Former OJ lawyer in Vegas sues Florida colleague
LAS VEGAS (AP) — A Las Vegas lawyer who represented O.J. Simpson in the Nevada trial that led to the celebrity football star's armed robbery and kidnapping conviction is suing Simpson's Florida-based lead attorney, alleging that he wasn't paid promised fees.
Gabriel Grasso alleges in the civil breach of contract lawsuit that he was promised $250,000 to serve as local attorney following Simpson's arrest in September 2007. But he said Yale Galanter only paid him $15,000.
Galanter told The Associated Press that he hadn't been served with the lawsuit and couldn't comment on it. But he said he intends to fight.
"You can say anything you want in a lawsuit. Proving it is another matter," Galanter said Tuesday. "Gabe Grasso got paid everything he was supposed to get paid commensurate with his skill level, his ability level and his responsibilities as local counsel in Las Vegas."
The 17-page lawsuit, filed Friday filed in Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, seeks unspecified damages in excess of $50,000. It cites "extensive and time consuming" proceedings between Simpson's arrest in September 2007 and trial a year later.
Galanter, who wasn't licensed to practice law in Nevada, needed a local lawyer
"Mr. Grasso did the lion's share of the work in the case," Grasso's lawyer, Joshua Tomsheck said Tuesday. Grasso declined comment.
"They had a legal, binding agreement," Tomsheck said. "All the motions were filed by Gabriel Grasso. All the Nevada legal research was done by Gabriel Grasso. The agreement was that he would be paid for his expertise."
Simpson was convicted in October 2008 of leading a group of men in an armed confrontation with two sports memorabilia dealers in a room at a Las Vegas casino hotel.
Galanter and Grasso argued that the NFL Hall of Fame, TV star and advertising pitchman was trying to retrieve personal mementoes and family possessions stolen following his acquittal in 1995 in the Los Angeles slayings of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ronald Goldman.
Simpson is now 64. He's serving nine to 33 years in a state prison in northern Nevada.
