Attorneys
from
Boies
Schiller,
Quinn
Emanuel,
and
Ropes
&
Gray
are
on
a
federal
judge’s
shit
list.
The
trio
of
firms
work
on
behalf
of
Servicios
Funerarios
GG
in
its
suit
against
private
equity
firm
Advent
International
Corp.
in
a
case
involving
the
sale
of
a
Mexican
funeral
company,
Grupo
Gayosso.
And
Judge
Indira
Talwani
of
the
District
of
Massachusetts
isn’t
happy
with
the
Biglaw
firms.
In
a
hearing
on
Friday,
she
ripped
into
the
attorneys
for
over-litigating
the
case
—
and
necessarily
running
up
those
legal
fees.
As
reported
by
Law360:
The
judge
said
seemingly
endless
motions
and
filings
in
the
case
had
the
effect
of
relitigating
points
and
appeared
to
be
“an
effort
to
try
to
gum
up
the
works.”“I
don’t
understand
how
11
lawyers
can
jointly
make
what
we
are
doing
here
difficult,”
Judge
Talwani
said.
“It
is
not
serving
you
well
—
your
clients
paying
your
bills
—
and
I
do
want
you
to
pass
this
message
to
your
client:
In
order
to
try
to
keep
your
bills
down,
it
would
be
helpful
to
try
and
figure
out
whether
there
are
some
things
that
don’t
have
to
be
fought
about.”“That
might
serve
your
clients,”
the
judge
added.
“It
might
not
serve
your
pocketbooks,
and
you
can
tell
your
clients
that
was
my
comment.”
Not
the
kind
of
comments
you
want
to
see
on
record.
Now,
admittedly,
it’s
a
complicated
case
with
arrest
warrants,
sanctions
motions,
finagling
over
deposition
dates,
so
many
delays
and
lots
of
entries
on
the
docket.
That
seemed
to
be
the
tipping
point
for
the
judge.
Judge
Talwani
complained
Friday
that
the
parties’
efforts
to
confer
on
issues
have
been
of
little
help
to
her
court’s
management
of
the
docket.
A
pair
of
letters
filed
an
hour
before
the
status
conference
appeared
to
spark
the
judge’s
public
fuming
and
dressing
down
of
the
attorneys.Lawyers
for
Advent
International
sent
the
court
a
letter
explaining
they
had
conferred
with
Servicios
about
a
timeline
that
would
govern
how
the
case
advanced
through
the
end
stages
of
fact
discovery,
expert
witnesses
and
pretrial
dispositive
motions.
It
said
Advent
and
Servicios
disagreed
on
the
exact
schedule,
and
it
then
attached
a
table
that
included
only
Advent’s
proposal.Half
an
hour
later,
Servicios
also
filed
a
letter
outlining
its
proposed
schedule,
including
a
May
trial
date.“I’m
just
not
sure
why
it
wouldn’t
occur
to
you,
just
give
me
that
on
one
single
piece
of
paper,”
the
judge
said.
Boies
Schiller
attorney
Carlos
Sires
said
their
client
“shares
the
court’s
frustration”
—
and
they’re
the
ones
footing
the
bill.
Kathryn
Rubino
is
a
Senior
Editor
at
Above
the
Law,
host
of
The
Jabot
podcast,
and
co-host
of
Thinking
Like
A
Lawyer.
AtL
tipsters
are
the
best,
so
please
connect
with
her.
Feel
free
to
email
her
with
any
tips,
questions,
or
comments
and
follow
her
on
Twitter
@Kathryn1 or
Mastodon
@[email protected].