Lawyer for Iran Terror Victims Accuses Others of Riding His Coattails
Steven Perles claims three other plaintiffs attorneys who practice around Washington, D.C., have been paid $33.6 million despite minimal legal work.
July 09, 2019 at 06:19 PM
4 minute read
A lawyer for victims of the 1983 bombing of the U.S. Marines barracks in Beirut who won more than $2 billion in judgments against Iran has sued three lawyers who represent other victims, claiming they were paid $29 million in legal fees that they didn't deserve.
Steven Perles, who has litigated several cases against state sponsors of terrorism, sued attorneys Joseph Peter Drennan, Dan Gaskill and Patrick Donahue in Manhattan Supreme Court on Monday. Perles, who runs his own firm in Washington, D.C., claims the three have been paid $33.6 million despite having barely lifted a finger to help him execute on a strategy that has so far resulted in $1.9 billion recovered for the victims. Perles contends that the three lawyers, who are solo or small-firm practitioners around Washington, D.C., are only entitled to a little over $4.5 million, but they want more.
“Although they claim that they are entitled to significant fees from any future recoveries, defendants are doing absolutely nothing to assist in the search for Iranian assets or otherwise collect on the judgments,” Perles' suit said. “Instead, plaintiffs, and plaintiffs alone, are continuing to search for and attach Iranian assets.”
In his complaint, Perles said he tapped his vast network of sources to assemble evidence that proved Iran was behind the barracks bombing. In the federal case Peterson v. Islamic Republic of Iran, he won a decision finding that Iran was liable to hundreds of victims of the attacks and their family members. He also worked to find assets to execute against and lobbied Congress to draft and pass laws that made his legal crusade possible.
As Perles tells it, he and attorney Thomas Fay were the driving force that has enabled Peterson and other victims to win over $4 billion in total judgments against Iran for its role in the bombing and to enforce $1.9 billion of them so far. (Fay is not a plaintiff in the suit filed Monday, although Perles Law Firm and an entity called Fay and Perles FSIA Litigation Partnership are.) Perles said Drennan and Gaskill were just brought on to help calculate damages for the 811 plaintiffs in the Peterson case.
Starting in 2003, after liability had been established in Peterson, Drennan, Gaskill and Donahue filed several “follow-on cases” that sought, and won, hundreds of millions in damages for additional victims under the same theories and facts found in the Peterson case, Perles said. They did little to help find Iranian assets, help change the law or help pay off other lawyers who have sought a bigger portion of the fees, the suit claims.
The suit is the latest development in the fee disputes that arose years ago in terrorism litigation against Iran. According to the new Perles complaint, the suits were generally taken on for a 33% contingency fee, which would mean more than $600 million has been available to distribution among the plaintiffs lawyers. Most of the legal fee disputes appear to have unfolded behind closed doors.
In an interview, Gaskill said Perles' claims had already been considered and rejected by a neutral third party. Gaskill said he did play a key role in lobbying Congress and litigating the Peterson case, adding it was a shame Perles had sued. “Most of the things in his claim are just totally false,” he said. “I just don't know, really, what else to say about it. The sad part is, it's kind of tarnishing what we've done.”
The other attorney defendants didn't respond to requests for comment, neither did Fay or Perles' lawyers from Bregman, Berbert, Schwartz & Gilday, KaiserDillon and the Law Offices of Stephen Turano.
It's possible the terrorism victims could recover more. A huge asset linked to Iran, a skyscraper at 650 Fifth Ave. in Manhattan, is currently tied up in an appeal in U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, with oral arguments having taken place in May and a decision expected. If two private entities that allegedly acted on behalf of Iran fail to overturn decisions by lower courts, their interest in the building could be sold.
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