Former Hunterdon County Prosecutor Bennet Barlyn

Former Hunterdon County Prosecutor Bennet Barlyn filed a lawsuit against the state that claims he was wrongfully terminated for speaking out against the Office of the Attorney General quashing a criminal case for political reasons.

(Michael Mancuso/NJ Advance Media)

TRENTON -- The four-year legal battle over whether a former county prosecutor was fired for objecting to the dismissal of indictments against supporters of Gov. Chris Christie has yet to go to trial, but New Jersey taxpayers are already on the hook for more than $3 million -- and counting.

The state's Attorney General's Office tapped a politically connected law firm, Gibbons P.C., in 2014 to defend New Jersey against former Hunterdon County Assistant Prosecutor Bennett Barlyn's whistleblower suit.

Gibbons billed the state more than $3 million in the 25 months since it took over the case from the attorney general's Division of Law.

That's actually more than Barlyn had originally sought or contemplated after he sued the state over his 2010 ouster, claiming he was suspended and then fired after he complained that a 43-count indictment against county law enforcement officials was dropped for political reasons.

"We tried to resolve this case before the complaint was even filed in 2012. Had that happened, it is inconceivable that any settlement would have been more than what Gibbons has charged the state at this point," Barlyn told NJ Advance Media.

The Office of the Attorney General has declined to comment on the case or offer any insight into why it refused to settle, and Barlyn said neither the state or its hired outside counsel ever responded to his offers to discuss a settlement.

But since then, Gibbons' submitted more than 400 pages of invoices that were ultimately approved by the state that totaled $3,071,191, according to records obtained by NJ Advance Media under the state's Open Public Records Act.

The bills were submitted by more than a dozen attorneys and clerks who have been working the case.

Acting Attorney General Robert Lougy.

"Gibbons and the state are really dictating and driving the cost of this matter to the New Jersey taxpayer," Barlyn said. "Because of the positions taken by Gibbons thus far, a trial appears inevitable. We have been and are preparing for that."

It's not unusual for the state to outsource certain cases to private firms. The state Division of Law, under Republican and Democratic administrations, has long hired private firms to supplement its hundreds of attorneys to help battle lawsuits on everything from medical malpractice to complex financial deals when it has a conflict of interest or needs specialized expertise.

But the price tag alarms good-government advocates.

"We are in the midst of a feeding frenzy," said Nancy Erika Smith, a private practice attorney who's currently representing clients suing NJ Transit for alleged racial discrimination. "Under this administration, I've never seen anything like it. The amount of billing is mind boggling."

THE BARLYN CASE

Barlyn claimed the Hunterdon County Prosecutor's Office was working an ironclad criminal case on a local sheriff and two of her deputies in 2010 when the state's attorney general swooped in, quashed the indictment and fired him for voicing objections.

Then-Sheriff Deborah Trout, Undersherriff Michael Russo and investigator John Falat Jr. were charged by the Hunterdon County prosecutor with official misconduct and falsification of documents. Among the charges were that Trout allowed Russo to oversee his own background investigation and allowed a prospective county investigator to obtain a county-issued handgun without proper background checks.

Among other allegations, the indictment charged that Falat printed and distributed fake sheriff's office ID cards. Barlyn's lawsuit claimed Robert Hariri, a pharmaceutical executive at Celgene, a major New Jersey biopharmaceutical company with close ties to the administration, was the recipient of one of the cards. Hariri donated $6,800 to Christie's first gubernatorial campaign in 2009.

Celgene has benefited from millions of dollars of state grants prior to Christie taking off and became a soft landing spot for Christie's former chief of staff, Richard Bagger, when he stepped down from his post and was hired by them in 2011. Sol Barer, Celgene's founder, hosted a fundraiser for Christie's presidential campaign in August. Its executive chairman and former CEO, Robert Hugin, donated $100,000 to a super PAC promoting Christie's presidential bid.

A grand jury handed up indictments against Trout, Russo and Falat in March 2010. Five months later, the state's Attorney General's Office took over the case and dismissed all counts, calling the indictment legally and factually deficient.

In his lawsuit, Barlyn argued he was suspended and fired soon after he complained to a superior he felt the case was dropped for political reasons.

Barlyn filed a wrongful termination lawsuit in 2012 that has dragged on as he's fought for sealed grand jury transcripts related to the indictments that he has argued would prove his case.

He won the battle for access to sealed grand jury transcripts related to the indictments in 2015. But the records remain under seal from the public.

Gibbons argued in court filings that Barlyn was let go because of "blatant insubordination" and poor work performance.

According to court documents, the state claims Barlyn publicly berated an acting prosecutor from the Attorney General's Office after the charges were dismissed. "Bravo! Bravo! Job well done. Mission accomplished!" Barlyn told the state official he would later accuse of quashing the criminal complaints for political reasons, according to the state's filings.

Gibbons and the Attorney General's Office have both declined to comment on this case.

