The Lion Has Roared: Proposition 65 Settlements And The Attorney General

California's Proposition 65 permits "private enforcers" to send Notices of Violation and bring lawsuits on behalf of the "public interest" where they purport to find trace amounts of banned chemicals at elevated levels in consumer goods. Given the large statutory damages provided by Proposition 65, the ease of making such a claim and the difficulty of defending against one, these private enforcers have been able to exact large attorneys' fees as part of the settlement process. The rub, however, is that the Legislature now requires that the Court actually approve any such settlement and review the attorneys' fees award for "reasonableness." But since the settling defendants are generally precluded by the very terms of their settlement from making any opposition, there really is no one to object to the reasonableness of the attorneys' fees being requested—until now! The Attorney General has the authority to either to take over the claim early in the case or, as part of