Neuman Anderson principal Kenneth Neuman rang in 2014 with a substantial jury verdict in a case that graced the pages of Crain’s Detroit Business, in an article entitled, Attorney and Birmingham Commission Member Found Liable in Civil Embezzlement Case.
According to the article:
Birmingham Mayor Pro Tem Stuart Sherman could pay more than $335,000 to Troy-based Jacob & Weingarten PC, after jurors found he had committed conversion and embezzlement from the law firm he worked for shortly before his departure a year ago.
Jurors in a weeklong civil lawsuit trial before Oakland County Circuit Judge Michael Warren made that finding Monday over a $112,745.22 check that Sherman, a shareholder and treasurer at the firm until December 2012, wrote to himself Dec. 26, 2012. That check, drawing on law firm funds at Huntington National Bank, is ostensibly “per (a) compensation formula,” at the firm, according to a handwritten memo note.
A central issue in the trial was attorney fees paid in Sherman’s representation of Barry Bess, an attorney at Southfield-based Seyburn Kahn PC who was removed as trustee of three trusts at Oakland County Probate Court by Judge Daniel O’Brien on Dec. 3, 2012.
Bess wrote several checks to the firm in late November totaling about $394,000 to the firm out of those three trusts, even though the trust beneficiaries had alleged breaches of fiduciary duty and had sought to have Bess removed as a trustee since 2011.
The firm later refunded that $394,000, and attempted to withdraw from representing Bess — although several other payments to Jacob & Weingarten are still in dispute before the Michigan Court of Appeals. O’Brien later appointed Jon Angell of Troy-based Angell & Co. PLLC to manage those trusts.
The attorney for the law firm in the dispute said Sherman acted in the opposite way he was instructed.
“This payment to himself (Sherman) was in contravention of what the firm’s board had told him. The management told him this wasn’t exactly the most ethical circumstance for receiving payment and we may have to return this money, or be sure we have court approval for this,” said Kenneth Neuman, partner at Birmingham-based Neuman Anderson PC and attorney for the Jacob & Weingarten firm at trial.
“The probate court ruled the money was improper and all of it had to be returned. And my client’s decision, in saying we’re not going to pay you (to Sherman), was contravened.”
The $335,000 jury award represents the first jury case in all of 2014 in Oakland County, allowing Neuman Anderson to pick up right where the firm left off in 2013, successfully representing clients in a wide range of litigation disputes.
Neuman Anderson is frequently called upon to represent other attorneys and law firms, as well as professionals in a wide range of disciplines, including doctors, engineers, architects, builders, accountants, real estate brokers, etc. We are complimented by the confidence our peers have in hiring Neuman Anderson as their strategic litigation partner to handle their complex business litigation issues, as we successfully did in this matter.