Opinion ID: 1134814
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: the hugheses' cross-appeal

Text: The Hugheses object to the court's failure to award the attorney's fees they requested. We will reverse an attorney's fee award only if the trial court abused its discretion. See Mount Juneau Enters., Inc. v. Juneau Empire, 891 P.2d 829, 834 (Alaska 1995). An abuse of discretion exists if the fee award is arbitrary, capricious, manifestly unreasonable, or based upon an improper motive. See Hughes v. Foster Wheeler Co., 932 P.2d 784, 793 (Alaska 1997); In re Soldotna Air Crash Litigation, 835 P.2d 1215, 1220 n. 7 (Alaska 1992). Alaska Statute 23.10.110 controls the award of attorney's fees in overtime-compensation cases under the AWHA. See Schorr v. Frontier Transp. Co., 942 P.2d 418, 419-20 (Alaska 1997). Former AS 23.10.110(c), which applies here, [4] provided that [t]he court in an action brought under this section shall, in addition to a judgment awarded to the plaintiff, allow costs of the action and reasonable attorney fees to be paid by the defendant. On prior occasions we have emphasized that this statute's requirement of full reasonable attorney's fee awards ordinarily trumps Alaska Civil Rule 82's provision authorizing partial fees for prevailing parties: [W]hen interpreting a state statute that expressly calls for an award of reasonable attorney's fees to successful plaintiffs, we have held that full fees should be awarded to claimants as long as those fees are reasonable. Bobich v. Stewart, 843 P.2d at 1237. [5] The Hugheses requested an enhanced, or lodestar, fee award. Their billing records showed 420.75 hours of work at an hourly rate of $150, for a total of $62,857.50. The court ruled that an enhanced fee was inappropriate because their attorney had unnecessarily complicated the case. The court concluded that the Hugheses should receive substantial fees for their litigation of the wage claim and defense against the counterclaims, issues on which they prevailed. The court multiplied the hours spent on these issues by $150 (which the court found was a reasonable rate), and eliminated billings that are too vague to allow a fair determination that they were reasonably incurred or incurred in connection with the Hugheses' lawsuit. This yielded $57,337.50. The court awarded one-half of this amount to Wanda, and one-quarter to Alvie. The reduced award to Alvie reflected a deduction for Alvie's separate settlement of his medical-benefits claim, which built in a $5000 sum for attorney's fees. The court then further reduced each of these awards by fifteen percent to account for overzealous behavior by the Hugheses' attorney and for time that the attorney spent duplicatively or wastefully, but that the court could not identify precisely from the vague billing records. The Hugheses first assert that the court abused its discretion in reducing their award to take account of Alvie's medical benefits claim. The Hugheses state that, in the billing records they submitted to the court, they attempted to subtract their fees expended in prosecuting the `medical claim.' While conceding that they may have inadvertently left in some hours in their billings, they assert that that is not a basis for a fifty percent (50%) deduction. But the court did not reduce the Hugheses' billings by fifty percent on account of Alvie's medical claim. Rather, it apportioned half the billings to Wanda, half to Alive, and reduced Alvie's half by fifty percent, which amounts to a twenty-five percent reduction. Before ordering the reduction, the court carefully considered the billing records, which it expressly described as vague. The court also considered Bobich's objection to the Hugheses' billings, in which Bobich identified numerous billings that were unrelated to the overtime claims. We conclude that the court did not abuse its discretion in finding that the billings included time spent on Alvie's medical claims, for which he had already been compensated. We further conclude that the court did not abuse its discretion in reducing Alvie's award to prevent double compensation. The Hugheses next object to the court's additional fifteen-percent reduction reflecting the Hugheses' attorney's role in unreasonably complicating the litigation. In ordering this reduction, the court observed that Bobich's behavior was inappropriate as well; the court stated that the unnecessary complexity ... was created by both parties.... [T]he defendants' conduct in this case was on a substantial number of occasions inappropriate and blameworthy.... Thus, deterrence of defendants' unlawful compensation practices and unreasonably aggressive litigation tactics is a factor to be considered here in determining what was a reasonable expenditure of fees under the circumstances. The court also observed that the Hugheses' case had been dismissed for discovery violations committed by their attorney and that, although the dismissal had been reversed, their attorney was severely criticized for his conduct ... by both [Superior Court] Judge Johnstone and the Supreme Court. Judge Johnstone ultimately issued a severe monetary sanction against him for his inappropriate conduct. The Hugheses now complain that the trial court penalized them, but never once punished the defendants. They also complain that the fifteen-percent reduction amounts to an improper duplicative penalty for conduct that Judge Johnstone had already punished. We are unpersuaded by these arguments. The Hugheses were entitled to full attorney's fees only as long as those fees [were] reasonable. Bobich v. Stewart, 843 P.2d at 1237. Although the court did not itemize its fifteen-percent reduction, it expressly said that the reduction reflected billings that it had found were not actually reasonable. The Hugheses have failed to show that the fifteen-percent figure adopted below is arbitrary, capricious, manifestly unreasonable, or the result of an improper motive. Hughes v. Foster Wheeler Co., 932 P.2d at 793. Moreover, because the reduction represents unreasonable fees, it is not a penalty. The Hugheses' complaints of dual and discriminatory punishment are therefore unfounded. Although the court might have more clearly explained the fifteen-percent reduction, see Bobich v. Stewart, 843 P.2d at 1237-38, our review of the record convinces us that it did not abuse its discretion in making the attorney's fee award.
The Hugheses lastly assert that the court originally entered final judgment on October 30, 1995, but then changed the date of the judgment to March 7, 1996, thereby depriving them of several months of interest. [6] They argue that this violates Alaska Civil Rule 58.1(a), which provides that judgments become effective the date they are entered and that a judgment's date of entry is normally the date it is signed. [7] But the Hugheses' argument on this point is inadequate either to preserve the point on appeal or to persuade us that any error was committed. They do not contend that prejudgment interest was calculated only up to October 30, 1995, or make any other argument of consequence. Their cursory argument results in a waiver of this aspect of their claim. See Adamson v. University of Alaska, 819 P.2d 886, 889 n. 3 (Alaska 1991).