Opinion ID: 4502478
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: All Services Will Be Billed. You will be billed

Text: at the hourly rate set forth in paragraph 3C for all services rendered. This includes telephone calls (minimum charge of 6 minutes), dictating and reviewing letters, travel time to and from meetings and the Court, legal research, negotiations and any other service relating to this matter. Client hereby gives the Law Firm a continuing lien on the client’s claim and the proceeds thereof for the amount of the attorney’s fees, out-of-pocket expenses, and costs for which the client is obligated under this agreement. The attorney’s lien is given by the client pursuant to New Jersey [Statutes] Annotated Title 2A:13-5. 7 4. Costs and Expenses. In addition to legal fees, you must pay the following costs and expenses: experts’ fees, court costs, accountants’ fees, appraisers’ fees, service fees, investigators’ fees, deposition costs, messenger services, photocopying charges, telephone toll calls, postage and any other necessary expenses in this matter. The Law Firm may require that expert(s) be retained directly by you. You would then be solely responsible to pay the expert(s). 5. Bills. The Law Firm will send you itemized bills from time to time. The Law Firm may require that costs and expenses (see paragraph 4) be paid in advance. All bills for costs and legal expenses are due upon receipt and failure to pay will waive any discounts. You will be charged interest at a monthly rate of one and onehalf percent (1 1/2%) on any remaining balance not paid within thirty (30) days from the date of the bill. If an outstanding balance necessitates collection efforts . . . the Law Firm will be paid its legal fees for collecting same. Further, at the Law Firm’s discretion, it may either use the rates which were current when the services were performed and adding interest at the regular rate for paying clients or using the rate current at the time the payment is made. By October 2012, Balducci had paid the $7500 minimum retainer. Balducci accepted her financial obligation to pay the expenses and, over the next three years, paid approximately $18,000 to $19,000 for the cost of experts’ fees, depositions, photocopies, and other items. The expenses that Cige claimed were still due, however, exceeded those payments. 8 In 2013, Balducci received invoices reflecting the hourly legal fees owed and became very upset. She called Cige, who explained that he forwarded the invoices only because of his legal obligation to keep track of his billing. He also confided that he was “padding” the bills, stating that the school board would be responsible for the legal fees after the successful conclusion of the case. Because of her expressed discomfort at receiving the invoices, he agreed to stop sending them. By early 2015, Balducci became dissatisfied with Cige’s handling of the case. Cige saddled her with the preparatory work for depositions while he spent time at chess tournaments, and he was not adequately prepared for the depositions. The mounting expenses also made her anxious. In September 2015, Balducci received an invoice for $12,400.61 in unpaid expenses, and Cige estimated that his legal fees totaled $200,000. The school board rejected Balducci’s first settlement demand of $3,500,000. After consulting with an expert in bullying cases, Cige approximated the value of the case at somewhere between $500,000 and $700,000. By October 2015, weighed down by the multiplying expenses and disenchanted with her attorney, Balducci retained a law firm willing to front the expenses and terminated Cige’s services. Only at that point did Cige 9 inform her that she was responsible for the payment of his hourly fees, which, by February 9, 2016, had climbed to $270,791.22. Cige’s Testimony Cige gave a very different account of his relationship with Balducci and the terms of their agreement. He began by stating that he had “more than twenty-five years of experience litigating [LAD] cases” and had “some experience in bullying law.” He had tried ten to twelve jury trials and fifteen to twenty non-jury trials. He also had represented a Somerville high school student in a bullying case against a board of education, though he had never tried a bullying case to conclusion. Cige had lectured on subjects such as LAD and disability discrimination as well as bullying, but was not designated a certified civil trial attorney. Balducci was not a close social acquaintance, however Cige had successfully represented her in a litigated matter. According to Cige, under the retainer agreement, he was entitled to the greater of three alternate methods of calculating his fee: (1) his hourly rate multiplied by the number of hours worked; (2) a contingent fee of 37 1/2% of both the net recovery and any award of statutory attorney’s fees; or (3) an award of statutory attorney’s fees. Cige maintained that Balducci had the responsibility to pay his hourly fees, 10 regardless of whether the case prevailed. He denied making any statement to Balducci that conflicted with the written terms of the retainer agreement. Cige asserted that Balducci reviewed the retainer agreement in his office and that he asked her if she had any questions before she signed it. Cige, however, admitted that he did not inform Balducci of the potential value of the case, of the potential litigation expenses, or of the estimated financial obligation she would bear if the litigation did not succeed. Nor did he detail the billing rates for expenses in the retainer agreement. Instead, he later forwarded a letter to Balducci indicating that he billed “$0.25 per page for photocopies, $1.00 per email, $1.00 per fax, $0.55 per mile, and $25.00 for New Jersey Lawyers Service.” The expenses for the emails -- $1.00 for every email sent or received -- amounted to just over $1700 and were in addition to the hourly rate he charged. Photocopying costs represented almost $12,000 of the nearly $16,000 in expenses owed to Cige at the time his services were terminated. Cige tendered to the school board a $3,500,000 settlement demand, a figure he thought high, to comply with his client’s wishes. He believed the case had substantial value because Balducci’s son had suffered severe harm from the bullying. He did not discuss with Balducci the settlement value in other cases, because the unique facts of each case do not permit reliable 11 comparisons. By letter dated September 3, 2015, Cige advised Balducci that he estimated the settlement value of her son’s case to be between $500,000 and $700,000 and that a successful trial would probably yield between $1,000,000 and $1,200,000. He also indicated to her that the settlement value would increase as the legal fees increased. Balducci’s dissatisfaction with his representation manifested itself after his estimate of the case’s value did not meet her expectations and after she received invoices for outstanding expenses. On January 19, 2016, months after his services were terminated, Cige advised Balducci that she still owed $15,955.45 in expenses. Approximately three weeks later, Balducci forwarded a check in the amount of $6122.62 for the expenses she considered valid. Cige responded two days later, informing Balducci that in addition to the outstanding expenses, she owed legal fees totaling $270,791.22. On March 10, 2016, Balducci initiated fee arbitration. The Fee Arbitration Committee, however, declined jurisdiction because the amount in dispute exceeded $100,000. Thereafter, Balducci filed the declaratoryjudgment complaint. 12