed in state court, claimed that the Auburn Hills-based firm was only paid a paltry sum by its co-counsel for its contributions to the underlying litigation. McAlpine argued its work was instrumental to the lawsuit, contributing about $16 million worth of labor, or about 24% of the total lodestar figure of $84.5 million. But Cohen Milstein and Pitt McGehee offered to pay just $500,000, McAlpine said.
"Defendants breached the co-counsel agreement by failing to distribute an attorney fee award reflecting McAlpine's respective lodestar, in favor of distributing a greater share to themselves," the firm alleged in its complaint. The defendants argued in a subsequent filing that McAlpine was too late in bringing its claims. "McAlpine had a full and fair opportunity to litigate the amount of any attorneys fee award in the appropriate place to do so — the federal Flint class action," the defendants said.
The class action at the heart of the law firms' dispute was settled in 2021 when Judge Levy gave final approval to a $626 million settlement, a deal expected to provide payments to more than 100,000 people affected by lead-contaminated water. Government officials were accused of switching the city's water supply to the Flint River despite information cautioning them against doing so, and working to cover up the ensuing public health crisis.
In December, McAlpine said that the court should deny the firms' request to toss the fees case because it wasn't suing for recovery from the common benefit award, as Cohen Milstein and Pitt McGehee argued. Rather, McAlpine's claims were centered on "breaches of obligations" between the firms that were independent of the Court's order, the firm said. The defendants' reply said what McAlpine was requesting went against their original agreement.
"McAlpine's argument is not supported anywhere," the defendants wrote. "To the contrary, McAlpine agreed to work under the supervision of Co-Lead Counsel and the Executive Committee, and never challenged Co-Lead Counsel's authority to apportion fees among class counsel based on their respective roles in the litigation and contributions to the settlement until after the common benefit fee was distributed."