“Burford should make clear what role it’s playing in other cases and release its funding agreements,” Morris said. “From the moment it invested, Burford had the ability to control key litigation decisions,” Nathan Morris, an official at the Chamber’s Institute for Legal Reform, said via email. The US Chamber of Commerce and others have been pushing states and courts to require disclosure of third-party funding. Litigation finance critics have long accused funders of pulling the strings on lawsuits in which they invest, prolonging cases and clogging up courts. The court that is hearing the price-fixing cases has yet to weigh in on the companies’ request to hand the claims over to Burford. Sysco discharged Boies Schiller alleging that their attorney conspired with Burford to block settlements.Īntitrust claims can be assigned in this way, according to lawyers not involved in the case, subject to court approval. Sysco’s original law firm Boies Schiller Flexner will represent Burford’s affiliate in the claims along with Seeger Weiss. The companies resolved the fight with Sysco agreeing to assign Burford its legal claims against the food suppliers, substituting a Burford entity as the plaintiff in the price-fixing lawsuits.
Sysco sued Burford in March, accusing the funder of meddling in the price-fixing suits, interfering with Sysco’s trial counsel, and blocking a settlement Burford deemed “too low.”īurford said Sysco gave it veto authority over the settlement talks-power that Burford says it normally doesn’t have-after Sysco violated the terms of the funding agreement. It also highlighted concerns that funders are actually calling the shots on how those cases are handled. The fight offered a peek inside the shadowy world of litigation funding, a $13.5 billion industry in which outside investors pool money to bet on lawsuits. “This case got all the attention that it got because it’s an opportunity for people to hate on legal finance.”
“Everybody wins,” said Tom Baker, law professor at University of Pennsylvania.
Burford is taking full control of price-fixing lawsuits it funded for Sysco, which gets Sysco out of messy legal fights with its suppliers. The companies told a court last week that they squashed their dispute. and litigation funder Burford Capital over a $140 million deal appears to have ended with both sides getting what they wanted. The public fight between food giant Sysco Corp.
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