- Stack cases with unnecessary attorneys
- Inflate legal tasks with implausible time entries
- Submit billing statements with overlapping hours or physically impossible schedules
The company referred to the alleged billing irregularities as a “deliberate smokescreen” intended to overwhelm and evade scrutiny by automakers and the courts.
The Legal Landscape: Song-Beverly and RICO Collide California’s Lemon Law was designed to protect consumers from defective vehicles by ensuring they could obtain legal representation without financial barriers. Under the Song-Beverly Act, prevailing plaintiffs are entitled to recover “reasonable attorney’s fees” from manufacturers.
But Ford alleges that consumer protection became the pretext for systemic abuse.
By invoking RICO—a law typically used to dismantle organized crime networks—Ford signals its intent to treat this not as isolated misconduct, but a criminal conspiracy. RICO allows plaintiffs to seek triple damages and attorney fees if they can prove a pattern of racketeering activity involving fraud.
If Ford prevails, it could open the floodgates for other automakers to pursue similar claims and potentially reshape how legal fees are monitored in consumer rights litigation.
No Response From Defendants… Yet As of publication, none of the nine defendants have publicly responded to the lawsuit.
Implications for Legal Billing and Consumer Justice The case poses high stakes not only for the firms involved but for the broader Lemon Law bar and potentially all contingent fee practices.
“This isn’t just about Ford. If proven, these claims could spark a reckoning across contingency fee litigation,”Cunningham noted. “Every law firm billing under fee-shifting statutes could come under renewed scrutiny.”
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