May 1, 2025
Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC and Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein LLP will represent a proposed class of investors in a suit alleging Jack Dorsey’s fintech company Block Inc. created a “haven for criminal and illicit activities” on its Cash App and Square payment platforms despite touting its anti-money laundering protocols.
In an order filed Wednesday in California federal court, U.S. District Judge Noël Wise appointed the two firms lead counsel in the putative investor class action, finding that their clients, a group of New York City public sector pension funds, had made “made a reasonable choice of counsel.”
Judge Wise said Wednesday she’d initially questioned the need for two firms to co-lead the litigation, but later determined that in this matter, the choice was “sensible” in part because the firms have a track record of working together to represent the New York City funds.
Among other things, the judge referenced the firms’ argument that having counsel based on the East and West coasts would facilitate better communication with the members of a potentially nationwide class. Judge Wise also noted the firms had been selected by their clients in a bidding process and had agreed to “an extremely competitive single rate” for their work on the case.
The investor suit, which launched in January, alleges that in its public statements, Block claimed its anti-money laundering program was designed to keep money laundering, terrorist financing and other illegal activity off the Cash App and Square platforms.
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The investors are represented by Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein LLP and Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC.