Hearing delayed over $75M in AG’s lawyers’ fees for Savannah River Site settlement
A scheduled Monday hearing over whether S.C. Attorney General Alan Wilson can pay two law firms $75 million from a federal government settlement has been delayed.
An assistant for Judge Clifton Newman said the judge had a conflict and the case had to be rescheduled. A reason for the conflict was not immediately given.
A new date for the hearing was not immediately scheduled.
In 2020, the federal government agreed to pay South Carolina $600 million for failing to remove weapons-grade plutonium from the Savannah River nuclear weapons complex in Aiken, Barnwell and Allendale counties. The state had been stuck with the deadly material for years after a major federal government construction project unraveled.
The U.S. Department of Energy agreed to remove nearly 10 metric tons of weapons-usable plutonium from SRS over the next 15 years.
As part of the deal, Wilson agreed to pay $75 million in fees for attorneys from two Columbia law firms, Willoughby & Hoefer, and Davidson, Wren & DeMasters. Wilson said that amount was derived from a contingency fee formula based on the amount recovered. Before becoming attorney general, Wilson worked for Willoughby & Hoefer.
In September 2020, Columbia attorney John Crangle and the S.C. Public Interest Foundation sued Wilson, arguing that the $75 million fee was unreasonable and Wilson had “no need to hire private counsel to address a relatively straightforward issue that government leaders ultimately negotiated.”
Gov. Henry McMaster also questioned the size of the fee.
