Legal Malpractice

A Comma here, a Paragraph There, $150 Million in Legal Malpractice

By (Andrew Lavoott Bluestone)

Rounding out the week in legal malpractice, this article caught our eye.  Law firm represents company seeking to go national in the cable market.  Advises in a transaction so large it gets its own nickname.  In one of probably hundreds of document drafts two paragraphs go missing, and everything falls apart. 

What secondarily caught the eye was a month long mediation.  That's longer than many trials.  Here is the story from the National Law Journal:

"LOS ANGELES – Irell & Manella has settled a $150 million legal malpractice lawsuit with one of its largest clients, Charter Communications Inc., according to a Feb. 10 filing in the case.

The settlement was reached following two months of mediation, according to court documents. Charter Communications Inc. v. Irell & Manella LLP, No. 07-cv-00402 (C.D. Calif.). No details of the settlement, including the dollar amount, were provided.

Irell, based in Los Angeles, had represented Charter and its chairman, Paul Allen, while both were looking to acquire cable systems to build a nationwide cable television company. In 2000, while working on an acquisition dubbed "the Bresnan Transaction," an unnamed Irell associate deleted two important paragraphs of the contract, giving Allen an unintended type of stock. No one noticed the mistake until 2002, after which Charter was forced to negotiate with Allen over millions of dollars to rectify the deal.

Charter then sued Irell for legal malpractice, breach of fiduciary duty, breach of contract and other claims. "
 

Full post as published by New York Attorney Malpractice Blog on February 13, 2009 (boomark / email).