WASHINGTON (Legal Newsline) - The law firm Mintz Levin is tired of spending time and money on an issue it feels was resolved when litigants did not request another deposition of one of its attorneys and a legal malpractice case against it was dismissed.
The firm filed a motion to quash a subpoena Aug. 9 in Washington, D.C., federal court, as the trustee of the bankruptcy of Atherotech, a failed clinical laboratory and diagnostics company, continues to seek answers.
Atherotech hired Mintz Levin and partner Hope Foster to give advice related to the payment to physicians of processing and handling (P&H) fees by it and competitors. Atherotech paid physicians $7 per specimen, while other companies paid up to $20.
In 2014, the Office of Inspector General of the Department of Health and Human Services issued a fraud alert that said P&H fees were potentially illegal. Atherotech stopped paying them, but went bankrupt two years later.
The bankruptcy trust deposed Foster regarding her representation. It also sued Mintz Levin for legal malpractice but lost at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit last year.
Claims remain against other parties, and the trust now wants to question Mintz Levin after initially relying on Foster's deposition.
"Plaintiff’s effort to depose Mintz after having already examined Hope Foster in depth under the more generous procedures under Rule 2004 concerning substantially the same topics nearly five years ago is improper," the motion to quash says.
"This is heightened by the fact that Mintz endured three years of costly litigation in defense of Plaintiff’s meritless claims of legal malpractice."
Instead of a full deposition, the trust can rely on Foster's previous answers and the firm can respond to written deposition questions with affidavits, it says.