These budgets are generally always tight, and they are subject to oversight and accountability review.  In either context, litigation budgets have to make sense, and they should never put the client in a budget crisis.  For these reasons, we try to tailor an appropriate approach to each client situation.  At the end of of our representation, our goal is for our client to say that it received not only the best result, but the one that made the most commercial and budgetary sense.

    We recognize that legal fees are expensive: sometimes absurdly so.  This can be particularly true in litigation involving large, institutional law firms where billable time is required by quota, dictates the personal compensation of the generating attorney, and is often charged at high rates that do not necessarily reflect the experience or effectiveness of the billing attorney.  Our firm’s philosophy, and our approach to handling litigation and disputes cost effectively is, in large part, a response to our experiences as members of institutional law firms and our experiences dealing with them as opposing counsel.  We believe we provide better, more flexible, and more responsive representation at a fraction of the cost and at reasonable billing rates.   Our firm is “AV” rated by Martindale-Hubbell.  

    We assume our cases will be resolved by the trier of fact instead of through mediation or settlement negotiation, and we develop them accordingly. We do not build cases with an eye toward settlement.  Good settlements come from being prepared for trial.  We also do not “litigate” for the sake of litigating.  We emphasize effective and aggressive discovery, hands on fact finding, witness development, and evidence gathering and preservation.  We do not engage in wasteful discovery or motion practice.  Motions must be cost effective when weighed against their likely result and their potential to have a positive impact on the case.  We develop facts and trial issues early, understand what we have to prove and disprove, and stay driven yet flexible in how we accomplish that.  We use cutting edge trial presentation software in all trials.

All law firms say they are dedicated to providing high quality, cost effective representation, yet complaints of the opposite persist. Here is why we are different, and why we mean it. We recognize that businesses and governments are going to have legal expenses. These expenses have to be predictable, controlled and properly budgeted. A business should never be affected more by litigation fees than it might have been by the defense of a claim, nor should it pursue a claim that realistically will result in a loss. The same principles apply in the context of state and municipal government, where budgets are managed at the agency or department level.