Attorney responds to Columbus City Council criticism over legal fees

COLUMBUS, Ga. (WRBL) — On Tuesday, Columbus Council – for the second time – questioned the legal fees paid to a private attorney that was representing a city department head. WRBL News 3 spoke exclusively with that attorney on Wednesday.

Chuck Boring billed the city $42,705 for his firm’s representation of Human Resources Director Reather Hollowell. 

WRBL News 3 was able to obtain the itemized bill that the Robbins Firm sent the city and it reveals the city has paid the fees. 

Now, City Councilor Glenn Davis is talking about filing a grievance with the State Bar to contest the bill. 

“I welcome it. Go ahead. File any grievance they want to because if they had actually known the facts before they started spouting off, I don’t think they would have been spouting off like that,” said Davis. 

On Tuesday, Davis challenged Boring’s legal fees in the nearly year-long representation of Hollowell, who was the target of a 16-month investigation that was led by the Muscogee County Sheriff’s Office into the city’s finance department. 

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Despite a recommendation of 12 misdemeanor charges by the sheriff’s office, the prosecutor did not bring a single one against Hollowell. 

“But when you have a situation that does not go through a process and all of a sudden just kind of goes away even though there may have been letters written or calls made. But that’s pretty much the extent there was no other course of action taking place. Then you get a bill of $45,000,” Davis said.

“So, when you see all the work I put in. All the records I turned over to the prosecutor that the sheriff’s office didn’t. The suggestions I made about reviewing the bodycam video of actually what went down in the HR department. Yeah, I would be happy to engage in a discussion with anybody on that council about what I actually did in this case to keep my client from being arrested,” Boring said.

Davis declined an on-camera interview but did release this statement that read in part: 

“My duty is to represent the taxpayers of Columbus and hold individuals, businesses, and government operations accountable. While I understand the desire to defend this high compensation to a beneficiary of a lucrative business, my focus is not on the beneficiary, but on ensuring transparency and integrity for the sake of our tax paying citizens. If I suspect questionable activity in any matter, I will address it thoroughly, regardless of opposition. This is the responsibility I accepted, and I remain committed to doing the job I promised our citizens—with diligence and integrity. 

WRBL has obtained a copy of the Robbins Firm itemized bill that was sent to the city. It reveals that Boring and his associates worked over 80 hours on the case since August of last year. 

That includes phone calls, meetings, research, evidence review, along with drafting and sending e-mails. All of that eventually led to Hollowell being cleared of wrongdoing. 

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“You know I would ask Mr. Davis, if he were the subject of an investigation and there was a different law enforcement agency in place and somebody was investigating him, and he was looking at possibly being charged with criminal offenses, would he just want his attorney to sit back and rest on their laurels and not represent him? And wait until after he’s arrested or get on the front end of it and actually help bring the truth out to an independent prosecutor,” Boring said.

WRBL requested the bill through the Georgia Open Records Act and was told by the city attorney it was exempt because of attorney client privilege. Boring and Hollowell consented with the city on releasing the documents.