Anaheim to Be Asked to OK LeBoeuf Work

The Anaheim City Council will be asked tonight to hire retroactively a law firm that recently paid $45 million to settle a malpractice lawsuit over its role as bond counsel in the Orange County bankruptcy four years ago.

The council will be asked to approve payment for the work done by LeBoeuf, Lamb, Greene & MacRae--authorized by the city attorney--in handling a wrongful termination case brought against the city.

LeBoeuf’s settlement with the county in the nation’s biggest municipal bankruptcy resulted in one of the largest malpractice payments by a law firm. The firm represented the county before its December 1994 loss of $1.64 billion in public funds through risky investments.

Anaheim City Atty. Jack L. White said he authorized Richard Terzian, an attorney in LeBoeuf’s Los Angeles office, to begin work May 8 representing the city and a supervisor in the wrongful-termination suit brought by an Anaheim Convention Center employee. The suit was recently settled.

“I don’t disqualify someone just because of something that happened in the past,” White said.

But Orange County Supervisor William G. Steiner, the remaining board member from pre-bankruptcy days, said any firm involved enough in the county’s financial collapse to pay a $45-million settlement shouldn’t expect public business from Orange County any time soon.

“Have they lost their minds?” Steiner said of Anaheim officials. “For those of us in the eye of the storm, I would never want to work with these firms again. My concern is that people have short memories.”

LeBoeuf attorneys provided legal counsel to Orange County for more than $1 billion in borrowings used by convicted former Treasurer-Tax Collector Robert L. Citron to gamble on some of Wall Street’s riskiest securities.

Terzian said he shouldn’t be blacklisted because of the involvement of other attorneys. He said he joined the firm in 1995.

“The only thing that should be an issue is who is capable of doing the job,” said Terzian, who charged $225 an hour for his work on the lawsuit.

Treasurer-Tax Collector John M.W. Moorlach, who replaced Citron, said Monday the firm has paid its penance.

“There has to be a time when we say it’s over, let’s move forward,” he said.