‘$1.1M attorneys’ fees in Malite case reasonable’

Superior Court Associate Judge Juan T. Lizama has found reasonable the $1.1 million in attorneys’ fees awarded to lawyers of the administrator of the Angel Malite estate that received $3.45 million in land compensation settlement from the government.

Lizama ruled that there is no indication that the attorneys’ fee agreement, which provided for a 33-percent contingency fee, violated the due process of the Malite estate.

The judge said he gave Malite estate administrator Jesus Tudela 10 days to object to the attorneys’ fee agreement, but Tudela submitted a waiver to any objection to such fees.

Lizama issued the determination in his order denying a motion objecting to the distribution of $1,138,500 in attorneys’ fees to administrator Tudela’s lawyers, Antonio Atalig and Reynaldo Yana.

The judge said movants Lourdes Rangamar, Rosa Malite, Romber Sinounou, and Angel Taman, who filed the motion through attorneys Matthew Smith and Steven Nutting, have no standing to object.

Lizama pointed out that there is no inherent unfairness in the attorneys’ fee agreement itself.

In their objection, the movants claimed that they had not received notice of the court’s approval of the attorneys’ fee agreement, and had thus been denied their due process rights to object to the distribution.

Lizama said the probate law provides for the appointment of a single administrator to settle all of the affairs of an estate.

Lizama said the purpose of appointing this administrator is to designate a party responsible for marshalling the assets of the estate, paying the debts of the decedent and estate, and distributing the residue of the estate to the legal heirs.

In this case, Lizama said, Tudela was the chosen representative of the Malite estate and he alone had standing to litigate claims on its behalf.

The judge noted that some of the same heirs now objecting to the distribution were in fact signatories to the attorneys’ fee agreement.

Further, Lizama said, as attorney Nutting took a role in negotiating the settlement, he must have been aware of the agreement.

“If Mr. Nutting’s clients objected to this central component of the settlement, surely Mr. Nutting could have filed a motion to intervene on their behalf,” Lizama said.

Although the civil action was open for many years, none of the movants even intervened, he said.

The case was finally settled, complete with attorneys’ fee agreement on March 13, 2006.

“The administrator was the only party representing the estate. No other individual intervened before the case was settled, in spite of ample opportunity to do so. These individuals cannot now claim that they have been denied due process,” the judge stressed.

Lizama, however, expressed concern that “objections may be based on personal opinions rather than concerns for due process.”

Lizama said that, although several attorneys have dabbled in the affairs of the Malite estate in the past few decades, only Atalig and Yana have achieved a meaningful settlement for the heirs.

“Insinuations that the services of Mr. Atalig and Mr. Yana are not worth the value agreed upon as part of the settlement imply a lack of respect for the judiciary and for fellow members of the Commonwealth Bar,” he said.

“The value of these services is a matter between the attorney and the client. Strangers to the attorney’s fee agreement have no business speculating on this value,” the judge added.

Lizama said he also observed that Nutting’s own motion for compensation of attorney’s fee seeks a total award of $114,345.

“The 84.7 hours that Mr. Nutting spent, late in the negotiations, are but a fraction of the hours Mr. Atalig has spent on this case in the past decade,” Lizama said.