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Ex-Girardi Keese Attys Fight Push For Contempt Order
Law360 (April 28, 2021, 4:41 PM EDT) Two ex-Girardi Keese PC attorneys have urged an Illinois federal court not to hold them in contempt for the firm s failure to follow a court order and issue settlement payments in plane crash litigation, arguing they can t be held liable for their former employer s actions.
Ex-Girardi Keese partners David Lira and Keith Griffin told the Northern District of Illinois in separate filings Tuesday that even if they could be held responsible, it would have been impossible for them to correctively issue settlement payments in the Lion Air Flight 610 crash suit, as they lacked the authority to do so from the.
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The warning signs about Tom Girardi flashed year after year, allegations that he skimmed settlement money, inflated costs, abandoned clients and cheated colleagues.
The vaunted Los Angeles trial lawyer, a regular on “Real Housewives of Beverly Hills,” and his firm were sued more than a hundred times between the 1980s and last year, with at least half of those cases asserting misconduct in his law practice.
Yet through it all, Girardi’s record with the State Bar of California, the government agency that regulates attorneys, remained pristine. The bar took no action to warn the public despite receiving what The Times has learned were multiple complaints. That spotless license allowed him to continue marketing himself as one of the nation’s most renowned civil lawyers, and to sign up thousands of new clients, some of whom would later say he absconded with millions of dollars of their settlement money.
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Contempt Hearing For Ex-Girardi Attys To Be Held In Person
Law360 (January 8, 2021, 3:46 PM EST) An Illinois federal judge said Friday he ll wait to hold a contempt hearing for two former Girardi Keese PC attorneys accused of covering up the alleged theft of $2 million in client settlement funds until it s safe enough to have the hearing in person.
U.S. District Judge Thomas M. Durkin said in a teleconferenced hearing he wants to hear live witness testimony before ruling on Edelson PC s bid to hold in contempt ex-Girardi Keese partners David Lira and Keith Griffin. The two attorneys are accused of covering for firm name partner Tom Girardi, who Edelson claims kept $2 million meant for.
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Ex-Clients: Girardi Firm Took Boeing Deals Without Consent
Law360 (December 17, 2020, 7:52 PM EST) Two Indonesian families who lost relatives in a 2018 Lion Air plane crash that killed 189 people are alleging the troubled plaintiffs firm Girardi Keese accepted a lowball settlement from Boeing for them without their permission, according to a motion filed in Illinois federal court this week.
The families claim former Girardi Keese partner David Lira, who left the firm earlier this year, confidentially settled the cases during a mediation session with retired Illinois state Judge Donald O Connell. Lira, the families say, claimed he had their express authority to settle the two cases, when he in fact did not. They said they fired the firm after.