. . . Counting Its Lawyer Expenses And Costs Of Reimbursing Winning Litigant’s Attorneys.
As reported by Brad Branan in a July 18, 2011 post at the online version of The Sacramento Bee, the Sacramento County Employees’ Retirement System should not be happy with the amount of legal expenses it spent in fighting California Public Records Act requests by The Bee to turn over the names and benefits amounts of certain pensioners. The System claimed that the information was private and it had to protect this information.
Unfortunately, the Third District Court of Appeal disagreed, determining that public pension information is the antithesis of private information. With such a win, there is an attorney fee shifting provision which benefits the newspaper.
The cost of this fight? The System paid $168,000 to the L.A. law firm of Nossaman LLP, while The Bee’s attorney’s fees were about $150,000. Total tab: over $300,000, with the appellate court ordering the System to pay the newspaper’s fees and costs.