Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-alsd-1_04-cv-00534/USCOURTS-alsd-1_04-cv-00534-3/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

SOUTHERN DIVISION

JANET B. FLOTT, :

Plaintiff, :

vs. CA 04-0534-P-C

:

JO ANNE B. BARNHART,

Commissioner of Social Security, :

Defendant.

REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION

This cause is before the Court for entry of a report and recommendation

pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1)(B) and Rule 54(d)(2)(D) of the Federal Rules

of Civil Procedure on plaintiff’s motion for attorney’s fees under the Equal

Access to Justice Act (“EAJA”), 28 U.S.C. § 2412. (Doc. 18; see also Doc. 19

(brief in support of motion for EAJA fees)) Upon consideration of all pertinent

materials contained in this file, it is determined that plaintiff should receive a

reasonable attorney’s fee in the amount of $2,187.50 under the EAJA for legal

services rendered by her attorney in this Court. 

FINDINGS OF FACT

1. On May 2, 2005, this Court entered a Rule 58 judgment reversing

and remanding this cause to the Commissioner of Social Security pursuant to

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In support of her request for a hearing, Ms. McPhillips, avers, in part, that “[t]he

appropriate vehicle for proving fees (or the prevailing market rate) is through testimony given by other

attorneys.” (Doc. 23, at ¶ 2) Presumably, if a hearing was held by the undersigned, plaintiff’s counsel

would offer the testimony of attorneys such as Paul Brown, Esquire, who provided an affidavit in

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sentence four of 42 U.S.C. § 405(g) for further proceedings. (Doc. 17; see also

Doc. 16) 

2. The motion for attorney’s fees under the EAJA was filed on

August 1, 2005 (Doc. 18), some ninety-one (91) days after entry of final

judgment (compare id. with Doc. 17). In the brief filed in support of the

motion for EAJA fees, plaintiff requests attorney’s fees in the amount of

$2,731.23 to compensate her attorney for the time spent representing her

before this Court as of the date of the filing of the fee application. (See Doc.

18, at 5)

3. The Commissioner of Social Security filed a response to

plaintiff’s EAJA fee application on August 15, 2005 and therein states that while

she does not dispute the issues of prevailing party status or timeliness of the

petition and does not object to the number of hours claimed, she “does object

to the requested hourly rate” of $156.07. (Doc. 21) 

4. Plaintiff filed a response to defendant’s response on August 16,

2005 (Doc. 22) and concomitant therewith a request for a hearing on her fee

request (Doc. 23). The motion for a hearing is DENIED.

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support of plaintiff’s motion for EAJA fees (Doc. 19, Attachment B), in order to establish that the

prevailing market rate is in fact higher than $125.00. This, of course, despite Judge Pittman’s recent

refusal to make an adjustment in the rate to account for changes in the cost of living. See n.3, infra.

Even setting aside Judge Pittman’s recent opinion, the undersigned is not inclined to hold a hearing in

this case. This is because the anticipated testimony of Paul Brown, and possibly others, who do not

practice social security law before this Court simply cannot outweigh the patent acceptance and

acknowledgment by the majority of social security attorneys practicing before this Court, whose skills,

experience, and reputation are comparable to plaintiff’s counsel, that $125.00 per hour is the prevailing

EAJA market rate in the Southern District of Alabama in social security cases. 

2

"[A] party who wins a sentence-four remand order is a prevailing party." Shalala

v.Schaefer, 509 U.S. 292, 302, 113 S.Ct.2625, 2632, 125 L.Ed.2d 239 (1993). 

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CONCLUSIONS OF LAW

1. The Equal Access to Justice Act requires a district court to "award

to a prevailing party . . . fees and other expenses . . . incurred by that party in any

civil action . . ., including proceedings for judicial review of agency action,

brought by or against the United States . . ., unless the court finds that the

position of the United States was substantially justified or that special

circumstances make an award unjust." 28 U.S.C. § 2412(d)(1)(A). It is

imminently clear in this case that plaintiff is a prevailing party under the EAJA2

and that the position of the United States in this case was not substantially

justified, the defendant having conceded as much.

2. The EAJA requires a prevailing party to file an application for

attorney's fees within thirty (30) days of final judgment in the action. 28 U.S.C.

§ 2412(d)(1)(B). The thirty-day clock did not begin to run in this case until this

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Court's reversal and remand order of May 2, 2005 became final, which occurred

at the end of the sixty (60) days for appeal provided under Rule 4(a)(1) of the

Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure, see Shalala v. Schaefer, 509 U.S. 292,

302, 113 S.Ct. 2625, 2632, 125 L.Ed.2d 239 (1993), that is, July 1, 2005. The

application filed in this case, bearing a date of August 1, 2005, was technically

filed one day after the time limit expired on July 31, 2005; however, it is

nonetheless timely since July 31, 2005 fell on a Sunday and the plaintiff filed

the motion the following business day.

