LEGAL FIRM’S FEES QUESTIONED BY JUDGE IN AUSTRALIA’S MARATHON C7 MEDIA CASE
December 11th 2007 01:23
Australia’s Seven Network appeared before judge Ronald Sackville yesterday to fight the last costs claim from the long-running monumental C7 case in which Seven claimed a host of media rivals conspired to cause the collapse of its pay-TV channel C7.
Seven has already spent about $140 million on a failed Federal court battle and had since lodged an appeal against the decision.
But the Australian Financial Review reported yesterday that Justice Sackville decide it would be more sensible to resolve the last aspects of litigation before the appeal actually starts.
Seven only wants to pay $8.7 million of Telstra’s costs and produced an expert who yesterday gave evidence that only 30 percept of Telstra’s solicitors’ costs could be justified.
One leading legal firm billed Telstra 33,000 lawyer hours during the case, as well as work done by a host of other legal people.
The Australian Financial Review said that Justice Sackville asked the legal firm who it had engaged two experts who charged $210,000 to give advice on maters never pleaded by Seven.
“Why would you engage experts to deal with a non-pleaded case? That’s why you engage lawyers,” he said.
Justice Sackville reserved his decision on costs but hopes to hand it down before year-end.
- From MediaBlab by Peter Olszewski via Factiva
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