Dec. 16, 2007 — One group of lawyers in the bankruptcy cases involving Jeffrey Prosser, former owner of Innovative Telephone, has collected close to $5 million in fees in the 12 months ending in July 2007, according to a report filed recently with the court.
The millions in payments went to the 11 law firms that have represented Prosser's primary holding company, Innovative Communication Corporation, the report said. It was filed by the court-appointed trustee for ICC, West Coast businessman Stan Springel.
There are at least four other groups of lawyers working on the case who have, collectively, billed millions more, the report stated. They are the lawyers for Prosser as an individual, those for the creditors, for the various court-appointed neutral parties such as Springel, and those for other interests. The latter includes bills from Jeffrey Moorhead, the Public Service Commission's hearing examiner — but in that instance the PSC has not answered the Source's questions about how much the bills are, or whether or not they will be paid.
The bills, if honored, would presumably be charged to Vitelco, as is the practice of the PSC.
The 11 firms representing ICC include eight from the mainland, and three from the Virgin Islands. The mainland firms were paid $4,220,397 in the reporting period while the V.I. ones got $517,782, an 8-to-1 ratio.
The three local firms were K.A. Rames, PC, of Christiansted, which was paid $236.361;
Dudley Clark & Chan, LLP, of St. Thomas, $221,421, and Thomas Alkon, PC, of St. Croix, $60,000.
In addition, in another part of Springel's report, there is a report of $7,700 paid to J'Ada Finch Sheen, the former V.I. attorney general and house counsel to ICC.
There is also a notation of a payment to "Lee Rohn Trust Account" of three payments of $4,831 each and a debt of $125,618 to that account. Ms. Rohn has repeatedly sued the Prosser interests on behalf of various clients. She currently has 17 pending cases against Prosser and his firms, according to another section of the Springel report.
The mainland firms collecting the most money from ICC in this period were the New York firm of Sherman & Sterling, LLP, for $2,276,329, and the Washington firm of Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, $1,250,000. Six other mainland law firms were paid lesser sums.
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