Their appointment came Wednesday from U.S. District Judge Judith E. Levy, but South Florida attorney Theodore “Ted” Leopold and Michigan litigator Michael Pitt have already spent thousands of hours on litigation over contaminated drinking water in Flint, Michigan.

The high-powered litigators set up external war rooms and collected more than 1 million documents in a sprawling scandal that put an international spotlight on the working-class community about 70 miles north of Detroit.