Legal Malpractice

Celebrity Litigation and Multi-Million Sanctions

By (Andrew Lavoott Bluestone)

It's not exactly legal malpractice and its not New York, but the headline and back story of this $ 1.96 Million sanction to Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison and Lowenstein Sandler shocks the eye.  Celebrity sues celebrity over an oral agreement to make a bequest.  This case ends in a finding of frivolity and the largest sanction we remember seeing.  Here is the story from Law.Com:

 "Bergen County, N.J., Superior Court Judge Ellen Koblitz doesn't seem too worried about sparing the reputations of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison and Lowenstein Sandler. In June, you'll recall, she found that the two firms had filed a frivolous suit on behalf of billionaire Ronald Perelman in a family dispute over hundreds of millions of dollars. On Friday she issued a final opinion , rejecting the firms' arguments for mercy and ordering them to pay $1.96 million in legal fees to the defendants, Perelman's former father-in-law and brother-in-law.

Full post as published by New York Attorney Malpractice Blog on August 26, 2010 (boomark / email).