If it’s Wednesday, Susman Godfrey is placing bets on lawsuits

At noon on Wednesdays, lawyers filter into a Houston conference room for one of the more dramatic regular meetings inside an American law firm.

One at a time, Susman Godfrey partners pitch colleagues on the next big lawsuit the firm should invest in. The colleagues poke holes. They probe the legal theory, question damages, ponder the jurisdiction. Then up to 150 lawyers, including those on Zoom, vote on whether to take the case.

“I wouldn’t call it a murder board,” Vineet Bhatia , one of the firm’s two managing partners, said of the weekly meeting in an interview. “It’s not a cake walk either.”

The unique vetting process plays a central role in the elite boutique litigation firm’s skyrocketing revenue. The firm has a knack for taking on cases that generate intense publicity and eye-popping results. The up-or-down Wednesday votes cost some of America’s best-known businesses billions in collective damages.

Successfully picking winners has made the firm’s lawyers some of the highest paid in the country. Profits of nearly $7 million per partner in fiscal 2023 ranked Susman Godfrey fourth among the 100 largest law operations by revenue, according to American Lawyer data. The boutique topped the latest bonus scale set by Cravath, Swaine & Moore and doled out bonuses ranging from $140,000 to $360,000 to its associates.

Fortress’ Billions Quietly Power America's Biggest Legal Fights

The easy explanation for how Fortress Investment Group worked its way to the top of the polarizing, opaque business of litigation funding would be: It has a ton of money.

With about $6.6 billion committed to legal assets, Fortress backs law firms behind some of history’s biggest mass tort suits, such as the Roundup cases against Bayer AG and talcum powder litigation against Johnson & Johnson. It funds other litigation funders.

And with another $2.9 billion committed to intellectual property, the asset-management giant claims to be the world’s largest institutional investor in patents.

But its secret may be its intensity and a meticulous streak that comes with all of that money.

“We’re a tough counterparty if you don’t do what you say you’re gonna do,” Jack Neumark, a Fortress managing partner and co-CIO, said during a nearly three-hour interview in which Fortress discussed litigation finance activities in depth for the first time. “We see where funds go. If you do something you’re not supposed to do, we’re gonna be upset.”

Mass tort firms are a huge part of Fortress’ law lending and have emerged as an increasingly popular area for litigation funders. What started as $5 million to $10 million investments in single commercial cases has grown into loans exceeding $100 million to law firms for their entire caseloads. It’s a built-in diversified portfolio that hedges risk.

Outten & Golden Defends Dropping Columbia Professor Over Israel-Gaza Speech

Employment law firm Outten & Golden, facing a complaint for dropping its representation of a Columbia Law School professor, said it decided not to handle employee speech matters tied to the Israel-Gaza conflict.

“We did this after much consideration, and with the good of our firm and the well-being of our diverse workforce in mind,” Outten & Golden said in a statement.

The professor, Katherine Franke, filed a complaint Sept. 10 with the Attorney Grievance Committee in New York saying that about two months earlier, Outten & Golden had “out of nowhere” told her it was dropping her as a client. Franke said she had signed a retainer agreement in February for the firm to represent her in a harassment complaint she faced at Columbia over comments she made in a TV interview over student protests.

Outten & Golden, which according to its website specializes in protecting and promoting employee rights, said in its statement that “because of the unique nature of the Israel-Gaza conflict, and the immense passion and pain that it can conjure, the firm made the deliberate decision not to handle matters arising from employee speech related to the conflict.”

Franke took to X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, to discuss her complaint. “How OuttenGolden treated me is part of a larger profession-wide problem, a McCarthy-ite reprisal against anyone who defends the dignity and rights of Palestinians,” she said in one of her posts.

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