{"id":423571,"date":"2026-01-22T20:26:21","date_gmt":"2026-01-22T20:26:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/423571\/"},"modified":"2026-01-22T20:26:21","modified_gmt":"2026-01-22T20:26:21","slug":"12m-in-legal-fees-sought-in-anti-trust-suit-involving-2-pa-healthcare-providers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/423571\/","title":{"rendered":"$12M in legal fees sought in anti-trust suit involving 2 Pa. healthcare providers"},"content":{"rendered":"

WILLIAMSPORT \u2014 A federal judge has been asked to approve payment of more than $12 million in legal fees and expenses to the law firm that represented approximately 12,000 central Pennsylvania healthcare workers.<\/a><\/p>\n

Berger Montague, with offices in Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia, represented the employees of Geisinger and the former Evangelical Community Hospital near Lewisburg.<\/p>\n

The suit, which resulted in a $28.5 million settlement, alleged there was a secret agreement <\/a>between the two healthcare providers, which they denied, not to poach the other\u2019s employees, thus artificially suppressing wages. <\/p>\n

The alleged agreement stopped only when the federal government in 2020 filed an antitrust suit to prevent Geisinger from becoming a 30 percent owner of Evangelical, the plaintiffs contended.<\/p>\n

That litigation was settled by an agreement that capped Geisinger\u2019s stake in the Lewisburg-area hospital at 7.5 percent. <\/p>\n

U.S. Middle District Judge Matthew W. Brann in November gave preliminary approval to the $28.5 million settlement to the employees\u2019 suit that was reached without conceding liability. A final approval hearing is scheduled on March 16.<\/p>\n

Geisinger agreed to pay $19 million and Evangelical $9.5 million to be shared by those employed by them in Union, Snyder, Northumberland, Montour, Lycoming and Columbia counties from Jan. 1, 2014, through Aug. 5, 2020.<\/p>\n

Each employee was guaranteed a minimum payment of $250, with the average amount estimated at $1,500. <\/p>\n

If Brann approves the requested legal fees, Nichole Leib and Kevin Brokenshire, who were registered nurses then and the lead plaintiffs, would receive $10,000 each for their work in the litigation that lasted more than four years.<\/p>\n

Evangelical was an independent hospital at the time, but it became part of York-based WellSpan Health in July 2024. Geisinger has been a member of Risant Health since March 31, 2024, but continues to operate under its own name.<\/p>\n

Berger is seeking $9.4 million plus interest or a third of the settlement award. It claims it invested more than 24,000 hours in the case.<\/p>\n

The law firm also seeks $2.7 in litigation costs, of which it says $2.3 million was paid to three expert witnesses.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WILLIAMSPORT \u2014 A federal judge has been asked to approve payment of more than $12 million in legal…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":423572,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[38149,97,252,253,201879],"class_list":{"0":"post-423571","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health-care","8":"tag-geisinger","9":"tag-health","10":"tag-health-care","11":"tag-healthcare","12":"tag-holy-spirit"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/423571","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=423571"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/423571\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/423572"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=423571"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=423571"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=423571"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}