Nelson v. Constant

TAMARA G. NELSON, ET AL., Plaintiffs v. BELINDA C. CONSTANT, ET AL. Defendants

CIVIL ACTION NO. 17-14581 DIVISION: 1

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT EASTERN DISTRICT OF LOUISIANA

January 8, 2021

MAGISTRATE JUDGE JANIS VAN MEERVELD

ORDER AND REASONS

Before the Court is the plaintiffs Motion for Attorneys' Fees, Costs, and Expenses. (Rec. Doc. 156). For the following reasons, the Motion is GRANTED. Plaintiffs are hereby awarded $96,478.21 in attorneys' fees and $10,089 in costs.

Background

Plaintiffs filed this lawsuit on December 5, 2017, to correct what they describe as egregious Due Process and Equal Protection violations occurring at the Mayor's Court of the City of Gretna. The Original Complaint advanced three causes of action:

Count 1: A Due Process challenge to the alleged financial conflict of interest in the Mayor's Court based on the theory that the Mayor, the police department, the city prosecutor, and the magistrate judges of the Mayor's Court are incentivized to maximize the fee and fine income generated through Mayor's Court prosecutions.

Count 2: An Equal Protection and Due Process challenge to Gretna's Deferred Prosecution Program based on the theory that Mayor's Court defendants without the ability to pay the program fee are excluded from participation.

Count 3: A Due Process and Equal Protection challenge to the alleged summary suspension of driver's licenses without a hearing when those defendants are unable to pay fees and fines assessed in Mayor's Court proceedings.

In May 2018, plaintiffs sought leave to file an amended complaint that dropped Count 3. Plaintiffs explained that they had obtained information from the Office of Motor Vehicles in response to their subpoena that resulted in the decision not to pursue Count 3. The amended complaint was entered into the record on June 7, 2018. After supplemental briefing was ordered by the court, plaintiffs' original motion to certify the class was denied without prejudice in September 2018. The parties began discussing settlement in October 2018 and agreed that only Count 2 could be settled. Nonetheless, plaintiffs proceeded to conduct discovery with regard to Count 2. Defendants moved for summary judgment on both Counts 1 and 2 in March 2019. Thereafter, but before a ruling by the District Court, the parties consented to proceed before the undersigned Magistrate Judge. Trial was set to begin on March 23, 2020. On February 20, 2020, the Court denied plaintiffs' motion for partial summary judgment on Count 1, granted the defendants' motion for summary judgment as to Count 1, and denied the defendants' motion for summary judgment as to their immunities' arguments.

At a telephone conference with the Court on February 28, 2020, the parties discussed the status of settlement of Count 2. The Court continued the March 23, 2020, trial in light of the parties' representations that only one issue remained and that they expected to negotiate a resolution. The parties came to an agreement and on May 14, 2020, plaintiff Timothea Richardson filed a Motion to Certify a Settlement Class and a Motion for Preliminary Approval of Class Settlement. The settlement agreement includes refunds and credits to a small number of Deferred Prosecution Program participants. The primary relief is injunctive and comes in the form ofchanges to the Deferred Action Program to provide alternatives for people who cannot afford the program's fee.¹ Following a status conference with the court, follow up discussions via email, and supplemental filings by the plaintiff, the Court issued an Order and Reasons granting the motions on September 3, 2020.

On September 5, 2020, plaintiff filed the present Motion for Attorneys' Fees seeking an award of $143,665 in attorneys' fees and $10,089 in costs. Defendants oppose, arguing that the requested billing rate for one of plaintiffs' attorneys is too high given his experience. They also argue that some of the billing entries improperly include clerical work, block billing, travel, work on unsuccessful issues and claims, duplicative work, and vaguely described work, and that these entries should be stricken or reduced. Plaintiffs have filed a reply memorandum in support of their motion, arguing that the requested billing rates are appropriate. Meanwhile, on December 4, 2020, the court held a Fairness Hearing and on December 18, 2020, issued an Order and Reasons approving the settlement agreement as fair, reasonable, and adequate.

The court now turns to the plaintiffs' Motion for Attorneys' Fees and Costs.

Law and Analysis

1. Entitlement to Fees

Pursuant to 42 U.S.C. §1988, the court may "award a reasonable attorney's fee to prevailing parties in civil rights litigation." Hensley v. Eckerhart, 461 U.S. 424, 429 (1983). Citing the legislative history, the United States Supreme Court has recognized that the prevailing party "should ordinarily recover an attorney's fee unless special circumstances would render such an award unjust." Id. (quoting S. Rep. No. 94-1011, at 4 (1976)). "Because Congress believed that the incentive of attorney's fees was critical to the enforcement of the civil rights laws, section 1988requires an extremely strong showing of special circumstances to justify a denial of fees." Houston Chronicle Pub. Co. v. City of League City, Tex., 488 F.3d 613, 623 (5th Cir. 2007) (emphasis in original) (quoting Kirchberg v. Feenstra, 708 F.2d 991, 998 (5th Cir. 1983)).

