Excerpt from: The Recorder (click for full article)
When it comes to Herbalife, nothing seems to come without drama. Expensive, bitter drama.
Even as hedge fund titans wage a high-profile battle over the nutrition company and its finances, five law firms are heading to the First District Court of Appeal this month to wage a $3 million fee fight in what's been called the World War III of probate litigation.
On one side are business litigation firm Mitchell Silberberg & Knupp and solo practitioner Hillel Chodos. They're demanding payment for guarding the interests of Alexander Hughes, 21-year-old heir to a $400 million fortune bequeathed by Herbalife founder Mark Hughes, who died of an overdose in 2000.
On another side are the trustees, who say Mitchell Silberberg assigned 41 attorneys to the task of unseating them and failed. Even bringing in Chodos, who billed $1,000 an hour without keeping time records, didn't help their cause, say the trustees' lawyers at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld. What's more, they contend that Mitchell Silberberg and Chodos never cared about young Alex's interests. In reality, Akin Gump says, they were doing the bidding of his mother and guardian, Suzan Hughes, who's trying to wrest control of the trust for her own purposes after obtaining some $14 million in a divorce settlement.
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