Claimants in the Boy Scouts bankruptcy case have retained the international law firm Dechert to challenge fee arrangements with their existing legal representation, specifically targeting Slater Slater Schulman’s 33-40% contingency fee structure. With approximately 14,600 child sex abuse claimants represented by Slater in the broader bankruptcy settlement, and a total settlement amount of $2.46 billion, the stakes of this fee dispute are significant. The dispute centers on allegations that Slater Slater Schulman deceived thousands of claimants about the status of their claims during the Chapter 11 settlement process—conduct that could affect how much money each claimant ultimately receives. The involvement of Dechert, represented by a trio of attorneys including Yale Law professor G.
Eric Brunstad Jr., signals that this is no routine fee approval. These motions, filed in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware, challenge whether Slater should face financial penalties for alleged misconduct and whether the proposed fee structure is reasonable given the alleged deception. The Supreme Court affirmed the core $2.46 billion settlement in January 2026, but that decision did not resolve the underlying fee dispute—leaving the question of what claimants will actually take home still in play.
Table of Contents
- Why Did Claimants Bring in Dechert for a Fee Fight?
- Understanding Contingency Fees in Mass Tort Settlements
- What Are the Specific Allegations Against Slater Slater Schulman?
- The Delaware Bankruptcy Court and the Jurisdictional Challenge
- The Supreme Court’s Affirmation Did Not End the Fee Fight
- Why Separate Counsel Is Critical in Fee Disputes
- The 14,600 Claimants and What They Actually Receive
Why Did Claimants Bring in Dechert for a Fee Fight?
Claimants rarely hire separate counsel to challenge their own law firm’s fees unless the trust has fundamentally broken down. In this case, the decision to retain Dechert appears driven by allegations that Slater Slater Schulman misrepresented information about claim status to thousands of claimants during the bankruptcy process. When a mass tort firm represents thousands of clients, conflicts of interest multiply—the firm’s interest in securing approval for its fees can diverge sharply from individual claimants’ interests in minimizing what they pay out.
Dechert’s involvement brings institutional weight and specialized expertise in mass tort disputes to bear on a question that affects over 14,600 people. A major national firm with a track record in bankruptcy disputes can credibly challenge whether Slater’s conduct was appropriate and whether a 33-40% contingency fee is justified given the alleged deception. This is not a case where claimants are objecting to the settlement amount itself—the $2.46 billion was affirmed by the Supreme Court—but rather to whether the firm that secured that settlement should face clawbacks or fee reductions for how it treated claimants along the way.
Understanding Contingency Fees in Mass Tort Settlements
A 33-40% contingency fee means that for every dollar a claimant receives from the settlement, the firm keeps between 33 and 40 cents. In a $2.46 billion settlement with 14,600 claimants, the range of total fees is substantial—potentially hundreds of millions of dollars. For a claimant expecting a settlement payment of, say, $50,000, a 40% contingency fee would net them $30,000 while the firm receives $20,000. A 33% fee would yield $33,500 for the claimant.
The critical issue here is that contingency fees are only reasonable when the firm has acted in good faith with its clients. If a court finds that Slater deceived claimants about claim status or handled the case improperly, the contingency structure itself comes into question. A firm cannot simultaneously mislead clients and then claim it earned every penny of its agreed-upon fee. This is where Dechert’s challenge gains traction—if the court determines that Slater’s conduct was improper, judges can reduce fees, order disgorgement, or impose penalties regardless of what was initially agreed. The problem is that not all courts will do this, and the threshold for what constitutes misconduct severe enough to warrant fee reduction varies across jurisdictions.
What Are the Specific Allegations Against Slater Slater Schulman?
According to the Bloomberg reporting on Dechert’s filings, Slater Slater Schulman allegedly deceived thousands of claimants about the status of their claims in the bankruptcy settlement process. The allegations do not appear to focus on embezzlement or theft, but rather on misrepresentation—telling claimants something about their case status that was false or misleading. In a settlement involving 14,600 people, even communication failures at scale can constitute deception if they are systematic and material to claimants’ decision-making. The bankruptcy court must determine whether these allegations rise to the level of misconduct that warrants financial penalties.
