Opinion ID: 738304
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Delay and risk.

Text: 31 Dunne argues that the magistrate judge should have used a higher hourly rate, given him a bigger increment for delay in payment, and applied a multiplier for risk and preclusion of other work. He argues that lawyers specializing in antitrust work in the Los Angeles area earn $300 per hour or more, yet to compute Dunne's fees, the magistrate judge used $175 per hour, increased to $200 because of delay in payment. Dunne goes so far as to claim he is entitled to more than $800 per hour based on what antitrust lawyers charge and how long he has waited for payment. 32 The magistrate found that there is no evidence that the work for Florida precluded Dunne from developing a substantial practice, and Dunne offers no reason why this finding might be clearly erroneous. Dunne had failed the California bar examination and could not have legally engaged in a general practice of law during most of this litigation. He worked on another antitrust case, and does not argue that there were any other cases he could legally have worked on but for the Florida case. 33 As for delay, Dunne's own historic rate had been $40 to $60 per hour. The magistrate based her $200 rate on an adjustment for delay as follows. Dunne argued to her at an earlier stage of the case that he had previously been awarded a $150 rate, which should be adjusted to $175 for inflation. The evidence was that a handful of the most highly compensated lawyers in the field might be getting $350 per hour, but the leading lawyers who had submitted affidavits showed hourly rates of $200 to $250. She credited evidence presented by Florida that Dunne's work was of exceptionally poor quality, which could not be compared to the work of the lawyers charging $200 per hour or more. She considered these and other factors to enhance what she termed his historic rate of $175 by $25 to cover delay in payment. 34 The district court must assure that attorneys in common fund cases are compensated for delay in payment, and the court has discretion to do so either (1) by applying the attorneys' current rates to all hours billed during the course of the litigation; or (2) by using the attorneys' historical rates and adding a prime rate enhancement. Washington Pub. Power, 19 F.3d at 1305. The magistrate judge did not follow either course exactly. She did not use a current rate Dunne was charging voluntary clients, but Dunne has not argued she should have, or directed our attention to evidence of what that rate might be. Nor did the magistrate enhance his $40 to $60 hourly rate by a prime rate enhancement. Dunne has not shown how either of the Washington Pub. Power methods would have yielded, as applied to evidence in the record, a higher rate than the $200 the magistrate judge used. It appears that either method would probably have yielded a lower rate, so any error was harmless to Dunne. The $200 rate the magistrate judge used was a current rate for other attorneys whose work, she concluded, had a higher market value than Dunne's, so use of that current figure did not prejudice Dunne's entitlement to compensation for delay. 35 The district judge must exercise discretion in deciding whether to award a risk multiplier. It may be an abuse of discretion to deny one, where the hourly rate does not reflect risk of nonpayment, willingness to represent the class assumes a risk multiplier will be applied, and there is no guarantee of payment. Washington Pub. Power, 19 F.3d at 1302. The magistrate judge decided against a risk multiplier largely because Dunne had no risk whatsoever of nonpayment; he had already been paid $863,944.15 for eight years work on the Florida case: 36 Because of his contract with Florida, Dunne was guaranteed $40 per hour, and as indicated, Dunne received a total payment of $863,944.15 pursuant to that contract. 37 ... Dunne received payment for the entire number of his 21,068.6 hours. The Magistrate Judge found for purposes of this litigation the hours worked were 17,552.70 taking into account double billing and other obviously excessive hours billed. 38 The absence of risk of nonpayment is obviously a good reason to deny a multiplier for risk of nonpayment. 39