BNP Paribas has asked a New York federal judge to compel several plaintiffs' lawyers, including the eponymous founder of Hausfeld LLP, to testify at an upcoming hearing on withdrawn allegations of misconduct by their co-counsel, following a $20 million jury verdict against BNP in a suit brought by refugees accusing the bank of helping finance atrocities in Sudan.

The French bank said in a Thursday memorandum that the refugees' counsel at Hausfeld and Zuckerman Spaeder LLP, and former counsel at Perry Law, have "made or affirmed" allegations of misconduct, such as witness tampering, committed by their co-counsel at Hecht Partners LLP. Those allegations were withdrawn in a Sept. 2 status report.

But BNP said it does not know the details of the incidents of alleged misconduct, therefore the lawyers who witnessed or know about the misconduct should attend a Nov. 12 hearing "to describe and substantiate their allegations."

"Without those lawyers' participation, the court, the class, and BNPP will be left without the necessary information to assess the allegations that plaintiffs' co-counsel have made and to determine the full scope, nature, and consequences of counsel's misconduct," BNP said.

BNP said it will follow a court order to identify "by page and line in transcript, in direct and cross examination, and other documents as necessary, information in connection with any claim of tainted testimony."

Among other things, BNP pointed to claims from the plaintiffs' co-counsel that attorneys were alarmed when Hecht's Kathryn "Lee" Boyd "brazenly stated that she planned to unilaterally engage in an action that would clearly violate ethical obligations" during a purported June trip to prepare victim witnesses in San Diego. The bank added that the plaintiffs' co-counsel didn't specify the witnesses involved or disclose the alleged unethical conduct Boyd planned to commit.

In an Oct. 24 letter addressed to Hausfeld partner and Chair Emeritus Michael D. Hausfeld, BNP's counsel at Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP alleged Hausfeld had attested that the Hecht firm "engaged in witness tampering and subordination of perjury." Publicly available evidence also "confirms that the Hecht firm improperly inflated the size of the purported class by instructing people to opt in and to claim injuries without basis to know those claims were true," the Gibson Dunn counsel said.

"And the Zuckerman Spaeder firm represented to the court that it could not ethically continue to work with the Hecht firm and then proceeded to do just that," the Gibson Dunn counsel said in the letter. "The sworn accusations of serious ethical misconduct that plaintiffs' counsel have made about each other raise the serious prospect that the jury's verdict, and the trial-court proceedings, were infected by fraud on the court."

"You succeeded in delaying an evidentiary hearing on plaintiffs' counsel's misconduct until after trial, but that misconduct cannot and will not be swept under the rug any longer," Gibson Dunn continued in the Oct. 24 letter.

Gibson Dunn accused the plaintiffs' counsel of being "desperate to pressure BNP into settlement based on a jury verdict that has no basis in Swiss or U.S. law, and before that verdict can be reviewed by the court of appeals."

Boyd, Michael Hausfeld, Hecht Partners and counsel with Zuckerman Spaeder and Gibson Dunn didn't immediately respond to requests for comment Friday

Last month, a New York federal jury returned a $20 million verdict against BNP, finding the bank liable for its role enabling the genocide that former Islamist dictator Omar al-Bashir committed against Black African civilians in Sudan. Specifically, the jury awarded $7.3 million to Entesar Osman Kashef, $6.7 million to Abulgasim Abdalla and $6.75 million to Turjuman Adam, finding that each plaintiff "proved beyond a preponderant likelihood" that BNP Paribas SA is liable to them.

The verdict followed a five-week trial in the Southern District of New York. Americans of Sudanese heritage sued in 2016, a year after the bank pled guilty to knowingly allowing Sudan to access the global banking system despite U.S. economic sanctions on Sudan's then-Islamist regime. The bank paid $9 billion in penalties. The trial was designed to inform a 23,000-member class of Sudanese plaintiffs and the $100 billion Paris-based lender on potential liability.

The plaintiffs had argued the bank was complicit and could be held liable for the abuses of the former regime in Darfur. The bank acknowledged the "horrific abuse" experienced by thousands in the region between roughly 1997 and 2011, but it still contended it wasn't responsible for attacks that were part of al-Bashir's ideology of Arab supremacy.

The plaintiffs' lawyers said at the time that the jury finding paved the way for tens of thousands of Sudanese refugees living in the United States to recover billions of dollars and set a precedent for holding global banks civilly liable for facilitating regimes accused of crimes against humanity.

BNP Paribas, meanwhile, maintained the verdict was specific to the three plaintiffs and should be overturned on appeal.

Earlier in the case, the bank had also filed a motion to open a sanctions investigation into the refugees' lawyers, accusing them of attempting to mislead potential class members while attempting to lure them to join the litigation, including purportedly instructing them about what injuries and damages to claim under oath, "regardless of whether those claims were known to be true or not."

U.S. District Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein denied that motion in July.

The plaintiffs are represented by co-lead class counsel Kathryn Boyd, David L. Hecht, Maxim Price, Michael K. Eggenberger and Kristen Nelson of Hecht Partners LLP, Michael D. Hausfeld, Scott Gilmore, Amanda E. Lee-Dasgupta, Claire Rosset, Mary Van Houten, James D. Gotz and Percy Metcalfe of Hausfeld LLP, Greg G. Gutzler, Carrie A. Syme, Madeline R. Harding, Kenneth P. Abbarno, Bobby DiCello and Adam J. Levitt of DiCello Levitt, and Aitan D. Goelman and Cyril Smith of Zuckerman Spaeder LLP.

The bank is represented by Barry H. Berke, Dani R. James, Michael Martinez, Matt Benjamin and David P. Salant of Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP, and Carmine D. Boccuzzi Jr., Abena Mainoo and Charity E. Lee of Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP.

The case is Kashef et al. v. BNP Paribas et al., case number 1:16-cv-03228, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.