3. The EAJA, like 42 U.S.C. § 1988, is a fee-shifting statute. The

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) (EAJA), quoting Hensley v. Eckerhart, 461

U.S. 424, 433, 103 S.Ct. 1933, 1939, 76 L.Ed.2d 40 (1983)(§ 1988); see Jean

v. Nelson, 863 F.2d 759, 772-773 (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, 110 S.Ct. 2316, 110 L.Ed.2d 134

(1990).

Case 1:04-cv-00534-WS-C Document 24 Filed 08/18/05 Page 4 of 11
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This calculation provides an objective basis on

which to make an initial estimate of the value of a

lawyer's services. The party seeking an award of

fees should submit evidence supporting the hours

worked and the rates claimed. Where the

documentation of hours is inadequate, the district

court may reduce the award accordingly. The

district court also should exclude from this initial

fee calculation hours that were not "reasonably

expended." . . . Cases may be overstaffed, and the

skill and experience of lawyers vary widely.

Counsel for the prevailing party should make a

good-faith effort to exclude from a fee request

hours that are excessive, redundant, or otherwise

unnecessary, just as a lawyer in private practice

ethically is obligated to exclude such hours from

his fee submission. "In the private sector, 'billing

judgment' is an important component in fee setting.

It is no less important here. Hours that are not

properly billed to one's client also are not properly

billed to one's adversary pursuant to statutory

authority."

Hensley, supra, 461 U.S. at 433-434, 103 S.Ct. at 1939-1940 (citations

omitted); see also id., at 437, 103 S.Ct. at 1941 ("[T]he fee applicant bears the

burden of establishing entitlement to an award and documenting the appropriate

hours expended and hourly rates."); ACLU of Georgia v. Barnes, 168 F.3d 423,

428 (11th Cir.1999) (“If fee applicants do not exercise billing judgment, courts

are obligated to do it for them, to cut the amount of hours for which payment is

sought, pruning out those that are ‘excessive, redundant, or otherwise

unnecessary.’ Courts are not authorized to be generous with the money of

Case 1:04-cv-00534-WS-C Document 24 Filed 08/18/05 Page 5 of 11
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others, and it is as much the duty of courts to see that excessive fees and

expenses are not awarded as it is to see that an adequate amount is awarded.”);

Norman v. Housing Authority, 836 F.2d 1292, 1301 (11th Cir. 1988)

("Excluding excessive or otherwise unnecessary hours under the rubric of

'billing judgment' means that a lawyer may not be compensated for hours spent

on activities for which he would not bill a client of means who was seriously

intent on vindicating similar rights, recognizing that in the private sector the

economically rational person engages in some cost benefit analysis."). 

4. In Norman, supra, the Eleventh Circuit indicated that "the

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." 836 F.2d at 1306. 

5. Because the defendant interposes no objection whatsoever to the

hours claimed by petitioner to have been spent on legal tasks, the undersigned

recommends that the Court find that plaintiff’s counsel reasonably spent 17.5

hours on legal tasks in this case. 

6. With respect to a determination of the hourly rate to apply in a

given EAJA case, for services performed by attorneys, the express language of

the Act, as amended by the Contract with America Advancement Act of 1996,

provides in pertinent part as follows:

Case 1:04-cv-00534-WS-C Document 24 Filed 08/18/05 Page 6 of 11
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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 . . . attorney 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) (Cum.Supp. 1997).

7. In Meyer v. Sullivan, 958 F.2d 1029 (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] per hour, is to determine whether the

court should adjust the hourly fee upward from

$[125] to take into account an increase in the cost

of living, or a special factor.

Id. at 1033-1034 (citations and footnote omitted).

8. The prevailing market rate in the Southern District of Alabama has

been raised to $125.00 per hour. See, e.g., Willits v. Massanari, CA 00-0530-

RV-C; Boggs v. Massanari, 00-0408-P-C; Boone v. Apfel, CA 99-0965-CB-L.

Because the market rate is not greater than the statutory rate of $125.00 per

hour, (see Doc. 34, Steele v. Barnhart, CA 03-0088-P-C (“Although plaintiff

Case 1:04-cv-00534-WS-C Document 24 Filed 08/18/05 Page 7 of 11
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In rejecting the argument for an increase in the hourly rate (now to $156.07), the

undersigned also notes with favor Senior United States Virgil Pittman’s relatively recent order adopting

the undersigned’s report and recommendation regarding EAJA attorney’s fees requested in Burrows v.

Barnhart, supra, at doc. 39.

It is a cost of living increase that plaintiff is seeking . . . . However, “while the statute

8

contends that the evidence shows that the prevailing market rate for attorneys

in Mobile exceeds $125.00 per hour, this court finds that plaintiff has presented

no evidence specifically regarding hourly billing rates for the sole practitioner

under EAJA in Social Security cases, in this District.”)), the Court need not

reach the second step set out in the Meyer case (see Doc. 31, Waller v.