This is not automatically obvious. Courts distinguish between minor miscommunications and serious deception. For example, if Slater failed to inform claimants about interim settlement developments that could have changed their bargaining position or caused them to object to the overall settlement amount, that crosses the line into serious misconduct. Conversely, if the firm simply failed to provide detailed status updates that claimants could have requested but did not, courts may view this as negligent rather than deceptive. The outcome depends heavily on what specific statements or omissions Dechert can prove.
The Delaware Bankruptcy Court and the Jurisdictional Challenge
All of these disputes are playing out in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware, where the Boy Scouts case has been administered since it entered Chapter 11. Delaware is home to the nation’s most sophisticated bankruptcy judges, which is why many large corporate and mass tort bankruptcies are filed or consolidated there. However, in November 2025, a judge raised jurisdictional questions about whether the fee dispute could properly be resolved in the bankruptcy court or whether it belonged in a different forum.
Jurisdictional questions matter because they determine whose court will ultimately decide the fate of Slater’s fees. If the bankruptcy court retains jurisdiction, Dechert’s motions will be decided by the judge overseeing the entire Boy Scouts settlement. If jurisdiction lies elsewhere—perhaps in state court or in federal district court—the case gets transferred and the timeline stretches. The November 2025 ruling raising these questions did not resolve the jurisdictional issue but instead flagged it for further briefing and argument. This procedural complication means that even after the Supreme Court affirmed the $2.46 billion settlement, the fee dispute remains genuinely unresolved, with no clear endpoint in sight.
The Supreme Court’s Affirmation Did Not End the Fee Fight
In January 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed the $2.46 billion Boy Scouts settlement, rejecting last-minute objections and appeals. This was a major win for the settlement proponents and a significant moment for claimants who have waited years for compensation. However, the Supreme Court’s decision did not address the fee dispute between Dechert and Slater—that conflict was either not before the Court or was not part of the decision announced. This is a critical distinction that many claimants may have missed.
The Supreme Court ruling affirmed the settlement structure and amount, but it did not approve Slater’s fees. Fee disputes are often resolved separately from the underlying settlement, sometimes months or even years after settlement approval. In some cases, particularly large ones, claimants have obtained fee reductions or clawbacks even after courts approved the underlying settlement. The Boy Scouts case has already demonstrated unusual complexity—a Supreme Court review is rare for bankruptcy settlements—so the fee component may take additional time to resolve. Claimants need to understand that the Supreme Court’s January 2026 decision, while positive for settlement finality, left the economic question of how much each claimant will actually receive still open to the fee dispute process.
Why Separate Counsel Is Critical in Fee Disputes
When Dechert was retained to challenge Slater’s fees, the claimants who hired Dechert made a strategic choice: they decided that their interests and Slater’s interests were no longer aligned. This decision reflects a fundamental principle in mass tort law: the attorney-client relationship depends on trust, and trust breaks down when the lawyer’s financial interest conflicts with the client’s. A firm seeking court approval for a 33-40% fee has an incentive to minimize allegations of misconduct and downplay the severity of any communication failures.
Independent counsel like Dechert can take a harder line—demanding fee reductions, pursuing penalty motions, and challenging the reasonableness of the fee itself—because Dechert’s fee is not tied to the amount paid to Slater. This is why the appearance of Dechert in this dispute is significant. It signals that at least some segment of the 14,600 claimants believe that Slater’s conduct warrants serious scrutiny and that they are willing to invest in additional legal fees (presumably in the form of a smaller contingency arrangement with Dechert) to protect their interests.
The 14,600 Claimants and What They Actually Receive
The real-world impact of this fee dispute falls directly on approximately 14,600 people who experienced child sexual abuse within the Boy Scouts organization and filed claims in the bankruptcy settlement process. Each of these claimants has waited years for resolution and compensation. The difference between a 33% fee and a 40% fee, applied across thousands of claimants with varying settlement amounts, translates into millions of dollars shifting between the law firm and the claimants collectively. Consider a claimant expecting a $100,000 settlement payment.
At 33%, they would receive $67,000. At 40%, they would receive $60,000—a $7,000 difference on one claim. Multiplied across 14,600 claimants, with widely varying claim values, a successful challenge to Slater’s fee structure or a court-imposed penalty could return tens of millions of dollars to the claimant pool. Conversely, if Dechert’s challenge fails and Slater’s fees are fully approved, the 14,600 claimants bear the entire cost of the fee dispute they just participated in, and their settlement payments remain reduced by the original 33-40%.
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