DEAL & SUITS

the government in breach of trust; that decision was upheld on appeal two years later. Final settlement talks heated up last July, days after the same appeals court reversed a $456 million award.

Under the settlement, which at press time awaited court and congressional approvals, the government will pay $1.4 billion to the trust holders and spend another $2 billion buying back tribal lands.

For plaintiff Elouise P. Cobell et al. The Law Offices of Dennis M. Gingold: Dennis Gingold. (He is in Washington, D.C.) The Law Offices of Thaddeus Holt: Thaddeus Holt. (He is in Point Clear, Alabama.) Holt was tapped by Gingold. Kilpatrick Stockton: G. William Austin III, Adam Charnes, William Dorris, Keith Harper, Elliot Levitas, Ronald Raider, David Smith, David Zacks, and associate Justin Guilder. (Austin, Harper, and Guilder are in Washington, D.C.; Charnes and Smith are in Winston-Salem, North Carolina; and the rest are in Atlanta.)

can assets. The sale was approved on September 20, 2008, by Manhattan federal bankruptcy court judge James Peck and closed two days later.

The Lehman estate claims that the deal was secretly structured to give Barclays a windfall profit, which was never disclosed to the court, to Lehman’s attorneys, or to its board. According to the estate’s complaint, Lehman negotiators agreed to give Barclays an undisclosed $5 billion discount off the book value of the assets transferred to the bank, as well as billions of dollars in assets demanded by Barclays for no additional consideration. After the court approved the deal, the Lehman estate contends, Barclays was permitted to keep billions in excess collateral from a terminated repurchase agreement and another $5 billion transferred to the bank after the sale hearing. Lehman also alleges that Barclays reneged on bonus agreements and paid only a fraction of other liabilities it promised to assume.

Barclays contends that there were no secret negotiations, and that it was always clear about its intention to record profits on the deal. It further claims that Lehman still owes Barclays billions of dollars.

For plaintiff Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. (New York) Jones Day: David Carden, Robert Gaffey, Robert Hamilton, David Heiman, William Hine, Lisa Laukitis, Jayant Tambe, and associates Kelly Carrero, Bridget Crawford, Jennifer Del Medico, Bart Green, Terry McMahon, Tracy Schaffer, and George Spencer. (Hamilton is in Columbus, Heiman is in Cleveland, and the rest are in New York.)

For plaintiff the Official Creditors Committee Quinn Emanuel Urquhart Oliver & Hedges: Susheel Kirpalani, Erica Taggart, and James Tecce. ( Taggart is in Los Angeles; the others are in New York.)

For defendant United States of America
In-House:

At the attorney general’s office: associate attorney general Thomas Perrelli, deputy assistant attorney general Michael Hertz, and counsel Brian Hauck. At the commercial litigation branch, civil division: director J. Christopher Kohn, deputy director Robert Kirschman, Jr., senior trial counsel John Stemplewicz, and trial attorney Michael Quinn. At the U.S. Department of the Interior: solicitor Hilary Tompkins.

—IREnE PLAGIAnoS

IN RE LEHMAN BROTHERS
HOLDINGS

In a trio of suits, the Lehman Brothers Inc. estate, its creditors, and the trustee charged with liquidating its assets are going after Barclays Capital. The plaintiffs claim that billions of dollars in Lehman assets were improperly transferred to Barclays, the British bank, following its acquisition of Lehman’s broker-dealer business in 2008.