Stockton’s Bankruptcy Tab.
Recently, a federal bankruptcy court has approved Stockton’s exit from bankruptcy in a Chapter 9 case. After about two years of work, the bankruptcy attorney tab for the Stockton bankruptcy has been reported to be around $14 million.
Littler Mendelson’s Fee Motion Is Deficient, With The Firm Having to Pay Sanctions To the Defending Plaintiff.
The next case does illustrate that prevailing parties should not just file a fee/costs motion without giving serious thought as to whether there is a fee/costs entitlement basis and without making sure adequate substantiation for fees being requested is presented before the deciding judge. Message here: don’t submit heavily redacted time entries.
In Barley v. Fox Chase Cancer Center, No. 13-6265 (E.D.Pa. Oct. 23, 2014) (copy accessible here), Fox Chase, represented by Littler Mendelson, obtained summary judgment against plaintiff Barley in an ADA federal lawsuit. Littler Mendelson then moved to obtain nearly $126,000 in fees and over $7,800 in costs from plaintiff on the theory that the suit was frivolous. District Judge Stewart Dalzell denied the motions, determining that plaintiff’s suit was not frivolous and that the fee submissions by LM were so heavily redacted that they were deficient from a substantiation standpoint. Then, the district court also ordered LM, as a sanction for bringing the motions, to pay plaintiff’s fees for having to defend against said motions. Ouch!