Legal Malpractice

Attorney Pays $ 200,000 in Legal Malpractice and Gets $ 1.2 Million

By (Andrew Lavoott Bluestone)

Here is the story of a three-way deal in a legal malpractice / overpayment of fees / municipal negligence case which we reported at the onset.  In Lodi, California [I must admit that the CCR song quickly comes to mind] target attorney had represented the city in litigation, especially an underground pollution case, and claimed he was owed $ 7 million or more.  Here, from Recordnet.com is the story:

"Lodi officials called lawyer Michael C. Donovan incompetent and a fraudster.

Over the course of seven years, they paid Donovan and his firms $16 million to pursue a legal strategy that was later discredited.

After they fired him in 2004 and abandoned his failed legal tactics in a behemoth underground pollution ordeal, officials said they did not owe him a penny more.

Now, after already spending millions more fighting him in court, it will cost the city another $1 million to make Donovan go away for good.

A divided City Council on Wednesday approved settlement agreements that end a back-and-forth legal battle:

The city will drop its 2005 lawsuit against Donovan, in which it claimed he committed fraud and legal malpractice, and receive $200,000 from the attorney's legal insurance.

Donovan, in turn, will get $1.2 million to drop his countersuit"

Full post as published by New York Attorney Malpractice Blog on February 06, 2009 (boomark / email).