A federal judge has curbed Ford Motor Company’s bid to continue pressing its claims against a group of Los Angeles law firms over an alleged racketeering conspiracy to use lawsuits under California’s so-called lemon law to bilk Ford and other car makers for millions of dollars in allegedly made-up legal bills.
On March 10, U.S. District Judge Michelle Williams dismissed Ford’s lawsuit against attorneys Steve B. Mikhov, Amy Morse and Roger Kirnos, of the Knight Law Firm.
The dismissal was with prejudice, meaning the court will not allow Ford to try again in that court. Ford may still appeal.
The ruling, which could end the case, comes about a year after Ford filed the action in the Central District of California court against the Knight Law Firm and others associated with the firm’s practice of filing thousands of legal claims against Ford over allegedly defective automobiles.
Those lawsuits were lodged against Ford under California’s outlier “lemon law,” formally known as the Song-Beverly Consumer Warranty Act.
The law, which gives California residents unique powers under state law to sue automakers over alleged defects in their vehicles, has been used by trial lawyers to assail Ford and other automakers with tens of thousands of lawsuits per year in Golden State courts.
The Knight Firm and its associated attorneys and partner firms had lodged more than 1,800 such lawsuits against Ford alone, as of the end of 2025, according to court documents. And the firm has been highly successful, winning at least 90% of their cases.
In bringing the case against Knight, Ford has said it is not attempting to use the action to block such lawsuits.
But it has accused Knight and its lawyers of allegedly filing false billing information in at least some of the cases, leading to improper fees paid by Ford, as the losing party in those cases.
Ford claims the allegedly fake billing records led to Ford paying the Knight firm lawyers and their referring partners at least $100 million more than they should have across their cases.
The Knight attorneys, however, have said the lawsuit amounts to an improper attempt by Ford to use racketeering claims to exact revenge and force lemon law plaintiffs and their attorneys to more carefully consider taking legal action, lest they risk being accused of fraud and conspiracy.
Last November, only about six months after Ford filed suit, Judge Williams dismissed the action against the Knight firm, as a business, and other related business defendants.
In the new ruling, the judge acknowledged that Ford had presented evidence that the lawyers had engaged in potential fraudulent fee petitions.
But the judge said Ford cannot use its lawsuit to seek to essentially punish the lawyers for the alleged potentially illegal activity, because to do so would infringe on the lawyers’ constitutional rights to petition the courts.
The judge said such activity is protected under the so-called Noerr-Pennington Doctrine, legal rules established under two U.S. Supreme Court decisions in the 1960s.
While Ford argued potential perjury cannot be protected under that doctrine, the judge said Ford’s argument “incorrectly attempts to reframe the scope of the Noerr-Pennington analysis and places the cart before the horse.”
“Plaintiff’s lawsuit focuses on Defendants’ ability to recover fees when pursuing Lemon Law cases, including the representations that Defendants make to courts when doing so,” Judge Williams wrote.
“Filings ‘in which plaintiffs or defendants make representations and present arguments to support their request that the court do or not do something, can be described as petitions without doing violence to the concept,” she said, citing a 2005 decision from the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
Ninth Circuit rulings are considered binding precedent in California federal courts, unless they are superseded by the Supreme Court.
The judge said this is so, even if the filings may be “fraudulent and abusive.”
While finding the Noerr-Pennington Doctrine precludes Ford’s lawsuit, the judge went further still, ruling Ford had not built a vehicle capable of carrying their racketeering claims forward.
In the ruling, she said, legal precedent has established the Knight firm’s “billing — the primary activity at any for-profit law firm hoping to stay in business…” cannot be used to substantiate a racketeering claim against the law firms and attorneys.
Ford has been represented in the action by attorneys with the firm of Kasowitz Benson Torres, of Los Angeles and New York.
The Knight firm and other defendants have been represented by attorney Neal K. Katyal, a prominent former deputy solicitor general under former President Barack Obama, and other attorneys with the firm of Milbank LLP, of Washington, D.C., and New York.
Williams was appointed to the federal bench in 2024 by former President Joe Biden.
