Contingency Fees on the Rise in Corporate Litigation | Law Student Argues His Dismissal Was Unconstitutional | Wells Fargo Accused of Improperly Collecting Premiums: The Morning Minute
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December 01, 2020 at 06:00 AM
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WHAT WE'RE WATCHING
CONTINGENCY PLANS - Contingency fees—they're not just for personal injury cases anymore. In the midst of the recession and pandemic, some firms are increasingly taking on contingency fee matters in business litigation and commercial cases, Dan Roe reports. Business owners who don't have the cash on hand to front litigation costs are turning to law firms that work on contingency and are willing to absorb case costs, said firm leaders, who reported a rise in contingency fee inquiries since the beginning of the pandemic. "Trying a case can cost almost as much as everything leading up to it," said William B. Lewis, Morgan & Morgan's business trial group co-managing partner. "Even in a two-year litigation cycle, it could be $300,000 in attorney's fees to try a case. There are pressure points for folks to settle even if they have a valid, strong claim. We allow clients to try cases because they don't have to pay huge amounts to get cases in front of a jury."
CLASS ACTION - The Texas Supreme Court is set to hear oral arguments today in a lawsuit by former law student Ivan Villarreal, who alleges that a cheating scandal at Texas Southern University Thurgood Marshall School of Law in Houston led to his bad grade on his criminal law exam. He ended up getting tossed from the school for having a 1.98 GPA. The high court previously allowed a law student to claim constitutional violations for his disciplinary dismissal, and this new dispute asks whether the same cause of action is open to a student who got dismissed for academic reasons. The school, of course, argues that it shouldn't be, contending in its Supreme Court brief that the intermediate appellate ruling allowing Villareal's case to move forward "risks opening new floodgates for constitutional litigation and enlarging the judicial presence in the academic community." Law.com's Angela Morris will be following the action today.
MONEY FOR NOTHING - Faegre Drinker Biddle & Reath partners Jesse Linebaugh, Larry E. LaTarte and Kristen Reilly have stepped in to defend Wells Fargo in a class action over its collection of mortgage insurance payments. The complaint, which alleges that Wells Fargo improperly collected premiums from borrowers for months or years beyond the required duration, was filed Oct. 16 in Iowa Southern District Court by Peiffer Wolf Carr Kane & Conway and Shindler, Anderson, Goplerud & Weese. The case, assigned to U.S. District Judge John A. Jarvey, is 4:20-cv-00321, Tuggle v. Wells Fargo Home Mortgage. Stay up on the latest litigation with the new Law.com Radar.
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EDITOR'S PICKS
Courts Have Dealt 2 Strikes to GOP Challengers in Pa. Election Cases. Will SCOTUS Be the Third?
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