By Carmen Finestra Santa Monica
Michael Nourmand, the attorney who represented the pregnant female part-time driver who won a discrimination suit against the Big Blue Bus line (“Pregnant pause continues,” Dec. 28), despite the fact that she had preventable accidents on her driving record, sounds like an extortionist. His legal fees of $400,000 are ludicrous for a case like this.
The fact that the plaintiff was awarded $177,000 in the judgment and he was not being paid on a contingency basis tells me he intended to charge unduly high fees in hopes of winning and soaking the city. There’s no way the plaintiff would ever have been able to pay him... and he knew that.
The fact that the court allowed those fees tells us all we have to know about our present legal system, and why malpractice insurance has made the cost of doing business and health costs soar.
I want City Deputy Attorney Rohr to continue to appeal, regardless of Nourmand’s threatening public statements that Santa Monica should pay up because the 7 percent interest now being charged is going to hurt the taxpayers in the end.
Michael Nourmand and people like (him) are the reason the taxpayers suffer.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on December 29, 2007. Read the original PDF.