Callahan & Blaine Hired By Former Orange County Register President to Again Take On Freedom Communications, Inc.

Eric Spitz, the ex-president of the Orange County Register, has elected to defend himself from the company’s bankruptcy creditors’ committee alleging improper investment of retirement funds by hiring the attorney who prevailed against the Orange County Register in 2009, Daniel J. Callahan of Santa Ana’s Callahan & Blaine.

In 2009, Callahan won a $38 million settlement against Freedom Communications, Inc., the former owner of the Orange County Register, based on its misclassification of employees as independent contractors. Even with the bankruptcy of Freedom Communications, Callahan still ultimately recovered $30 million for his clients.

Now that Freedom Communications has again filed bankruptcy, its Unsecured Creditors’ Committee is suing Eric Spitz in an adversary bankruptcy proceeding filed on January 26, 2017 in Federal Bankruptcy Court in Santa Ana, California (Case No.: 8:15-bk-15311-MW).

Ironically, Callahan served as the Chair of the Unsecured Creditors’ Committee for Freedom Communications in its earlier bankruptcy. Now in this subsequent bankruptcy, the Unsecured Creditors’ Committee is suing Callahan’s client, Eric Spitz, alleging that Spitz breached his fiduciary duty to the company and to the beneficiaries of the company retirement plan.

“The present lawsuit against Eric Spitz seeks to convert Mr. Spitz into a personal insurer of the retirement fund by alleging that if he had made better investments, the company’s retirement account losses would have been less,” said Callahan. “We are honored to have Mr. Spitz as a client and look forward to providing him a vigorous defense against these contrived allegations.”

Callahan noted that adding to the intrigue is the fact that the attorney for the Creditors’ Committee, Robert J. Feinstein, was also the attorney who represented the prior Creditors’ Committee, which Callahan chaired. Callahan said that their relationship was at best acrimonious while Callahan was trying to protect his client’s recovery vis-à-vis the other creditors through the earlier bankruptcy proceeding.

Jake Gosselin