Wal-Mart Decision Hits Firm

As is typical of a major case dominating the news, Lawdragon 500 members are in the middle of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision rejecting the massive employment discrimination suit brought by Wal-Mart employees. Reuters did an article on perennial star Joseph Sellers and his firm, Cohen Milstein, which was lead counsel to the plaintiffs and had spent $5M in attorney time and $2M in experts and discovery work on the case, thanks in part to the two million pages of documents the plaintiffs team had to go through. All of that is “at risk,” Sellers said of the firm’s investment in the case. He said the firm received “overtures” from outside litigation funders but decided against that, and added that the court's decision will make it harder to get such funding for the smaller cases that move forward.

Still, Sellers later told the Times and other reporters that he will pursue EEOC claims, smaller class actions and individual discrimination cases: “Instead of one case, this case will be splintered into many pieces.” Sellers co-counsel on the case is fellow Lawdragon 500 member Brad Seligman of the Impact Fund, and their victorious opponent was another list-maker, Ted Boutrous of Gibson Dunn.