Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-alnd-2_97-cv-00092/USCOURTS-alnd-2_97-cv-00092-5/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 442
Nature of Suit: Civil Rights Employment
Cause of Action: 29:0794 Job Discrimination (Handicap)

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IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ALABAMA

SOUTHERN DIVISION

PATRICIA GARRETT,

Plaintiff,

v.

THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES OF THE

UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA AT

BIRMINGHAM,

Defendant.

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CIVIL ACTION NO.

97-AR-0092-S

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

Plaintiff, Patricia Garrett (“Garrett”), has appealed from the

order entered by this court on January 13, 2005, granting the

motion of defendant, The Board of Trustees of the University of

Alabama at Birmingham (“UAB”), for summary judgment, and dismissing

the action brought by Garrett under the Rehabilitation Act of 1973

(“Rehab Act”), 29 U.S.C. §§ 701, et seq.

Rule 7, F.R.App.P., provides:

In a civil case, the district court may require an

appellant to file a bond or provide other security in any

form and amount necessary to ensure payment of costs on

appeal. Rule 8(b) applies to a surety on a bond given

under this rule.

In order for this court to fix the amount of a Rule 7 bond to be

posted by Garrett, it is necessary to predict with some degree of

accuracy the “costs” that may be taxed against Garrett if her

appeal proves unsuccessful. It would be easier to predict the

amount of such “costs” if an attorney’s fee for a successful

FILED

 2005 Feb-23 PM 02:06

U.S. DISTRICT COURT

N.D. OF ALABAMA

Case 2:97-cv-00092-WMA Document 146 Filed 02/23/05 Page 1 of 8
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appellee were not a possible item of “costs”. Such is not the case

here, however. 

The controlling law is found in Pedraza v. United Guaranty

Corporation, 313 F. 3d 1323 (11th Cir. 2004). In Pedraza, the

critical holding is contained in this statement:

[T]he meaning of “costs” as used in Rule 7, should be

derived from the definition of costs contained in the

statutory fee shifting provision that attends the

plaintiff’s underlying cause of action.

Id. at 1333.

The Eleventh Circuit reached its conclusion based on its

understanding of Marek v. Chesny, 473 U.S. 1, 105 S. Ct. 3012

(1985), and Adsani v. Miller, 139 F. 3d 67 (2nd Cir. 1998), cert.

denied, 525 U.S. 875, 119 S. Ct. 176 (1998). Not only did the

Eleventh Circuit adopt the rationale of the Second Circuit in

Adsani, but it flatly rejected the opposite conclusions that had

been reached by the two major treatises on federal procedure, cited

as 20 James Wm. Moore, et al., Moore’s Federal Practice, §

307.10[2], at 307-6 (3d ed. 2002), and Wright, Miller & Cooper,

Federal Practice & Procedure, § 3953 at 293 (3d ed. 1999). Id. at

1330. 

In preparing the headnotes for Pedraza, the editors of

Thompson-West easily recognized that what the Pedraza court said

was a holding and not obiter dictum. The publisher of Federal

Third in headnote 5 re-stated as that holding as follows:

Case 2:97-cv-00092-WMA Document 146 Filed 02/23/05 Page 2 of 8
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Term “costs”, as used in rule governing bond for costs on

appeal, includes anticipated appellate attorney fees,

where statutory fee shifting provision that attends

underlying cause of action defines costs to include

attorney fees. Rule 7, F.R.A.P.

Id. at 1324.

Not only did Thompson-West fully comprehend the significance

of the Eleventh Circuit’s holding, but the same panel that decided

Pedraza decided the companion case, Baynham v. PMI Mortgage Ins.

Co., 313 F. 3d 1337 (11th Cir. 2002). There it said:

In Pedraza, we held that a cost bond issued pursuant to

Fed.R.App.P. 7 (“Rule 7") may properly include

anticipated attorneys’ fees if the statutory fee shifting

provision that attends the plaintiff’s underlying cause

of action defines “costs” to include attorneys’ fees.

Id. 1338. (italics in original). (emphasis added).

In other words, the Eleventh Circuit immediately and expressly

recognized that what it said in Pedraza was a “holding”, that is,

was necessary to its decision. Without adopting Adsani, the

Eleventh Circuit could not have reached the specific conclusion it

reached that the fee shifting provision in the Real Estate

Settlement Procedures Act of 1974 (“RESPA”), 12 U.S.C. §

2607(d)(5), could not be used to include potential fees in a Rule

7 bond. The Eleventh Circuit made plain its firm agreement with

Adsani by saying:

[Although we adopt the approach to defining Rule 7

“costs” taken by the Second Circuit, that analysis yields

the opposite conclusion in this case from the one

produced in Adsani. This is so because RESPA’s fee

shifting provision, § 2607(d)(5), explicitly

distinguishes attorneys’ fees from awardable “costs”.

Case 2:97-cv-00092-WMA Document 146 Filed 02/23/05 Page 3 of 8
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Id. 1334-1335.

After the Eleventh Circuit decided Pedraza, which rejected

Professor Moore’s position, Moore’s treatise was carefully amended

to recognize Pedraza and Adsani as representative of the minority

side of a split in the circuits. In other words, after Pedraza,

Professor Moore’s commentators quickly recognized its significance

and reacted to it. There may be legitimate arguments on both sides

of the Rule 7 question at issue, but it is quite clear which side

the Eleventh Circuit is on.

With no question remaining about where to look to find out if

attorneys’ fees are a part of the taxable costs in this case, the

court looks to the statute upon which Garrett’s underlying cause of

action is based. 