A plaintiff is the prevailing party "when actual relief on the merits of his claim materially alters the legal relationship between the parties by modifying the defendant's behavior in a way that directly benefits the plaintiff." Lefemine v. Wideman, 568 U.S. 1, 4 (2012). "The fact that [a plaintiff] prevailed through a settlement rather than through litigation does not weaken her claim to fees." Maher v. Gagne, 448 U.S. 122, 129 (1980).

Here, there is no dispute that plaintiffs are prevailing parties as to Count 2 as a result of the concessions they garnered in the settlement agreement. There are no special circumstances justifying a total denial of fees. Accordingly, the court finds that an award of attorneys' fees is appropriate under §1988.

2. Calculation of a Reasonable Fee Award

a. Legal Standard

"To determine the award amount, the court must first calculate the "lodestar" by multiplying the number of hours reasonably spent on the litigation times a reasonable hourly billing rate." Watkins v. Fordice, 7 F.3d 453, 457 (5th Cir. 1993); see Hensley v. Eckerhart, 461 U.S. 424, 433 (1983) ("The most useful starting point for determining the amount of a reasonable fee is the number of hours reasonably expended on the litigation multiplied by a reasonable hourly rate."). The party requesting fees bears the burden of proving that the rates charged and hours expended are reasonable. See Blum v. Stenson, 465 U.S. 886, 896 n.11 (1984); Walker v. U.S. Dep't of Hous. & Urban Dev., 99 F.3d 761, 770 (5th Cir. 1996); Louisiana Power & Light Co. v. Kellstrom, 50 F.3d 319, 324 (5th Cir. 1995).

In analyzing the reasonableness of the hours worked and hourly rate requested, the Court considers the factors announced in Johnson v. Georgia Highway Express, Inc., 488 F.2d 714 (5^th Cir. 1974). Watkins, 7 F.3d at 457.

The Johnson factors are:

1) time and labor required, (2) novelty and difficulty of the issues, (3) skill required to perform the legal services properly, (4) preclusion of other employment, (5) customary fee, (6) whether the fee is fixed or contingent, (7) time limitations imposed by client or circumstances, (8) amount involved and results obtained, (9) experience, reputation and ability of the attorneys, (10) undesirability of the case, (11) nature and length of the professional relationship with the client, and (12) award in similar cases.

Matter of Fender, 12 F.3d 480, 487 (5th Cir. 1994). If the Johnson factors warrant, the lodestar may be adjusted upward or downward. Watkins, 7 F.3d at 457. "The lodestar, however, is presumptively reasonable and should be modified only in exceptional cases." Id.

In the context of a §1988 award where the plaintiff has obtained partial relief, the Supreme Court has explained that the factor of "results obtained" is crucial. Hensley, 461 U.S. at 434.

Where a plaintiff has obtained excellent results, his attorney should recover a fully compensatory fee. Normally this will encompass all hours reasonably expended on the litigation, and indeed in some cases of exceptional success an enhanced award may be justified. In these circumstances the fee award should not be reduced simply because the plaintiff failed to prevail on every contention raised in the lawsuit. Litigants in good faith may raise alternative legal grounds for a desired outcome, and the court's rejection of or failure to reach certain grounds is not a sufficient reason for reducing a fee. The result is what matters.

If, on the other hand, a plaintiff has achieved only partial or limited success, the product of hours reasonably expended on the litigation as a whole times a reasonable hourly rate may be an excessive amount. This will be true even where the plaintiff's claims were interrelated, nonfrivolous, and raised in good faith. Congress has not authorized an award of fees whenever it was reasonable for a plaintiff to bring a lawsuit or whenever conscientious counsel tried the case with devotion and skill. Again, the most critical factor is the degree of success obtained.

Id. at 435-36 (internal citation and footnote omitted).

b. Billing Rates of Plaintiffs' Attorneys and Paralegal

"'[R]easonable' hourly rates 'are to be calculated according to the prevailing market rates in the relevant community.'" McClain v. Lufkin Indus., Inc., 649 F.3d 374, 381 (5th Cir. 2011) (quoting Blum v. Stenson, 465 U.S. 886, 895-96 (1984)). "[T]he burden is on the applicant to produce satisfactory evidence . . . that the requested rates are in line with those prevailing in the community for similar services by...