A recent Legal Intelligencer story by Max Mitchell, “NFL Concussion Lawyers Questions Expert’s Analysis of Attorney Fees” reports that several leading law firms in the NFL concussion settlement litigation are taking issue with an expert report that suggested slashing attorney fee recoveries.
More than 10 law firms have filed responses to a December expert report that recommended capping attorney fees. Attorneys questioning the report’s conclusions included both Chris Seeger of Seeger Weiss and Sol Weiss of Anapol Weiss, who are co-lead class counsel in the litigation that came to a $1 billion settlement with the National Football Association in early 2015. Most responses from the attorneys questioned the assumptions underpinning the report Harvard professor William Rubenstein issued last month, and some said that capping attorney fees could damage some of the former players’ ability to recover under the settlement.
Seeger’s response, specifically took issue with Rubenstein’s determination that, since the litigation settled relatively quickly, it was reasonable to recommend that the court reject a proposed 5 percent set-aside that would go toward a common benefit fund for class counsel attorneys. “Any suggestion that class counsel did not invest sufficient time in this litigation to warrant the requested $106.8 million in common benefit fees is simply wrong,” Seeger said. “Although this may not have been a typical MDL involving extensive discovery bellwether trials, and the like, all kinds of labor, resources, and ingenuity went into resolving this litigation.”
Last year, class counsel asked U.S. District Judge Anita Brody of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, who is overseeing the litigation, to approve $112.5 million for attorney fees and costs stemming from the settlement, which is intended to compensate about 20,000 former players suffering from concussion-related injuries. The NFL has agreed to pay the money in addition to the money for the class members.
The fee request included a 15.6 percent rate for attorneys representing claimants directly, along with the 5 percent set-aside that would be paid to the common benefit fund either from attorney fees, if the claimant had individual representation, or from the claimants’ recovery if they were unrepresented. Rubenstein, who Brody asked to review the fee request, issued a 47-page expert report in mid-December recommending a presumptive 15 percent cap on contingency fees and that the court not adopt the 5 percent set-aside.
Responses largely took issue with the class participation rate Rubenstein used, and said the report did not take into account how vigorously the NFL would contest some of the claimant’s petitions. A filing by X1Law said attorneys also said that cutting the fees could have a chilling effect on attorneys wanting to represent claimants who have difficult cases.
“Capping attorney’s fees at 15 percent would cut the legs out from under independently retained plaintiff’s attorneys (IRPAs) due to the time and risk involved in this complex and contentious claims process, essentially gutting their ability to represent class members by making the representation financially dangerous,” X1Law attorney Patrick Tighe said in the filing. “Professor Rubenstein’s proposed cap would severely chill access to IRPAs, limiting IRPA advocacy and oversight, resulting in a lack of oversight in any otherwise dangerous claims process for class members.”
When reached for comment, Tighe said a 15 percent cap on fees would specifically impact players whose symptoms do not presently show up on tests, but may manifest in a few years. “It’s going to eliminate a vast majority of class members from being able to present a claim,” he said.