UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF NEW JERSEY

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA ex rel. 

STEVEN S. SIMRING, M.D. 

 Plaintiff, 

v. 

UNIVERSITY PHYSICIAN ASSOCIATES 

(UPA), et al. 

 Defendants. 

Civil Action No.: 04-cv-3530 (PGS) 

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER 

 This matter is before the Court on Plaintiff, Steven Simring’s Motion for Reconsideration (ECF 

No. 153) to increase the amount of legal fees awarded. The facts of the case are set forth in Magistrate 

Judge Arleo’s Report and Recommendation dated October 2, 2012 (ECF No. 117) (the “Report”), and 

this Court’s Decision and Order dated August 22, 2013 (ECF No 150) (“Decision”); and therefore the 

facts are not set forth at length herein. 

 The Report was very thorough, and carefully scrutinized the request for fees and costs by relator’s 

counsel. It granted a fee in the amount of $365,867.10 to Mr. Furst and Mr. Lipman. The Decision 

adopted the Report’s rationale in its entirety except for two items. Namely, there was an application for 

fees by Stone & Magnanini who was retained to litigate the amount of the legal fees on behalf of Mr. 

Furst and Mr. Lipman (“fee on fee request”) which the Report denied; but the Decision awarded an 

additional $365,867.10. Secondly, there were many “blocked billed” entries contained within the many 

bills supporting the proposed legal fees which included legal research and other activities. The Report 

deemed that the entire block billed items should be billed as legal research (the lowest hourly rate) 

because there was no other means to equate or break down the time spent on each activity. Hence, the 

Report awarded research time at $250.00 per hour, and then multiplied that rate times the number of 
hours billed in the entry. The Decision modified same. In the Decision, the Court awarded a blended rate 

($425.00 per hour) to all block billed entries. That is, the Court blended the highest rate of New Jersey 

litigators ($650.00 per hour) with the usual associate’s rate ($250.00 per hour) and found that a median 

hourly rate of $425.00 per hour was a more appropriate method to determine the value of the broad 

variety of activities within the block billed entries. This added $50,520.00 to the fee recommended by 

the Report. Hence, the fee awarded to Mr. Furst, Mr. Lipman and Stone & Magnanani was increased to 

$743,586.60 by the Decision. Despite this substantial increase, this motion seeks additional fees. 

II. 

 Motions for reconsideration are governed by Fed. R. Civ. P. 59(e) and L. Civ. R. 7.1(i). The 

Aextraordinary remedy@ of reconsideration is Ato be granted sparingly.@ A.K. Stamping Co., Inc., v. 

Instrument Specialties Co., Inc., 106 F. Supp. 2d 627, 662 (D.N.J. 2000) (quoting NL Indus., Inc., v. 

Commercial Union Ins. Co., 935 F. Supp. 513, 516 (D.N.J. 1996)). The Rule Adoes not contemplate a 

Court looking to matters which were not originally presented.@ Damiano v. Sony Music Entertainment, 

Inc., 975 F. Supp. 623, 634 (D.N.J. 1996) (quoting Florham Park Chevron, Inc., v. Chevron U.S.A., Inc., 

680 F. Supp. 159, 162 (D.N.J. 1988)). 

The Third Circuit has held that the Apurpose of a motion for reconsideration is to correct manifest 

errors of law or fact or to present newly discovered evidence.@ Harsco Corp. v. Zlotincki, 779 F.2d 906, 

909 (3d Cir. 1985), cert. denied, 476 U.S. 1171 (1986). AReconsideration motions, however, may not 

be used to relitigate old matters, nor to raise arguments or present evidence that could have been raised 

prior to the entry of judgment.@ NL Indus., Inc., 935 F. Supp. at 516; See Wright, Miller & Kane, Fed. 

Practice and Procedure: Civil 2d ' 2810.1. Such motions will only be granted where (1) an intervening 

change in the law has occurred, (2) new evidence not previously available has emerged, or (3) the need to 

correct a clear error of law or prevent a manifest injustice arises. See, North River Ins. Co. v. CIGNA 

Reinsurance Co., 52 F.3d 1194, 1218 (3d Cir. 1995). Because reconsideration of a judgment after its 
entry is an extraordinary remedy, requests pursuant to these rules are to be granted Asparingly,@

Maldonado v. Lucca, 636 F. Supp. 621, 630 (D.N.J. 1986); and only when Adispositive factual matters or 

controlling decisions of law@ were brought to the Court’s attention but not considered. Pelham v. United 

States, 661 F. Supp. 1063, 1065 (D.N.J. 1987). See G-69 v. Degnan, 748 F. Supp. 274, 275 (D.N.J. 

1990). 

III. 

 Counsel seeks review in five major areas. Each is analyzed below in light of the reconsideration 

standard. 

