Opinion ID: 1145408
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Relationship between successful and unsuccessful claims

Text: Describing the situation in which successful and unsuccessful claims are factually or legally intertwined, the Supreme Court noted, In [some] cases the plaintiff's claims for relief will involve a common core of facts or will be based on related legal theories. Much of counsel's time will be devoted generally to the litigation as a whole, making it difficult to divide the hours expended on a claim-by-claim basis. Such a lawsuit cannot be viewed as a series of discrete claims. Instead the district court should focus on the significance of the overall relief obtained by the plaintiff in relation to the hours reasonably expended on the litigation. Hensley, 461 U.S. at 435, 103 S.Ct. at 1940, quoted approvingly in City of Riverside v. Rivera, 477 U.S. 561, 569, 106 S.Ct. 2686, 2691, 91 L.Ed.2d 466 (1986). The superior court's decision implicitly accepts Singh's argument that his successful and unsuccessful claims fell under the second scenario described in Hensley, namely that the claims were legally and/or factually intertwined. Neither party has contested the superior court's determination that the claims were intertwined. Based on our review of the relationship between the state and federal civil rights claims, we conclude that the superior court did not err in determining that the claims were intertwined. [9]