Former Brobeck partners agree to $23 million creditor settlement.

Two years after Brobeck Phleger & Harrison LLP filed for bankruptcy, more than 200 former partners of the firm agreed to settle outstanding claims against them.

Under settlement agreements reached last month, they will pay $23.8 million.

"The partners decided to make peace, to put this behind them, to make payments for the benefit of the creditors and to move on," said James Miller, who was on Brobeck's initial liquidation committee and is now a partner at Snyder Miller &Orton LLP in San Francisco.

Since last November, a bankruptcy trustee has tried to collect on $258 million in liabilities from l, 145 creditors of the San Francisco firm, which imploded from heavy debt and the dotcom crash. The agreements, along with a settlement with one of the firms that hired many of the partners, reduce the outstanding claims against Brobeck to $209.5 million.

In papers filed last month in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in San Francisco, 189 former partners agreed to settle $22.4 million in claims. On Feb. 28, 19 more partners agreed to settle an additional $1.4 million in claims.

Fourteen former partners have not settled claims.

Most of the former partners would not sign agreements until they were released from claims by the firm's landlords, which include Equity Office Properties, University Circle Investors LP and Kilroy Realty Corp.

Each partner has paid 10 percent of their settlement costs. The balance is due in cash by April 15, or in four installments through April 2006 at 12 percent interest.

Staff reporter Amanda Bronstad can be reached at [phone], ext. 225, or at [e-mail].