May 8 (Reuters) - (Billable Hours is Reuters' weekly

report on lawyers and money. Please send tips or suggestions to

[email protected])

Apple ( AAPL ) and Amazon have asked for a combined $223,000 in

sanctions against a prominent class action law firm, accusing it

of dragging out litigation over the price of iPhones and iPads

after the initial plaintiff in the case sought to drop out.

U.S. District Judge Kymberly Evanson in Seattle last month

said the companies could ask to recover legal fees from Hagens

Berman Sobol Shapiro for failing to immediately disclose that

its client wanted out of the case.

Hagens Berman "needlessly prolonged this litigation and

required considerable judicial resources," Evanson said.

The companies said in their fee request on Friday that their

legal teams worked more than 350 hours on motions relating to

seeking information about the plaintiff.

Spokespeople for Hagens Berman, Apple ( AAPL ) and Amazon did not

immediately respond to requests for comment. The lawsuit, which

accuses the companies of conspiring to artificially inflate the

price of iPhones and iPads sold on Amazon's platform, is

continuing after other plaintiffs were added to the case.

Apple ( AAPL ) and Amazon have denied the antitrust claims.

Apple ( AAPL ) is represented by attorneys from Weil, Gotshal &

Manges and Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, while Amazon has a

team from Sidley Austin, Redgrave and Davis Wright Tremaine.

The tech companies said they would limit their fee request

to match hourly rates typically charged in the Western District

of Washington. Weil partner Mark Perry, a Washington, D.C.,

lawyer who co-leads the firm's appellate and strategic

counseling practice, said his rate for the purpose of the fee

request was $900 an hour. Perry and other defense lawyers in the

case did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Hagens Berman client Steven Floyd told his lawyers in

January 2024 that he wanted out of the litigation because he did

not want to participate in the discovery process, Evanson said

last month.

But the firm did not immediately disclose this to the court,

the judge said, and instead created the impression that Floyd

"had suddenly fallen out of contact in January 2024, for reasons

his counsel did not know and possibly unrelated to the

litigation."

Hagens Berman's "characterizations of Floyd's situation over

the past fourteen months have not reflected his reality,"

Evanson said.

The judge on Tuesday formally dismissed Floyd's claims from

the lawsuit.

-- William Burck and Alex Spiro aren't the only partners at

Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan who are charging $3,000 an

hour.

Court filings in a $34 million fee fight between Quinn

Emanuel and former client Desktop Metal showed that Michael

Carlinsky, co-managing partner of the firm, is also charging the

$3,000 hourly rate.

Carlinsky said in an email he is "honored to be in the same

club, so to speak, as Spiro and Burck. Two fine lawyers."

Reuters first reported Burck and Spiro's sky-high billing

rates in February. Susman Godfrey also has a pair of veteran

litigators - Neal Manne and Bill Carmody - who are charging that

much.

-- Williams & Connolly is charging a Minnesota school district a

flat rate of $300,000 to defend it in a student disability case

at the U.S. Supreme Court, according to information provided by

the district that also showed the firm's star appellate partner

Lisa Blatt normally charges $2,400 an hour.

The firm initially charged $45,000 for a brief urging the

justices not to take up the case, which tests the scope of the

law concerning students with disabilities. Firms commonly bill a

flat amount for litigation at the high court.

The court heard arguments last week from Blatt, representing

the school district, and Latham's Roman Martinez, who argued for

the parents of the student who filed the petition at the high

court.

Blatt and a spokesperson for the school district did not

immediately respond to a request for comment.

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