Mey Deserves Credit

Editor, News-Register:

Thank you for the May 2 article about Legal Aid of West Virginia honoring three West Virginia law firms and Ohio County Circuit Court Judge James P. Mazzone for directing $469,000 in "cy pres" funds to Legal Aid, a nonprofit group that provides free legal service to thousands of low-income West Virginians annually. As the article pointed out, cy pres funds are dollars left over from class action lawsuit settlements that cannot be distributed to class members because the class members cannot be located or did not claim their share of the settlement funds.

In this case, the cy pres funds came from a nationwide class action lawsuit, litigated in Ohio County Circuit Court, alleging telemarketing violations under the federal Telephone Consumer Protection Act.

The article omitted to mention one very important person: Diana Mey, the Wheeling resident who filed the lawsuit in 2001. To her great credit, Ms. Mey originally filed pro se, meaning she was representing herself. She worked tirelessly on the case, eventually obtained lawyers to help her, and insisted as a condition of settlement that cy pres funds be distributed to charity. Her work resulted in major gifts to worthy groups ranging from Community Foundation for the Ohio Valley, to Habitat for Humanity, to Wheeling Health Right, to the local Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts organizations. All told, Ms. Mey's case resulted in over $1.5 million in donations for West Virginia charities.

Congratulations to the other honorees, including Congressman Alan Mollohan for his efforts to fund legal aid organizations, and the Ohio County Bar Association, which leads the state in providing free legal services to those who could not otherwise afford them.

John W. Barrett

Bailey & Glasser LLP

Charleston