Spector Files Suit Against Former Lawyer Over Fee

Legendary record producer Phil Spector wants his money back.

He claims in a lawsuit that his former attorney, Robert L. Shapiro, owes him at least a portion of the $1-million retainer he paid for legal counsel in his murder case.

But Shapiro says Spector actually owes him $500,000, according to the lawsuit.

The two men parted ways in February, when Spector brought in a new legal team, led by Leslie Abramson, to defend him against charges that, on Feb. 3, 2003, he fatally shot Lana Clarkson, a 40-year-old actress and nightclub hostess he had met earlier that evening.

Shapiro went to his friend’s aid the night of the killing. Spector was arrested at that time and released on $1 million bail; he was formally charged with murder in November. Since then, Shapiro has made a few brief court appearances in the case.

The lawsuit, filed Thursday in Los Angeles County Superior Court, alleges that Shapiro and his law firms -- Christensen, Miller, Fink, Jacobs, Glaser, Weil & Shapiro and the Law Offices of Robert L. Shapiro -- “took advantage of Mr. Spector and used his legal plight as an opportunity to unabashedly line their own pockets.”

Attorney Raymond P. Boucher, who represents Spector in the civil suit, accuses Shapiro in court papers of doing “very little legal work” on Spector’s case and says the work that was done was “incompetently performed.”

Shapiro had little to say Friday.

“I decline to comment on the case, because I feel ethically bound by the attorney-client privilege,” he said. “But all of the issues will be contested in court.”

He also said he personally represented Spector in the murder case, and that Christensen, Miller -- of which he is a partner and whose white-collar criminal defense section he leads -- was not involved in that representation.

Boucher alleges in the lawsuit that Spector was “coerced” into signing a nonrefundable retainer agreement with Shapiro in the days after he was released from jail.

At the time, Spector had been unable for several days to take medications to stabilize an unspecified “mental condition” and was “under a tremendous amount of mental stress that comes with being arrested for murder,” the lawsuit says.

Legal ethics expert Diane L. Karpman said the case was not as clear cut as it might seem.

“You have to look at the person and his reputation,” she said. Shapiro “has a credible reputation. He’s a dealmaker. He’s a magician. And you have to pay for what you get.”

She said a lot of what Shapiro may have been doing was behind the scenes, so it would be difficult for someone not involved in the case to assess the extent of his work on it.

But Karpman added that lawyers were ethically prohibited under State Bar of California rules from charging “unconscionable fees.”

“It’s unconscionable for a lawyer to receive extraordinary fees when they don’t do the work,” she said.

Attorney Harland Braun, who recently defended actor Robert Blake against charges that he killed his wife, said Spector was relying on Shapiro’s judgment as a friend.

Braun believes that Spector has a right to reclaim part of the fee. “You don’t have a right to shake someone down,” he said. “You have an obligation to charge a fair fee. Phil clearly was relying on Robert’s relationship with him.”

Meanwhile, in Spector’s criminal case, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Carlos Uranga ordered defense attorneys Friday to turn over a fingernail of Clarkson’s if they had it, or it could not be submitted later as evidence.

Prosecutors had filed a motion earlier this year demanding that the defense turn over the fingernail, but defense attorneys denied ever having it.

“I never had a fingernail,” Dr. Henry Lee, a nationally renowned forensic expert working for the defense, said outside court. “I don’t know where the fingernail issue came from.” He said he had picked up a white thread at Spector’s house that was later found to have no evidentiary value.

Spector declined to comment on his criminal case, but weighed in on the death of actor Marlon Brando.

“The world has lost a great genius,” he said. “I loved the man. I will miss him dearly.”

Spector’s preliminary hearing in the criminal case has been set for Oct. 20.