Opinion ID: 754158
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Law In The Sixth Circuit

Text: 55 In Glover III, this Court rejected the same prevailing party argument that is advanced by defendants here. We held that plaintiffs may rely on the trial court's 1985 order to establish that they are prevailing parties and, pursuant to that order, plaintiffs have succeeded on a significant issue. Glover III, supra, 934 F.2d at 716. We also held that moving for contempt to compel compliance with earlier District Court orders is a compensable post-judgment monitoring activity. Id. at 715-16. (citing Northcross v. Board of Education of Memphis City Schools, 611 F.2d 624, 637 (6th Cir.1979), cert. denied, 447 U.S. 911, 100 S.Ct. 2999, 64 L.Ed.2d 862 (1980)). In so holding, we rejected defendants' argument that prevailing party status was dependent upon the outcome of their appeal of the District Court's contempt findings. Id. We also upheld the award despite reversing the District Court in part because it interpreted its remedial order beyond the order's express terms in two areas. Id. at 712 (vocational training), 713 (work pass program). Thus, when plaintiffs seek fees for compliance monitoring, plaintiffs are not required to again establish prevailing party status, nor is the award dependent upon the outcome of an appeal. 56
57 Defendants rely heavily, if not exclusively, on our statement in Northcross in their argument that plaintiffs are not entitled to fees unless they prevail on each post-judgment dispute. There we stated, [t]he [1977] hearings [which involved plaintiffs' work defending a desegration plan from attack] were collateral to and distinct from the desegregation suit itself, which had been finally terminated in 1974, so had the plaintiffs failed to prevail on the merits the district court would have been justified in denying fees altogether. Northcross, 611 F.2d at 641. We believe that this reliance is misplaced for several reasons. First, because the Northcross plaintiffs prevailed in defending the remedy and because the Court held that plaintiffs are prevailing parties, this statement is dicta. Second, defending a remedy from collateral attack is indistinguishable from affirmatively moving for contempt to enforce compliance with the remedy because both activities share the same purpose of protecting court-ordered relief. See Jenkins v. State of Missouri, 127 F.3d 709, 717 (8th Cir.1997) (compliance monitoring, enforcement of the remedy, and defense of the remedy are generally viewed as necessary adjuncts to the initial litigation and compensable). Finally, the Northcross dicta relied upon by defendants is inconsistent with Glover III, which held that compliance monitoring is compensable regardless of the degree of success or the outcome of appeals. 58 Glover III does not however definitively answer how courts should handle the prevailing party issue when unsuccessful legal work for which fees are requested does not relate to compliance monitoring or otherwise protecting a remedy previously affirmed or not appealed. In such cases, we elect to follow the approach outlined recently by the Eight Circuit. 59 In an ongoing school desegregation case involving the Kansas City School District, the Eighth Circuit had occasion to examine the prevailing party issue when the Supreme Court struck down the use of certain remedial measures employed in the court-approved desegregation plan. Jenkins v. State of Missouri, supra. Because the Supreme Court's decision did not affect the district court's underlying holding that the State of Missouri had committed constitutional violations and was obligated to remedy those violations, the court found that the decision did not retroactively take away the Jenkins class's status as a prevailing party. Id., 127 F.3d at 714 (discussing Balark v. City of Chicago, 81 F.3d 658, 665 (7th Cir.1996)) (holding that prospective termination of a 10-year-old consent decree pursuant to Rule 60(b)--as opposed to reversal on direct appeal--did not deprive plaintiffs of prevailing party status, which they enjoyed for 10 years). The Eighth Circuit treated the prevailing party question as a threshold issue and went on to examine whether fees should be awarded for matters on which the plaintiff lost. Id. at 716. 60 The Jenkins court applied the paradigm of Hensley v. Eckerhart, 461 U.S. 424, 103 S.Ct. 1933, 76 L.Ed.2d 40 (1983), a case involving a civil rights plaintiff who had prevailed on some but not all issues, to the prevailing party issue surrounding post-judgment fees in institutional reform cases. Id. (citing Assoc. for Retarded Citizens v. Schafer, 83 F.3d 1008, 1010-12, (8th Cir.), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 117 S.Ct. 482, 136 L.Ed.2d 376 (1996)). The test asks first whether the issues in the post-judgment litigation are inextricably intertwined with those on which the plaintiff prevailed in the underlying suit or whether they are distinct. Id. at 717. Compliance monitoring, enforcement of the remedy, and defense of the remedy are generally viewed as necessary adjuncts to the initial litigation and compensable. Id. Other activities, such as efforts to expand the scope of the original relief obtained, may amount to the assertion of distinct new claims that cannot rest upon the prevailing party determination in the underlying case. Id. When the issues are intertwined, plaintiffs are entitled to fees, i.e., they maintain their prevailing party status. Id. at 718. If on the other hand, the issues are distinct, plaintiffs are entitled to fees only if they prevail on the separate issue. Id. at 717 (discussing Arvinger v. Mayor and City Council of Baltimore, 31 F.3d 196, 202 (4th Cir.1994) and Schafer, supra, which denied prevailing party status on strength of underlying litigation under these circumstances). In applying this analysis to the facts before it, the Jenkins court concluded that the issues that went up to the Supreme Court were related to the issues on which the Jenkins class prevailed as the plaintiffs were placed in the position of defending the scope of the district court's remedial authority. Id. at 719. 10 61