OUTSIDE COUNSEL

A recent NJ Advance Media analysis of private firms contracted by the state for legal work from 2006 through 2015 found many with close ties to Christie and his allies have prospered since his election, while those often used by his Democratic predecessor, Gov. Jon Corzine, have lost ground.

The cozy relationships haven't been one-way streets.

One of the biggest losers in legal work under Christie was Gibbons law firm, whose work dropped by nearly $2 million from 2008 to 2011.

But in late 2012, Gibbons hired longtime Christie confidant Bill Palatucci as special counsel and by 2013 the firm reversed its downward trend in outside counsel work. Last year, Gibbons was the largest beneficiary of outside counsel work, receiving nearly $3.2 million from the state -- largely from the Barlyn case.

Gibbons was a healthy supporter of Christie's 2016 presidential campaign. Nearly 50 individual donations that totaled $54,550 were made by Gibbons' attorneys and employees, campaign records show.

Peter Torcicollo, the lead counsel at Gibbons for the Barlyn case, was among of the Christie supporters. According to records, he donated $7,700 to support Christie's presidential campaign.

That sometimes cozy relationship between politically connected firms contracted to perform outside counsel and their private support of the governor has some crying foul.

"The billing is out of control. I've been a lawyer 36 years and I have never seen so much money going to defend the indefensible," Smith said.

She accuses attorneys at firms hired by the state of "fighting stuff that they never would have fought for in the past at taxpayers' expense."

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie.

Smith described excessive court filings that only delay the proceedings and firms bringing numerous attorneys to the courthouse for routine motions -- both of which quickly drive up legal bills.

One example of driving up the cost Smith railed against was even even pointed out by a Superior Court judge in her lawsuit against NJ Transit during a case management conference in January.

Smith argued at the hearing NJ Transit should be compelled to hand over additional claims of racial discrimination. Attorneys representing the authority -- from the politically-connected McElroy, Deutsch, Mulvaney & Carpenter -- said it would an undue burden to force NJ Transit to expend the man hours to track the files down.

"It may be an undue burden, with all due respect to counsel, to have three attorneys here, three partners here from ... the office," said Judge Ned Rosenberg, according to a court transcript.

NJ Transit's counsel joked with the judge that one of the attorneys present wasn't a partner of the firm. Rosenberg corrected himself, but reiterated Smith's claim of excessive expenditures on behalf of the state.

"Well, three attorneys from the same office may be an undue burden on the state of New Jersey," he said.

The cost to taxpayers for outside counsel fluctuates.

In the four years before Christie took office, his predecessor's administration, under former Gov. Jon Corzine, spent more than $93 million in outside counsel fees, according to public records. That amount rose more than $3 million under Christie during his first four years in office.

Former Hunterdon County Prosecutor Bennet Barlyn.

In 2015, the state hit a peak in outside counsel costs when it shelled out more than $30 million to various firms.

'COMPLEX LITIGATION'

Barlyn's case was deemed complex litigation by the state's Office of the Attorney General. It's the only classification in cases where the state seeks outside counsel where the state negotiates rates with the selected firm.

Otherwise, fee scales are predetermined in other cases, such as employment litigation, insurance coverage or medical malpractice litigation. In those cases, the state pays partners and associates at firms $150 an hour, according to state Request for Qualification forms. In general litigation cases, partners tapped as outside counsel earn $200 an hour, while associates receive $150 and law assistants can earn $125 an hour.

The state agreed to pay Gibbons' lead counsel and any other partners at the firm $325 an hour for their work the case. The retention letter also called for paying associates $225 an hour and $125 an hour for work done by clerks.

The attorney general's office said Gibbons was selected "from a list of law firms approve for such outside counsel work that was generated by a general ... RFQ," said spokesman Leland Moore.

The state refuses to say how it deems a case to fall under complex litigation status.

"We don't do case-specific (requests for proposals) for complex litigation," Moore said, adding, "There is no rote formula or cookie cutter checklist for designating a matter as complex litigation."

When pressed further how matters are deemed complex litigation, the Office of the Attorney General refused to provide any explanation.

"We have commented to the extent we're going to comment," Moore said.

A HISTORY OF FIGHTING CASES

Christie's administration has a history of fighting legal battles at taxpayers' expense that good government groups have argued have been needless battles -- and an unnecessary waste of taxpayer dollars.

In 2015, taxpayers were on the hook for nearly $154,000 to settle court cases in which the governor's administration tried to stop records from being disclosed to the public.

The payouts included instances in which the administration attempted to shield records on how Christie attempted to promote himself to a national audience, as well as costs related to his frequent out-of-state travel.

The legal bills and payouts from 2015 mean taxpayers have footed a bill of nearly $758,000 since 2012 after courts deemed the administration was wrong to try to keep public records secret. That figure is likely to grow in the current year.

"These needless denials have an enormous cost," Iris Bromberg, a transparency law fellow with the ACLU of New Jersey, told NJ Advance Media in February when the costs were first reported.

Matt Arco may be reached at marco@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @MatthewArco or on Facebook. Follow NJ.com Politics on Facebook.