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PNC’s Says Legal Bills Are Off-Limits to Assault Victim

April 13, 2020 | Posted in : Billing Record / Entries, Defense Fees / Costs, Ethics & Professional Responsibility, Fee Discovery / Fee Disclosure, Fee Request, Legal Bills / Legal Costs

A recent Law 360 story by Cara Salvatore, “PNC’s Legal Bills Are Off-Limits in Assault Case, Bank Says,” reports that PNC Bank told a New Jersey court that a former wealth manager who won $2.4 million after being attacked by a customer has no right to see billing records from two PNC-hired law firms as she prepares a motion to recover legal fees.  PNC Bank NA asked a court to block former employee Damara Scott's March 19 subpoenas for billing records from two firms that are outside counsel to PNC, Ronan Tuzzio & Giannone and Goldberg Segalla.

A jury awarded Scott $2.4 million in February in her lawsuit claiming the bank failed to protect her from an attack by a man known for targeting female employees and customers of the bank for harassment.  Scott served the document requests "without leave of court," PNC said.  "Post-trial discovery is not permitted without leave except in proceedings to enforce a judgment." Further, the requests "improperly seek information protected by the attorney-client privilege and attorney work-product doctrine," the bank said.

PNC expects Scott to file a request for legal fees, but it said there should be no need for Scott to see any of PNC's legal bills at this time.  PNC hired Ronan Tuzzio after Scott sued in the fall of 2015 and hired Goldberg Segalla in July 2019, it said.

Scott's lawyer, Nancy Erika Smith, said that PNC's likely future challenge to the reasonableness of Scott's future fee request would open the door for a view of PNC's legal bills as well.  "If PNC wants to claim that plaintiff spent [an] unreasonable amount of time winning the case, I am allowed by law to look at the amount of time PNC lawyers spent losing it," Smith said.