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A special master looking into potential overbilling in a $75 million attorney fee request has delayed the findings of a report he said could have “serious and far-reaching adverse ramifications” for plaintiffs firms in the case and “for the practice of the plaintiffs' class action bar.”

Retired U.S. District Chief Judge Gerald Rosen of the Eastern District of Michigan, now of the JAMS mediation service, was appointed special master a year ago in a securities class action settlement with State Street Corp. after a federal judge raised concerns about the billing activities of three plaintiffs firms. In a Feb. 28 letter to the judge, Rosen asked that he extend a March 15 deadline for his report to be completed. That would give plaintiffs lawyers more time, he wrote, to respond to an 85-page expert report that New York University School of Law professor Stephen Gillers prepared for him as part of the investigation.

“Counsel pointed out that the stakes for their clients are extraordinarily high in this matter,” Rosen wrote. They told him “that if I were to adopt in my report the opinions of professor Gillers, there could potentially be serious and far-reaching adverse ramifications [for] at least some of the firms, and even beyond this investigation for the practice of the plaintiffs' class action bar and even for courts in class actions.”

On March 1, U.S. District Judge Mark Wolf in Boston granted the request. The report is now due on April 23.

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Attorneys from the three plaintiffs firms under investigation—New York's Labaton Sucharow, San Francisco's Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein and Thornton Law Firm in Boston—did not respond to requests for comment. Joan Lukey, a lawyer at Boston's Choate Hall & Stewart, who represents Labaton, also did not respond.

Last year, following a series of articles in The Boston Globe raising questions about Thornton's political donations and allegations of overbilling in the State Street case, the three firms admitted they double counted hours in the case. Wolf previously had approved a $300 million settlement of cases alleging State Street had overcharged pension fund clients in foreign currency trades. He also approved the fees but, in a letter to the court, Labaton Sucharow's David Goldsmith admitted “inadvertent errors” in the billing of staff attorneys who worked temporarily for the firm—a mistake that led to an additional $4.1 million in the fee request.

The three firms agreed to pay up to $2 million to cover the costs of the special master's probe. They have since raised unsuccessful objections about a consultant Rosen hired, John Toothman, calling him a “partisan advocate.”

On Sept. 29, Rosen asked for more time to complete his report, citing “recent events related to the discovery phrase of the investigation.” On Oct. 6, he asked for $1 million more, which Wolf granted. On Dec. 12, Rosen asked for a second extension due to “much more work than anticipated.”

According to Rosen's letter asking for a third and final extension, he retained Gillers to respond to a report by a plaintiffs attorneys' expert. Rosen said he provided Gillers' report on Feb. 23, but plaintiffs lawyers said they needed more time to respond. Plaintiffs lawyers also wanted to depose Gillers, the letter said.

“They also indicated that they may wish to retain an additional expert to address professor Gillers' report, which they contend constitute a 'novel' approach to Massachusetts attorney referrals. (We, of course, do not agree with that characterization of professor Gillers' report.),” Rosen wrote.

Plaintiffs lawyers planned to name that expert by March 10.