The client in question is Alberto Safra, son of the late Joseph Safra, whose $23 billion fortune has apparently spawned the kind of family dispute that keeps elite litigators very, very busy. Safra hired WilmerHale to represent him in that fight, and over the course of two years, the meter ran up to $35 million, with $18.9 million still outstanding.<\/p>\n
Safra has now gone to London\u2019s High Court to challenge the invoices, triggering judicial scrutiny of the firm\u2019s charges. And according to the court\u2019s findings, there are some choice<\/em> entries.<\/p>\n We\u2019re talking about a single day where WilmerHale billed more than $162,000. We\u2019re talking about top partners charging as much as $2,095 per hour \u2014 a tidy $265\/hour increase from what had been agreed just 15 months earlier. And we\u2019re talking about Washington, D.C. partner John Trenor logging 19.3 hours in a single day, while nine timekeepers collectively racked up 130.2 hours in one 24-hour stretch. (Hope everyone remembered to hydrate.)<\/p>\n The real legal issue isn\u2019t just whether the bills are eye-popping, but whether they\u2019re insulated from challenge. WilmerHale argued that its arrangement with Safra constituted a \u201ccontentious business agreement\u201d (CBA), a statutory mechanism under English law that can shield legal fees from court assessment.<\/p>\n But the court wasn\u2019t buying everything WilmerHale was throwing down.<\/p>\n Judge Leonard zeroed in on the firm\u2019s ability to unilaterally increase its hourly rates, something he found \u201cirreconcilable\u201d with the CBA framework. The court found that WilmerHale increased rates twice during the retainer period without notifying Safra, calling it \u201can evident failure to give adequate costs information.\u201d<\/p>\n On the positive side for the Biglaw firm, Judge Leonard acknowledged that Trenor and his team \u201cworked extremely hard, under substantial pressure, to help the claimant achieve his goals\u201d and that the hours billed were \u201cexplained\u201d and \u201ccommensurate with the scale of work.\u201d He also noted that WilmerHale\u2019s rates were broadly comparable to other advisers in the matter and that the increases were \u201clargely inflation-based.\u201d<\/p>\n So now the Biglaw bills are under the microscope with Judge Leonard\u2019s assessment headed Wilmer\u2019s way.<\/p>\n The post WilmerHale\u2019s $35M Bill Comes Under Fire<\/a> appeared first on Above the Law<\/a>.<\/p>\n Biglaw billing drama is usually a closed-door affair, but every now and then, the curtain gets yanked back. And when it does, the numbers are\u2026 not subtle.<\/p>\n As reported by<\/a> Law.com, that\u2019s exactly what\u2019s happening to WilmerHale, which is now staring down some very public scrutiny over a $35 million legal bill that has a judge in London raising an eyebrow\u2026 and ordering a full-on assessment.<\/p>\n The client in question is Alberto Safra, son of the late Joseph Safra, whose $23 billion fortune has apparently spawned the kind of family dispute that keeps elite litigators very, very busy. Safra hired WilmerHale to represent him in that fight, and over the course of two years, the meter ran up to $35 million, with $18.9 million still outstanding.<\/p>\n Safra has now gone to London\u2019s High Court to challenge the invoices, triggering judicial scrutiny of the firm\u2019s charges. And according to the court\u2019s findings, there are some choice<\/em> entries.<\/p>\n We\u2019re talking about a single day where WilmerHale billed more than $162,000. We\u2019re talking about top partners charging as much as $2,095 per hour \u2014 a tidy $265\/hour increase from what had been agreed just 15 months earlier. And we\u2019re talking about Washington, D.C. partner John Trenor logging 19.3 hours in a single day, while nine timekeepers collectively racked up 130.2 hours in one 24-hour stretch. (Hope everyone remembered to hydrate.)<\/p>\n The real legal issue isn\u2019t just whether the bills are eye-popping, but whether they\u2019re insulated from challenge. WilmerHale argued that its arrangement with Safra constituted a \u201ccontentious business agreement\u201d (CBA), a statutory mechanism under English law that can shield legal fees from court assessment.<\/p>\n But the court wasn\u2019t buying everything WilmerHale was throwing down.<\/p>\n Judge Leonard zeroed in on the firm\u2019s ability to unilaterally increase its hourly rates, something he found \u201cirreconcilable\u201d with the CBA framework. The court found that WilmerHale increased rates twice during the retainer period without notifying Safra, calling it \u201can evident failure to give adequate costs information.\u201d<\/p>\n On the positive side for the Biglaw firm, Judge Leonard acknowledged that Trenor and his team \u201cworked extremely hard, under substantial pressure, to help the claimant achieve his goals\u201d and that the hours billed were \u201cexplained\u201d and \u201ccommensurate with the scale of work.\u201d He also noted that WilmerHale\u2019s rates were broadly comparable to other advisers in the matter and that the increases were \u201clargely inflation-based.\u201d<\/p>\n So now the Biglaw bills are under the microscope with Judge Leonard\u2019s assessment headed Wilmer\u2019s way.<\/p>\n Biglaw billing drama is usually a closed-door affair, but every now and then, the curtain gets yanked back. And when it does, the numbers are\u2026 not subtle. As reported by Law.com, that\u2019s exactly what\u2019s happening to WilmerHale, which is now staring down some very public scrutiny over a $35 million legal bill that has a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":148575,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-148603","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-above_the_law"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/xira.com\/p\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/IMG_5243-1-scaled-e1623338814705-620x568-ZJCh3S.jpg?fit=620%2C568&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148603","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=148603"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148603\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/148575"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=148603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=148603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=148603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast<\/a>, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer<\/a>. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her<\/a> with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter @Kathryn1<\/a>\u00a0or Mastodon @Kathryn1@mastodon.social.<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/abovethelaw.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2016\/06\/GettyImages-med411024-300x300.jpg?resize=300%2C300&ssl=1\" "\\"\\"")
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\nKathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast<\/a>, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer<\/a>. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her<\/a> with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter @Kathryn1<\/a>\u00a0or Mastodon @[email\u00a0protected].<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"