The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit has determined that the district court overseeing the NFL concussion settlement did not have jurisdiction to wade into a dispute over a firm's $4.6 million fee awarded for shepherding the class action through the litigation.

A unanimous three-judge Third Circuit panel ruled Thursday that the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania did not have jurisdiction to rule on Minnesota attorney John Lorentz's efforts to obtain a third of the multimillion-dollar common benefit fee that Philadelphia law firm Anapol Weiss received for playing a leading role in the class action.

Citing the lower court's decision in rejecting the dispute, Third Circuit Judge Joseph Greenaway said the matter should not have been filed as a motion to intervene in the class action docket itself but instead should have been brought as an attorney's lien.

"Here, as a practical matter, Lorentz's breach of contract claim was not factually interdependent with the underlying claims in In re NFL," Greenaway said. "Accordingly, although district courts can have ancillary jurisdiction over attorney fee disputes, because this was a 'simple' and separate contract dispute, such jurisdiction does not exist here."

Judges David Porter and Morton Greenberg joined Greenaway.

Lorentz, who initially represented two-time Super Bowl champion Jim McMahon, argued in a brief filed earlier this year to the appellate court that McMahon was a vocal supporter of the concussion litigation and that he was one of the few players named as a class representative. Those facts, attorneys for Lorentz contended, helped the Anapol firm win a leadership role in the concussion litigation, which is expected to top $1 billion in recoveries for ex-players.

Anapol Weiss, however, pushed back, contending that the referral agreement did not include sharing the common benefit funds.

READ the Third Circuit's ruling here: