Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-alsd-2_12-cv-00279/USCOURTS-alsd-2_12-cv-00279-3/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 864
Nature of Suit: Social Security - SSID Title XVI
Cause of Action: 42:405 Review of HHS Decision (SSID)

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IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF ALABAMA

NORTHERN DIVISION

PATRICIA VAUGHN, *

* 

Plaintiff, *

*

vs. * CIVIL ACTION 12-00279-CG-B

*

MICHAEL J. ASTRUE, Commissioner *

of Social Security, *

*

Defendant. *

REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION

This matter is before the Court on Plaintiff’s Application for 

Award of Attorney Fees Pursuant to the Equal Access to Justice Act 

(“EAJA”), and the response of Defendant, the Commissioner of Social 

Security. (Docs. 22, 24). This action was referred to the 

undersigned Magistrate Judge for report and recommendation pursuant 

to 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1)(B) and Local Rule 72.2(c)(3). Upon 

consideration of the pertinent pleadings, it is the recommendation 

of the undersigned that Plaintiff’s application be GRANTED and that 

Plaintiff be awarded a reasonable attorney’s fee in the amount of 

$ 1,241.88 under the EAJA for legal services rendered by her attorney 

in this Court. 

I. Findings Of Fact

Plaintiff commenced this action on April 20, 2012. (Doc. 1). 

On October 9, 2012, Defendant filed an unopposed Motion to Remand 

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pursuant to sentence four of 42 U.S.C. § 405(g). (Doc. 17). The 

undersigned entered a Report and Recommendation on October 11, 2012, 

recommending that Defendant’s motion be granted and that the decision 

of the Commissioner be reversed and remanded. (Doc. 19). On October 

26, 2012, the Report and Recommendation was adopted as the opinion 

of the Court, and Judgment was entered reversing and remanding this 

cause to the Commissioner of Social Security for further proceedings.

(Docs. 20, 21).

On November 5, 2012, Plaintiff filed a Motion for Attorney’s

Fees under the EAJA,1 seeking an attorney’s fee award of $1,241.88.

(Doc. 22). The sum requested represents a total of 6.80 hours, at 

an hourly rate of $182.63 per hour, for attorney time spent 

representing Plaintiff in this Court. (Id.)

Defendant has filed a Response in which he states that he has 

no objection to Plaintiff’s fee request or the amount of the fee 

request, and that he consents to an award of $1,241.88 in attorney’s

fees. (Doc. 24 at 1). Defendant contends however that the fees 

should be awarded directly to Plaintiff, as opposed to Plaintiff’s

 1 One of the requirements for eligibility for an attorney’s fee award 

under the EAJA is that the claimant must show that she is a prevailing 

party in a non-tort suit involving the United States. 28 U.S.C. § 

2412(d)(1)(B). “[A] party who wins a sentence-four remand order is 

a prevailing party.” Shalala v. Schaefer, 509 U.S. 292, 302 (1993).

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counsel.2 (Id. at 2).

II. Conclusions Of Law

The U.S. Supreme Court has indicated that “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.” Watford v. Heckler, 765 F.2d 1562, 1568 

(11th Cir. 1985) (quoting Hensley v. Eckerhart, 461 U.S. 424, 433 

(1983)). See also Jean v. Nelson, 863 F.2d 759, 772-73 (11th Cir. 

1988) (discussing the reasonableness of the hours expended in the 

context of contentions by the government that the fee requests were 

not supported by sufficient documentation and often involved a 

duplication of effort), aff’d sub nom, Commissioner, I.N.S. v. Jean, 

496 U.S. 154 (1990).

A. EAJA Hourly Rate

The EAJA (as amended)3 provides, in relevant part, as

follows:

 2

Defendant’s position is supported by existing case law, which holds 

that under the EAJA, “attorney’s fees are awarded to the ‘prevailing 

party,’ not to the prevailing party’s attorney.” Reeves v. Astrue,

526 F.3d 732, 738 (11th Cir. 2008). 

3 On March 29, 1996, the EAJA was amended so as to increase the statutory 

cap on EAJA fees from $75.00 per hour to $125.00 per hour. See, e.g, 

Winters v. Astrue, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 59791, *3 n.2 (S.D. Ala. 

