Pharmaceutical gelcap-maker Procaps SA sued Carlton Fields Jorden Burt in Florida state court on Tuesday, alleging the law firm's shoddy advice in a contentious antitrust lawsuit exposed Procaps to an $18.5 million legal fee award.

Colombia-based Procaps, represented by Miami-based legal malpractice specialist Warren Trazenfeld, alleges in Miami-Dade County's Eleventh Judicial Circuit that Carlton Fields failed to fully inform the company about the risks of pursuing litigation against a former joint venture partner, Patheon Inc., under Florida's Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act. That law includes a provision that allowed Patheon and its lawyers at Cooley to seek their legal fees after securing a summary judgment that put an end to Procaps' antitrust claims.

The malpractice suit, which seeks at least $15 million in damages, alleges that Carlton Fields gave inadequate advice to Procaps with respect to the Florida law. If the company realized it might end up on the hook for millions in legal fees under the state unfair trade practices law, Procaps would never have gone through with it, according to the complaint.

“Since the [Florida state law] claim was duplicative of other claims that did not expose Procaps to attorney's fees, Procaps would have never agreed to bring such a claim if it was fully informed of the attorney's fee risk,” the malpractice complaint said. The suit includes claims of negligence and breach of fiduciary duty against Carlton Fields.

A statement sent on Wednesday by a Carlton Fields spokeswoman said the firm has not yet seen Procaps' complaint, but that the firm didn't believe it committed malpractice.

“Our client was the plaintiff suing the defendant for substantial damages, which can never be a sure thing,” the firm said in its statement. “We are quite confident that there was no malpractice involved at any step of the way.”

Procaps' malpractice action follows the company's loss in a highly contentious litigation battle against Patheon.

The underlying antitrust suit emerged in Florida federal court in light of a 2012 collaboration agreement struck between the two companies, in which Procaps—a manufacturer of soft-gel capsules used in pharmaceuticals—would team up with Patheon to develop and market a new brand of soft-gels. Soon after the companies reached the joint venture deal, however, Patheon acquired Procaps' main rival in the soft-gel market, Banner Inc.

Considering Patheon's actions disloyal, Procaps sued in 2012. The complaint alleged that with the Banner acquisition, Patheon had effectively turned its collaboration deal with Procaps into an unlawful agreement to divvy up the market. The suit raised claims under the federal Sherman Act but also included claims under the Florida unfair trade practices law.

After about three years of heated litigation before a federal magistrate judge—the two sides consented to the magistrate having full jurisdiction—Patheon secured a summary judgment in 2015, defeating all of Procaps' claims. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit upheld that ruling in 2016.

The antitrust case then went back to the magistrate judge, who in August 2017 granted Patheon's motion for fees, finding that the Florida state law invoked in Procaps' antitrust suit warranted the award to the winning side. The fees came in at more than $18.49 million, according to court records, and the magistrate used the 2017 ruling to come down hard on Carlton Fields.

After describing the litigation as “especially unpleasant and nasty,” U.S. Magistrate Judge Jonathan Goodman went on to write, “suffice it to say that the court is, at a minimum, extremely disappointed in the way that Procaps and its counsel handled many aspects (both substantive and procedural) of this complex case.”

In Tuesday's malpractice action, Procaps alleges that, before it ever sued its former joint venture partner, Patheon offered to pay millions to resolve a potential dispute over its acquisition of Banner. However, Carlton Fields allegedly advised Procaps to turn down the settlement offer because “litigation would result in obtaining significantly more money than Patheon was offering,” the malpractice complaint said.

The law firm then allegedly failed to fully inform Procaps about the risks, in terms of a potential attorneys fee award, that would come along with including a claim under Florida's unfair competition law. Ultimately, after the $18.5 million fee award and the loss on summary judgment, Procaps paid Patheon to settle the dispute. A confidential settlement agreement was submitted in April, according to court records.

“Silence is not golden in the practice of law,” Trazenfeld, Procaps' lawyer in the malpractice case, said in a statement. “A lawyer is obligated to fully and timely advise clients of all potentially adverse consequences before filing a lawsuit. Carlton Fields' failure to warn my client about its exposure to a statutory prevailing party attorney's fee provision before filing suit against Patheon had significant economic consequences.”

In its statement Wednesday responding to the Procaps malpractice claim, Carlton Fields said the company's settlement was premature and came in the midst of an appeal of the attorney fee ruling, which the firm believed was “contrary to numerous federal opinions” in similar situations. Carlton Fields also said it guided Procaps to an award of more than $1 million in a related breach-of-contract arbitration, but that settled as well, while the firm was pursuing greater damages on appeal.

“There was every good reason to believe our client would win that appeal. Without our involvement, however, our client settled prematurely both our appeal seeking greater damages in the contract case and the appeal from the fee award and now seeks to obtain some kind of recovery from our law firm instead,” the law firm said. “This is unfounded. We will defend this case vigorously.”