Barnhart, CA 01-0253-BH-L, Report & Recommendation, at 4 & 5 (“Plaintiff

has presented no evidence regarding [] fee awards in excess of the statutory rate

for the Southern District of Alabama and the prevailing market rate for Social

Security cases in this District has been set at $125.00 per hour. . . . The

undersigned has no authority to legislate a new statutory cap and can only exceed

the cap if plaintiff’s counsel establishes that the market rate is above $125.00

and that an increase in the cost of living or other special factors justifies raising

the rate above $125.00. . . . Because plaintiff has not established that the

prevailing market rate for this District ($125.00) should be increased beyond

the statutory rate of $125.00 per hour, this court need not reach the second step

of the Meyer analysis.”)).3

Case 1:04-cv-00534-WS-C Document 24 Filed 08/18/05 Page 8 of 11
clearly allows an adjustment for changes in the cost of living, it does not absolutely

require it . . . such a decision is within the discretion of the district court.” Baker, 839

F.2d at 1084 (emphasis in original).

Herein, the district court cases plaintiff presents are distinguishable from the

case sub judice. In Smith, the requested fee calculated at $135.00 per hour was not

challenged by defendant; herein, defendant challenges the reasonableness of plaintiff’s

request for the $150.93 hourly rate. In Jones, the hourly rate was adjusted upward

from $125.00 to $139.69, overall an 11% increase, in Usher, the rate increase from

$125.00 to $138.33 represents a 10% increase, and in Dewberry, the rate increase

from $125.00 to $133.63 represents a 6.5% increase.

Herein, plaintiff’s requested fee increase from $125.00 to $150.93 per hour

amounts to an increase of 17%. This court finds the requested increase unreasonable.

Further, this court notes that in a similar prior case, on March 22, 2004, the

plaintiff requested a fee for counsel of record, Ms. McPhillips, calculated at $147.96

per hour. This court determined de novo that the fee was to be calculated at this

court’s prevailing rate, at $125.00 per hour. Steele v. Barnhart, C.A. 03-0088-P-C

(S.D. Ala. (Dec. 23, 2003)). 

Herein, just 31⁄2 months later, on July 2, 2004, plaintiff filed the subject Motion

For Attorney[’s] Fees requesting that counsel of record, Ms. McPhillips, be awarded a

fee calculated at $150.93 per hour, an inexplicable 2% increase in just 31⁄2 months for

similar services. Plaintiff’s objection is OVERRULED.

After due and proper consideration of all portions of this file deemed relevant to

the issues raised, and a de novo determination of those portions of the Report and

Recommendation to which objection is made, the Report and Recommendation of the

Magistrate Judge (doc. 37), is hereby ADOPTED as the opinion of this court.

(Id. at 2-3)

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9. In consideration of the foregoing, the plaintiff is due to be

awarded an attorney's fee in the amount of $2,187.50 under the EAJA for

the17.5 hours her attorney spent performing work traditionally performed by

Case 1:04-cv-00534-WS-C Document 24 Filed 08/18/05 Page 9 of 11
4 The Court REJECTS the request of plaintiff’s counsel that “any sum approved be

ordered to be paid to the attorney for the Plaintiff, Rose A. McPhillips[.]” (Doc. 18, ¶ 6

(emphasis in original)) Plaintiff is the prevailing party in this case and, under the explicit terms of the

statute, the award of fees and other expenses is to be made to the prevailing party. See 28 U.S.C. §

2412(d)(1)(A). In absence of precedent or regulatory authority establishing that this Court may pay

attorney’s fees directly to plaintiff’s counsel, the undersigned recommends that the Court continue to

follow statutory provisions and order only that fees be awarded to the prevailing party. 

10

attorneys in social security cases.4

CONCLUSION

The Magistrate Judge recommends that plaintiff be awarded reasonable

attorney's fees in the amount of $2,187.50 under the Equal Access to Justice

Act, representing compensation for 17.5 hours of service by Rose A.

McPhillips, Esquire, at the market rate of $125.00 an hour.

The attached sheet contains important information regarding objections

to the report and recommendation of the Magistrate Judge.

DONE this the 18th day of August, 2005.

s/WILLIAM E. CASSADY 

UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE

Case 1:04-cv-00534-WS-C Document 24 Filed 08/18/05 Page 10 of 11
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MAGISTRATE JUDGE'S EXPLANATION OF PROCEDURAL RIGHTS AND

RESPONSIBILITIES FOLLOWING RECOMMENDATION, AND

FINDINGS CONCERNING NEED FOR TRANSCRIPT

l. Objection. Any party who objects to this recommendation or anything in it must,

within ten days of the date of service of this document, file specific written objections with

the Clerk of this 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); Nettles v. Wainwright, 677 F.2d 404 (5th Cir. Unit B, 1982)(en

banc). 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 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 days 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 appealed.

2. 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 case 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.

s/WILLIAM E. CASSADY 

UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE

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