Paid its lawyers a 10 percent cut from abatement money

On 01/16/2025 the County paid The Keefe Law Firm 207,383.37 on check 00352470 and charged it to the opioid settlement abatement account 232100S149-5E07001. The ledger calls it Legal Consulting. The firm's invoice of 12/02/2024 shows what it is. It states that Middlesex has received 2,151,196.53 since the last payment on 11/2/2023, that per the retainer agreement the firm receives 10 percent, 215,119.65, and that the firm already received 7,736.28 in backstop payments, leaving 207,383.37. The County's engagement letter with the firm sets the fee at 10 percent on all payments as they are received over the life of the settlement. This is a contingency fee for suing the opioid companies, taken out of the money the settlements pay the County to abate the crisis. The FY2025 report to the State does not name the fee. MOA Section E(6) says payments to counsel for local governments on the Distributor and Johnson and Johnson settlements shall be made from the Supplemental Contingent Fee Fund, not the abatement allocation. The voucher, dated 12/23/2024, cites Resolution 24-43-R, which awarded the 2024 counsel contract to a different firm, Wilentz, Goldman and Spitzer. Resolution 25-40-R, which awarded the 2025 counsel contract to The Keefe Law Firm, was adopted on 01/16/2025, the day the check was issued. The retainer runs over the life of the settlement. No later payment to the firm appears in the vendor history the County produced in September 2026.