A Manhattan federal judge on Tuesday awarded $28.5 million in fees to plaintiffs lawyers who negotiated a settlement with underwriters of IndyMac mortgage-backed securities—but only after questioning how long the lawyers worked on the case and cutting a substantial slice from their “unreasonably high” requested award.
U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan took issue with several aspects of a $44.9 million fee bid by lawyers at Berman DeValerio, Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll, Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein and other firms who represented IndyMac investors in about 50 MBS trusts the bank sponsored before its collapse. Ultimately, Kaplan’s award of $28.5 million amounted to 8.2 percent of the $346 million settlement fund, rather than the 13 percent the lawyers sought.
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