April 9, 2012). These amendments apply to civil actions commenced 

on or after the date of enactment. Id. Therefore, the statutory cap 

of $125.00 per hour applies in this present action.

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The amount of fees awarded under this subsection 

shall be based upon prevailing market rates for 

the kind and quality of the services furnished, 

except that . . . attorneys fees shall not be 

awarded in excess of $125.00 per hour unless the 

court determines that an increase in the cost 

of living or a special factor, such as the 

limited availability of qualified attorneys for 

the proceedings involved, justifies a higher 

fee.

28 U.S.C. § 2412(d)(2)(A) (emphasis added). In Meyer v. Sullivan, 

958 F.2d 1029 (11th Cir. 1992), the Eleventh Circuit determined that 

the EAJA establishes a two-step analysis for determining the 

appropriate hourly rate to be applied in calculating attorney’s fees 

under the Act: 

The first step in the analysis, . . . is to 

determine the market rate for “similar services 

[provided] by lawyers of reasonably comparable 

skills, experience, and reputation.” . . . The 

second step, which is needed only if the market 

rate is greater than [$125.00] per hour, is to 

determine whether the court should adjust the 

hourly fee upward from [$125.00] to take into 

account an increase in the cost of living, or 

a special factor. 

Id. at 1033-34 (citations and footnote omitted). 

The prevailing market rate for social security cases in the 

Southern District of Alabama has been adjusted to take into account 

an increase in the cost of living. Lucy v. Astrue, 2007 U.S. Dist. 

LEXIS 97094 (S.D. Ala. July 5, 2007). In Lucy, the following formula, 

based on the CPI, was utilized:

($125/hour) x (CPI-U Annual Average “All Items 

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Index,” South Urban, for month and year of 

temporal midpoint)/152.4, where 152.4 equals 

the CPI-U of March 1996, the month and year in 

which the $125 cap was enacted.

Id. at *13-14. The “temporal midpoint” is calculated by counting the 

number of days from the date that the claim was filed to the date 

of the Magistrate or District Judge’s Order and Judgment. Id. at *5-6. 

The undersigned finds, based on the Lucy decision, that the 

formula utilized by the Court in Lucy is the proper method in this 

District for determining the attorney fee rate in cases such as these.

The Complaint in this action was prepared and filed on April 20, 2012, 

and the Order and Judgment of the District Judge were issued on October 

26, 2012. (Docs. 1, 20, 21). The number of days between those two 

dates is 189; thus making July 23, 2012, the “temporal midpoint”

between those two dates. The CPI-U for July of 2012 is 222.667.

Plugging the relevant numbers into the foregoing formula renders the 

following equation: $125 x 222.667/152.4. This calculation yields 

an hourly rate, adjusted for “cost of living” increases, of $182.63. 

Accordingly, based on the formula set forth in Lucy, the undersigned 

finds that an hourly rate of $182.63 is appropriate.

B. Reasonableness of Hours

With regard to the reasonableness of the hours claimed by 

Plaintiff’s attorney, “[t]he fee applicant bears the burden of 

establishing entitlement and documenting the appropriate hours and 

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hourly rates.” Norman v. Housing Auth. of City of Montgomery, 836 

F.2d 1292, 1303 (11th Cir. 1988). “[T]he measure of reasonable hours 

is determined by the profession’s judgment of the time that may be 

conscionably billed and not the least time in which it might 

theoretically have been done.” Id. at 1306. 

