Guin Stokes & Evans attorneys have been Lead Counsel in several large securities cases involving mismanaged pension funds. For example, Charles Watkins was Co-Lead Counsel in In re Xerox Corporation ERISA Litigation, Civ. No. 3:02 cv 01138 (D. Conn.), a “company stock” case which settled in 2009 for $51 million after seven years of litigation.
Almost a dozen other ERISA cases in which Mr. Watkins played a leadership role have resulted in combined recoveries of more than $100 million for tens of thousands of retirement and benefit plan participants. See Kiefer v. Ceridian Corp., 976 F.Supp. 829 (D. Minn. 1997) ($51 million settlement in an ERISA benefit error class action reached three weeks before trial); Carter v. Ret. Plan of Texaco, Inc., No. 99-0114 (S.D.N.Y.) ($10 million settlement of ERISA class action on behalf of 10,000 plan participants); Nelson v. Brinson Partners Inc., No. 03 C 6446, 2004 WL 178180 (N.D. Ill.) ($7 million settlement of claims involving retirement plan investment in Enron notes); Steiner v. Control Data Sys., Inc., No. 98-1489 (D. Minn.) (Represented plaintiffs in a $4.25 million ERISA class action settlement affecting some 700 plan members); Babcock v. Computer Assocs. Int’l., No. 00-1648 (E.D.N.Y.) (represented 770 participants in employee stock ownership plan; case settled after eight years of litigation for more than $2 million in 2008); Shrader v. BP Corp., 02-8668 (N.D. Ill. 2002) ($2.3 million benefit error settlement); Scott v. Washington Nat’l Ins. Co., No. 96-3828 (N.D. Ill.) (Mr. Watkins was Lead Counsel in ERISA welfare benefits class action settled by employer’s agreement to provide back benefits and lifetime retiree health care); Watkins v. York International, No. 4:04-cv-40377 (E.D. Mich.) (under-seal settlement of benefits error class action); In re Household Int’l, Inc., ERISA Litig., No. 02-7921 (N.D. Ill.) (Liaison Counsel in case alleging plan fiduciaries engaged in imprudent investment of plan assets; settled for $45 million); In re Sears Retiree Group Life Ins. Litig., No. 97-7453 (N.D. Ill.) (class action on behalf of 80,000 Sears retirees; settlement conferring between $30 million and $200 million in benefits). In his first major ERISA case, Mr. Watkins argued Gluck v. Unisys Corp., 960 F.2d 1168 (3d Cir. 1992), which resulted in reversal of the District Court’s dismissal and established a widely cited precedent on the statute of limitations under ERISA.