The fee shifting provision in the Rehab Act is found at 29

U.S.C. § 794a(a)(1), as follows:

The remedies, procedures, and rights set forth in section

717 of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (42 U.S.C. 2000e-16),

including the application of sections 706(f) through

706(k) (42 U.S.C. 20003-5(f) through (k), shall be

available, with respect fo any complaint under section

791 of this title, to any employee or applicant for

employment aggrieved by the final disposition of such

complaint, or by the failure to take final action on such

complaint. In fashioning an equitable or affirmative

action remedy under such section, a court may take into

account the reasonableness of the costs of any necessary

work place accommodation, and the availability of

alternatives therefor or other appropriate relief in

order to achieve an equitable and appropriate remedy.

(emphasis supplied).

The Rehab Act thus incorporated the fee shifting provision of 42

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U.S.C. § 2000e-5(k), which says:

In any action of proceeding under this sub-chapter the

court, in its discretion, may allow the prevailing party,

other than the Commission or the United States, a

reasonable attorney’s fee, including expert fees, as part

of the costs, and the Commission and the United States

shall be liable for costs as a private person.

(emphasis supplied).

There is nothing in Adsani or in Pedraza to suggest that before a

trial court can include in a Rule 7 bond possible fees for

appellee’s counsel who provides a successful defense the court must

find that the appeal is “frivolous, unreasonable or without

foundation”. These are the words of Baker v. Alderman, 158 F. 3d

516, 524-25 (11th Cir. 1998), in which the Eleventh Circuit relied

upon the following holding in Christianburg Garment Co. v.

E.E.O.C., 434 U.S. 412, 420 98 S. Ct. 694, 700 (1978) for

evaluating the entitlement of a prevailing defendant to attorneys’

fees:

In sum, a district court may in its discretion award

attorneys’ fees to a prevailing defendant in a Title VII

case upon a finding that the plaintiff’s action was

frivolous, unreasonable, or with foundation, even though

not brought in subjective bad faith.

As pointed out in Baynham, supra, 313 F 3d at 1338, if a plaintiff

proceeds “in bad faith, vexatiously, wantonly, or for oppressive

reasons” (quoting Chambers v. NASCO, Inc., 501 U.S. 32, 45-46, 111

S. Ct. 2123, 2133 (1991)), attorneys’ fees may be included in a

Rule 7 bond in an exercise of the trial court’s inherent power, and

the court, upon such a finding need not look to the fee shifting

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statute. If this court were attempting to use its inherent power

to add UAB’s prospective attorneys’ fees to a Rule 7 bond, it would

have to pre-judge Garrett’s motivation for taking her appeal,

something this court is unwilling to do. But, that is not what

this court is undertaking to do. There is a substantial difference

between the two standards. Following Pedraza this court is not

called upon to judge Garrett’s appeal by either standard. In order

to fix a Rule 7 bond it is not required to make a pre-appeal

finding that Garrett’s appeal is “frivolous, unreasonable or

without foundation”. To make such a finding would be presumptuous

and would be injudicious without reading appellant’s brief.

This court, of course, understands that in the event Garrett

loses her appeal, UAB’s attorneys’ fees cannot be assessed against

her unless a court then finds that her appeal was “frivolous,

unreasonable or without foundation”. See Baker, supra, 158 F. 3d

at 524-25. To reiterate, this court is not called upon to make

that determination before the appeal is decided. Rather, applying

Pedraza, this court must only find that the definition of “costs”

under the Rehab Act can include attorneys’ fees for a prevailing

appellee, and that there is a significant risk that appellant will

be unable to pay the costs taxed against her. In this case, these

essential factors are both present.

To be sure that this court is not misunderstood, Pedraza does

not hold that a bond posted pursuant to Rule 7 is automatically

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forfeited in favor of a successful appellee. It only recognizes

that an appellant must post a bond that stands good for the

appellee’s fee if and when a fee is awarded under a fee shifting

statute. In other words, a Rule 7 bond is no more than an

insurance policy covering a potential loss. The amount of the

coverage is selected after making an intelligent estimate of the

possible loss to be covered. Here, the amount of the “costs”, if

any, to be taxed against Garrett if she loses her appeal, is for

another day. What is called for today, under Rule 7, is that

Garrett guarantee the “costs” that can, in theory, be anticipated;

and attorneys’ fees for UAB are possible if not entirely

predictable. While Rule 7 is admittedly burdensome on a nonprevailing plaintiff who wants to appeal, the intent of Rule 7 is

clear and inescapable, at least as long as Pedraza remains the law

of the Eleventh Circuit.

The mere fact that UAB did not seek attorneys’ fees in the

trial court as a prevailing party under the Rehab Act does not

constitute a waiver of its right to insist upon a Rule 7 bond from

Garrett to cover such fees on appeal.

Unless within fourteen (14) days, the parties agree on an

amount for a Rule 7 bond to be posted by Garrett with a surety to

be approved by the Clerk, each party shall file with the court one

or two affidavits by affiants knowledgeable in the area of

attorneys’ fees, stating their judgments and beliefs as to the

Case 2:97-cv-00092-WMA Document 146 Filed 02/23/05 Page 7 of 8
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amount of attorneys’ fees that can reasonably be anticipated by UAB

for defending this appeal. Thereafter, the court will fix the

amount of the Rule 7 bond.

DONE this 23rd day of February, 2005.

_____________________________

WILLIAM M. ACKER, JR.

UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

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