A Department of Justice investigation into the city of Ferguson reported in March it found substantial racial bias in the city’s policing.
Now the city’s trying to push back against the D.o.J.’s suggestions, and it isn’t coming cheap.
Ferguson is paying an attorney more than 1,300 dollars an hour to help the suburb negotiate and possibly even litigate the D.o.J.’s reforms.
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports the same monrth the d.o.j.’s report came out the Ferguson City Council decided behind closed doors to hire Dan. K. Webb at an hourly rate close to double Missouri’s highest attorney billing rate last year.
Webb is a 69-year-old former federal prosecutor who has represented Microsoft, Philip Morris and the New York Stock exchange in the past.
That hourly rate doesn’t included the expenses and fees of other lawyers or paralegals from his firm who may work on the case.
A spokesperson for the city isn’t publicly discussing Webb’s hiring or his fees.