Law firm says it has lost touch with hundreds of clients suing over L.A. County landfill

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Set us as preferred Downtown LA Law Group, a law firm facing multiple state and local investigations, says they plan to bow out of a high-stakes environmental case against the county’s second-largest landfill within the next two months.Andrew Morrow, an attorney spearheading the litigation for the firm, said in court Thursday that the group has passed off about 500 of its 1,200 landfill clients to another personal injury firm.Roughly 500 more clients, he said, could not be reached and will likely be dismissed from the case.“We have sort of exhausted our ability to communicate with most of these people,” Morrow told Judge Maame Ewusi-Mensah Frimpong.

California Residents of Val Verde, a tiny town north of Los Angeles, claim Downtown LA Law Group used a cowboy recruiter to find plaintiffs for lawsuits against a local landfill.The firm denied the allegations and said a rival lawyer was trying to eliminate competition.A spokesperson for the firm did not respond to questions from The Times into what precipitated them losing touch with roughly 40% of their clients in the litigation against Chiquita Canyon landfill, which has been accused of allowing toxic fumes to waft into nearby homes.The hearing comes as Downtown LA Law Group, or DTLA, faces allegations of attorney misconduct in two significant cases moving through California courts.The Times reported this fall that nine of the firm’s clients in a sex abuse settlement said they had been paid to sue — and in some cases make up their claims — to become part of a historic $4 billion payout.This month, The Times reported that an actor said he’d been sent to the area around the Chiquita Canyon landfill to recruit clients for the firm.

Some residents told The Times they’d been signed up for lawsuits without their consent.California bans non-attorneys from directly sol...