Judith Regan, Would-Be O.J. Book Publisher, Sued by Former Counsel
Last year, the Dreier and Redniss and Associates law firms were representing high-profile publisher Judith Regan, perhaps best known for her controversial attempt to publish the O.J. Simpson book If I Did It in a much-publicized $100 million lawsuit.
This year, they are suing her, contending that she stiffed them on $42,560 in fees, not to mention their share of an undisclosed settlement she apparently received with the help of another attorney. Their complaint, which was filed in New York state court, contends Regan breached their representation agreement by not anteing up the money, including 25 percent of her settlement, reports Reuters.
So far, the two firms say they got a mere $125,000 for 1,240 hours of billable work, according to the New York Daily News.
Regan could not be reached by the news agency for comment. However, Bertram Fields, the lawyer hired by Regan to settle the $100 million suit with her former employers and a co-defendant in the new claim by her former counsel, “said he had not seen the lawsuit, but added that they had no reason to sue him,” Reuters reports.
As discussed in earlier ABAJournal.com posts, Regan sued her former employers, News Corp. and HarperCollins Publishers, in New York state court last year. Her action claimed defamation and breach of contract and was later settled on undisclosed terms. Regan contended in the suit, which sought $100 million in damages, that she had been fired on trumped-up charges of anti-Semitism after a firestorm of criticism over the Simpson book and a falling out with her employers over her potential assistance to authorities as a witness in a politically charged tax case.
Although Regan’s own HarperCollins imprint, ReganBooks, didn’t publish If I Did It after criticism of Simpson’s apparent profiteering from the murder of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, in 1994, it later went to press and became a best-seller. That was after the family of Ron Goldman, a male companion of Simpson who was murdered along with her, obtained rights to the book under a $33.5 million 1997 civil judgment in their wrongful-death case.
