Like any good breakup letter, the one that New York elevator servicing company Nouveau Elevator Industries Inc. sent to its outside lawyer Nicholas Caiazzo in November has an “it’s not you, it’s me” quality to it. Citing “economic reasons,” company president Donald Speranza wrote that he had decided that it was time to “part ways” with Caiazzo and his firm, Wilson Elser Moskowitz Edelman & Dicker. Nouveau, which had called on litigators from Wilson Elser whenever someone claimed the company’s elevator maintenance or installation had caused them harm, wanted a cheaper firm.
It doesn’t take an oracle to predict that in a recession, clients would look to trim legal costs. But clients and lawyers alike say that what is happening now is more of a Freddy Krueger-style bloodletting. And litigators, traditionally thought of as safe from recessionary pressures, are feeling it, too. Clients are demanding deep discounts, creating incentives for litigators to resolve cases quicker, keeping more lawsuits in house, and, yes, even shedding longtime counsel.
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