Dying Lawyer Sues Own Firm

A lawyer who has terminal cancer has sued her law firm, claiming it won’t pay her the remaining $1.7 million she earned for working on the tobacco settlement because she is dying.

Janis L. Ettinger, 43, says her firm--Storch, Amini & Munves--has paid her $300,000 of the $2 million she earned as her share of the firm’s fee for representing New York City in the multibillion-dollar national tobacco litigation.

Storch, Amini & Munves said in a statement that the firm’s members have “great personal sympathy” for Ettinger and continue to pay her her salary and benefits but that she is not an equity holder in the company.