[The Louima case is] a silhouette of the contingency-fee problem. So ingrained and unexamined is the notion of the one-third contingency fee that it has taken on the character of a natural law. Hence, it is doubtful that any lawyer, reading of the barbaric attack on Louima, considered whether a contingency fee in the millions could be lawful when the city's liability and Louima's recovery of a substantial sum were certain. On the other hand, even a reflective frankfurter vendor standing outside a courthouse under a Sabrett umbrella might reason that, if liability and recovery were certain, then there is no contingency that Louima's lawyer is risking since his receiving a fee is certain from the beginning, and if that is so, then the Appellate Division's rule would have done nothing except guarantee to that lawyer a freight train of money that should have been... More >>>