 The first issue concerns the fee on fee award. As noted above, the Court awarded a fee to Stone & 

Magnanini but did not award any such fees to Mr. Lipman and Mr. Furst. Evidently, Mr. Lipman worked 

40 hours and Mr. Furst worked 17.1 hours on the award of legal fees prior to the retention of Stone & 

Magnanini. They argue that the Decision failed to assess fees for hours spent before Stone & 

Magnanani was retained by Mr. Furst and Mr. Lipman. Said counsel argue that the Decision appears to 

have permitted such fees pursuant to some language in the decision. Despite relator’s counsel’s 

contention, the Decision did not award fees to Mr. Furst and Mr. Lipman prior to engagement of Stone & 

Magnanini because it was unfair “to bill defendants for the fees of three attorneys” (Mr. Lipman, Mr. 

Furst and Stone & Magnanani). (ECF No. 150, p. 1476). Since the Decision is clear, the Court does no 

find any manifest errors of law or abuse of discretion which requires reconsideration, the Court denies 

same. 

 The second issue concerns block billing. Mr. Lipman argues that legal research “was only a small 

fraction of the nearly 200 hours of block billing and “the hour figure” represented the total amount of 

time billed for all days that included any entry for legal research.” (ECF 103 at p. 1492) (Emphasis in 

original). Lipman “suggests that imposing a substantial penalty on counsel who undertake brief legal 

research tasks is neither just . . . nor consistent with governing law.” (ECF 153-1 at p. 1493). This 
matter was carefully vetted and resolved reasonably in the Decision by applying a blended rate (ECF No. 

150, at page 1474-75). Under the reconsideration standard, this argument is simply an attempt to 

relitigate old matters, and the court denies this portion of the application. 

 The third issue is that Stone &Magnanini seeks to supplement the fees of their fee on fee request, 

and those of Mr. Lipman and Mr. Furst as well by adding new hours for more recent work. To the best of 

my knowledge, this information was never presented before the final settlement conference, nor in the 

previously submitted briefs. The purpose of a reconsideration motion is not “to raise arguments or 

present evidence that could have been raised prior the entry of judgment” as this argument does; hence 

the Court denies same. 

 The fourth issue claims that the “Furst and Litman fees even for time spent preparing for and 

attending court-ordered settlement conferences including the conference the day before the decision and 

order” (August 21, 2013) should be compensated. This is nothing new. The Court awarded fees to 

Stone & Magnanini on the fee on fee request; but it denied same for the work of Mr. Lipman and Mr. 

Furst because the use of three firms to pursue their claim is unreasonable. 

 Within this request, there are two references concerning Mr. Lipman’s extraordinary effort to attend 

the August 21, 2013 settlement conference. For instance, the brief (ECF No. 53-1, p. 1488) states “the 

Court ordered counsel with settlement authority to attend (as the Court is aware, Litman traveled from 

California [to Trenton, New Jersey] for the session on August 21, 2013”). A very similar assertion is set 

forth in his supplemental declaration (ECF No. 153-2 p. 1507). The comment lacks adequate context 

for two reasons. Initially, this fee dispute has been ongoing for a number of years; and during this time, 

all the attorneys, Magistrate Judge Arleo, and myself (to a more limited extent) made concerted efforts to 

determine a fair and reasonable fee. Each participant has handled themselves in a professional, civil, and 

timely manner. Mr. Lipman’s efforts to attend the August 21, 2013 conference are of no greater 

importance than the efforts of others. Secondly, there was an ongoing request by Stone & Magnanini to 
have all relator’s counsel present at settlement conferences. The reason was obvious. That is, Stone & 

Magnanini, Mr. Furst and Mr. Lipman’s fees were all in dispute and each lawyer had their own interest 

in arguing for their portion. This gave rise to a potential conflict of interest issue. In order to avoid same, 

Mr. Lipman’s attendance was preferable. 

 Lastly, there is a request to pay the fees of Steven Altman in the amount of $17,616.00 who was 

“not acting as an attorney but only as a consultant who provided targeted . . . consultation on addressing 

certain of his former DOJ colleagues concerns.” Relator’s counsel is correct. The Court did not 

adequately resolve this issue previously. Since Mr. Altman appears to be more akin to a lobbyist rather 

than a lawyer, this rate ($465 per hour) and the time spent is reasonable. As such, his fees are awarded1. 

 In conclusion, the proposed fees by relator’s counsel as originally submitted was unreasonable. It 

was revised by the Report and the Decision and the amount previously awarded is fair and realistic 

(when Altman’s fees are included). 

 ORDER 

 IT IS on this 16th day of December, 2013; 

 ORDERED that the motion for reconsideration regarding the expense related to the fees of 

Mr.Altman ($17,615.00) is granted; and all other matters within the motion are denied. 

 s/Peter G. Sheridan 

 PETER G. SHERIDAN, U.S.D.J. 

 

1 When reviewing the role of Lipman and Altman, their involvement had the same purpose. That is to intercede or lobby the 

U.S. Attorney’s Office to persuade them to undertake this case. As such, Lipman’s fees should be somewhat similar to 

Altman’s who acted as a lobbyist or governmental relations expert.