In the case sub judice, Plaintiff has attached to her motion 

a time sheet detailing the description of work performed, the time 

expended, and the date on which the work was performed. (Doc. 22,

att. 3). The undersigned has reviewed this document and observes that 

Defendant has agreed to pay the full amount sought by Plaintiff

($1,241.88), which sum is based on 6.80 hours of work performed at 

a rate of $182.63 per hour. (Doc. 24 at 1). Having considered the 

circumstances presented, as well as the usual number of hours billed 

by attorneys in similar actions, the Court finds that 6.80 hours is 

a reasonable number of hours for attorney time expended representing 

Plaintiff in federal court.4 

III. CONCLUSION

Upon consideration of the pertinent pleadings, the undersigned 

Magistrate Judge RECOMMENDS that Plaintiff’s Motion for Award of

Attorney’s Fees Pursuant to the Equal Access to Justice Act be GRANTED

and that Plaintiff be awarded a reasonable attorney’s fee in the amount 

 4 Because the Court granted Plaintiff’s motion for leave to proceed 

without prepayment of fees and costs (Docs. 2, 3), Plaintiff incurred 

no costs in this action and has no claim therefor. 

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of $1,241.88 under the EAJA for legal services rendered by her attorney 

in this Court. 

The attached sheet contains important information regarding 

objections to the undersigned’s report and recommendation.

DONE this 11th day of January, 2013.

 /s/ SONJA F. BIVINS 

 UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE

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MAGISTRATE JUDGE’S EXPLANATION OF PROCEDURAL RIGHTS

AND RESPONSIBILITIES FOLLOWING RECOMMENDATION

AND FINDINGS CONCERNING NEED FOR TRANSCRIPT

1. Objection. Any party who objects to this recommendation or 

anything in it must, within fourteen days of the date of service of 

this document, file specific written objections with the clerk of 

court. Failure to do so will bar a de novo determination by the 

district judge of anything in the recommendation and will bar an 

attack, on appeal, of the factual findings of the magistrate judge. 

See 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1)(C); Lewis v. Smith, 855 F.2d 736, 738 (11th 

Cir. 1988). The procedure for challenging the findings and 

recommendations of the magistrate judge is set out in more detail 

in SD ALA LR 72.4 (June 1, 1997), which provides, in part, that:

A party may object to a recommendation entered 

by a magistrate judge in a dispositive matter, 

that is, a matter excepted by 28 U.S.C. § 

636(b)(1)(A), by filing a “Statement of 

Objection to Magistrate Judge’s Recommendation” 

within ten days5 after being served with a copy 

of the recommendation, unless a different time 

is established by order. The statement of 

objection shall specify those portions of the 

recommendation to which objection is made and 

the basis for the objection. The objecting 

party shall submit to the district judge, at the 

time of filing the objection, a brief setting 

forth the party’s arguments that the magistrate 

judge’s recommendation should be reviewed de

novo and a different disposition made. It is 

insufficient to submit only a copy of the 

original brief submitted to the magistrate 

judge, although a copy of the original brief may 

be submitted or referred to and incorporated into 

the brief in support of the objection. Failure 

to submit a brief in support of the objection 

may be deemed an abandonment of the objection.

A magistrate judge’s recommendation cannot be appealed to a Court 

of Appeals; only the district judge’s order or judgment can be 

 5 Effective December 1, 2009, the time for filing written objections 

was extended to “14 days after being served with a copy of the 

recommended disposition[.]” Fed. R. Civ. P. 72(b)(2).

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appealed.

2. Opposing party’s response to the objection. Any opposing party 

may submit a brief opposing the objection within fourteen (14) days 

of being served with a copy of the statement of objection. Fed. R. 

Civ. P. 72; SD ALA LR 72.4(b). 

3. Transcript (applicable where proceedings tape recorded). 

Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915 and Fed. R. Civ. P. 72(b), the magistrate 

judge finds that the tapes and original records in this action are 

adequate for purposes of review. Any party planning to object to this 

recommendation, but unable to pay the fee for a transcript, is advised 

that a judicial determination that transcription is necessary is 

required before the United States will pay the cost of the transcript. 

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