attorney fees

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo vetoed a bill that would have required government agencies to obey a 90-day limit to appeal court decisions in favor of people requesting information under New York's Freedom of Information Law, The New York Times' Jesse McKinley reports. However, the governor issued an executive order that essentially reversed his veto of the bill, setting a 60-day window for a legal response by government agencies except for "'extremely complex matters or extraordinary circumstances outside agency control.'"

Cuomo also vetoed a bill that would have allowed courts to order legal fees in favor of people who request information

Companies including Dole and Ancestry.com are souring on Delaware as the place of their incorporation, The Wall Street Journal's Liz Hoffman reports: "Dole is one of several companies that say the state has become less hospitable toward business. Among their gripes: a growing tide of shareholder litigation, which some feel the state hasn’t done enough to curb. One new measure bars companies from shifting their legal fees to shareholders who sue and lose—a boon to would-be plaintiffs."

One of the main complaints from Dole and Ancestry.com is against appraisal suits, which require companies to pay interest on the value of all claims disputing the price paid.

Delaware is the legal home to 54 percent of public companies, and the Delaware Court of Chancery has had its filings increase by 20 percent between 2003 and 2012, the WSJ reports.

It is unclear who will pay the fees for the attorneys who have been negotiating settlements of Superstorm Sandy insurance cases, The New York Law Journal's Andrew Keshner reports. The Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Emergency Management Agency say that they are not statutorily authorized to pay legal fees to plaintiffs' lawyers. But insurance carriers don't want to pay the fees out of concern that they could face qui tam whistleblower suits. Eastern District Magistrate Judges Cheryl Pollak, Ramon Reyes, Jr. and Gary Brown, the trio tasked with facilitating case resolution, held a hearing this week to resolve the fee and other issues, Keshner reports. The judges said they would restart mediation if the fee and other issues can't be resolved.

The Ohio Supreme Court ruled last week that a prosecutor must pay attorney fees to The Cincinnati Enquirer for withholding 911 recordings, that newspaper's Kevin Grasha reports. The prosecutor did not have legal authority to withhold the recordings from a murder case, the court ruled, and must pay attorney fees to the newspaper.

Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Mary Jo White expressed concern this week about corporate bylaws that force shareholders to pick up legal bills if they lose their lawsuits against boards of directors, Reuters reports. The Delaware Supreme Court upheld that sort of bylaws in May, even though, under the "American rule," each litigant normally has to pay for its own legal costs.

The city of Chicago has beaten the argument that it impermissibly ceded its police power to the law firm it retained to prosecute a lawsuit on the city's behalf alleging that five drugmakers engaged in highly deceptive marketing of opioid painkillers, The Litigation Daily's Scott Flaherty reports. The drug companies argued that the firm's interest in earning a contingency fee from any recovery created a conflict that stripped the defendants of their due process rights. A federal judge ruled that because the city retains control over the litigation of the case the retention of a private law firm didn't violate the rights of the defendants.

The New York Court of Appeals has ruled that South Brooklyn Legal Services is not entitled to recover attorney fees from the Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance under the New York Equal Access to Justice Act when it got a client's monthly shelter allowance restored to a higher amount, the New York Law Journal's Joel Stashenko reports.

The Equal Access to Justice Act "was intended to employ the 'catalyst' theory, under which litigants are to be rewarded with payment of attorney fees if their cases were the catalyst behind change in policy or correction of the complained-about action," Stashenko writes. The appellate court didn't reach the issue of whether the catalyst theory applies to the Equal Access to Justice Act, so one advocate said the theory does apply in the First Department because the Appellate Division, First Department, ruled in favor of the theory.