Opinion ID: 588801
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Baseline Criteria

Text: 17 Prior to Texas Teachers at least, attorney fees were not withheld under section 1988 simply because the plaintiff merely obtained a nominal damage award. Perez v. University of Puerto Rico, 600 F.2d 1, 2 (1st Cir.1979) (Fees may not be denied simply because only nominal damages are awarded.); Ganey v. Edwards, 759 F.2d 337, 339-40 (4th Cir.1985) (liability determination need not even be accompanied by nominal damage award); Burt v. Abel, 585 F.2d 613, 618 (4th Cir.1978) (nominal damage award sufficient); Basiardanes v. City of Galveston, 682 F.2d 1203, 1220 (5th Cir.1982) (judgment for nominal damages may warrant fee award); Skoda v. Fontani, 646 F.2d 1193, 1194 (7th Cir.1981) (per curiam) ($1.00 judgment satisfies prevailing party requirement); Hogue v. Clinton, 791 F.2d 1318, 1323 (8th Cir.) (absent proof of actual injury, plaintiff should be granted nominal damages and attorney fees), cert. denied, 479 U.S. 1008, 107 S.Ct. 648, 93 L.Ed.2d 704 (1986); Scofield v. City of Hillsborough, 862 F.2d 759, 766 (9th Cir.1988) (attorney fees allowable solely on basis of nominal damage award); see Derr v. Gulf Oil Corp., 796 F.2d 340, 344 (10th Cir.1986) (Title VII case citing Nephew v. City of Aurora, 766 F.2d 1464, 1466 (10th Cir.1985)), a § 1988 case subsequently reversed on other grounds, 830 F.2d 1547 (10th Cir.1987) (en banc); nominal damage award entitled plaintiff to attorney fees); Garner v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 807 F.2d 1536, 1539 (11th Cir.1987) (Title VII case; nominal damage award confers prevailing party status). But compare Huntley v. Community Sch. Bd., 579 F.2d 738, 742 (2d Cir.1978) (district court did not abuse discretion in determining that $100 damage award on procedural due process claim amounted, at most, to moral victory) with Milwe v. Cavuoto, 653 F.2d 80, 84 (2d Cir.1981) (nominal damage award on constitutional claim stemming from official misconduct sufficient to support an award of fees) (alternate holding). 18 Much as the Fifth Circuit recently pointed out, however, in Estate of Farrar v. Cain, 941 F.2d 1311, 1317 (5th Cir.1991), cert. granted sub nom. Farrar v. Hobby, --- U.S. ----, 112 S.Ct. 1159, 117 L.Ed.2d 407 (1992), all of the cases cited above, except Scofield, antedate Texas Teachers as well as Hewitt v. Helms, 482 U.S. 755, 107 S.Ct. 2672, 96 L.Ed.2d 654 (1987), and Rhodes v. Stewart, 488 U.S. 1, 109 S.Ct. 202, 102 L.Ed.2d 1 (1988) (Per Curiam). Furthermore, the courts of appeals which have been presented with the issue in the wake of Texas Teachers have drifted apart. 11 Compare Romberg v. Nichols, 953 F.2d 1152, 1159 (9th Cir.1992) (a nominal damages award does not a nominal victory make); Fassett by and through Fassett v. Haeckel, 936 F.2d 118, 122 (2d Cir.1991) (fee award appropriate where nominal damages are recovered for deprivation of an absolute constitutional right) (citing Ruggiero v. Krzeminski, 928 F.2d 558, 564 (2d Cir.1991)) with Estate of Farrar, 941 F.2d at 1315-17 (nominal damage award represents de minimis success where sole purpose of lawsuit was recovery of damages); Spencer v. General Electric Co., 894 F.2d 651, 662 (4th Cir.1990) (dicta) (indicating that $1.00 judgment might constitute de minimis success absent any other favorable litigation result); Denny v. Hinton, 131 F.R.D. 659, 662-63 (M.D.N.C.1990) (nominal damage award constitutes de minimis success), aff'd mem., Denny v. Elliott, 937 F.2d 602 (4th Cir.1991), and Lawrence v. Hinton, 937 F.2d 603 (4th Cir.1991). See also Brewer v. Chauvin, 938 F.2d 860, 864 (8th Cir.1991) (citing Hogue v. Clinton, 791 F.2d 1318 (8th Cir.1986)). 19 As Texas Teachers explains, in order for a claimant to qualify for prevailing party status the litigation must achieve, at a minimum, a material alteration in the legal relationship between the parties. Texas Teachers, 489 U.S. at 792, 109 S.Ct. at 1493. The Court in Texas Teachers limned its material alteration standard, in broad outline, through reference to two earlier cases, see id. (discussing Hewitt v. Helms, 482 U.S. 755, 107 S.Ct. 2672, 96 L.Ed.2d 654 (1987), and Rhodes v. Stewart, 488 U.S. 1, 109 S.Ct. 202, 102 L.Ed.2d 1 (1988) (Per Curiam)), to which we now turn. 20 In Hewitt v. Helms, 482 U.S. 755, 107 S.Ct. 2672, 96 L.Ed.2d 654 (1987), a prison inmate commenced a section 1983 action for damages, as well as declaratory and injunctive relief, alleging due process violations by prison officials. Helms was released on parole prior to any decision by the district court, and the district court later entered summary judgment against Helms. The Third Circuit reversed on the ground that Helms had been denied due process. The court of appeals ordered the case remanded for entry of judgment in favor of Helms, except as to any defendant determined entitled to qualified immunity. Prior to the actual remand to the district court, however, the defendant prison officials secured a favorable Supreme Court decision dismissing one of Helms' claims. After remand from the Supreme Court, the Third Circuit reaffirmed its earlier holding on the other due process claim and again remanded to the district court on the issue of qualified immunity. On remand, Helms did not pursue injunctive relief. The district court once again entered summary judgment against Helms, on the ground that the defendants were immune from liability for damages, and denied a fee award under section 1988. The Third Circuit again reversed, on the ground that its earlier interlocutory ruling that Helms' due process rights had been violated constituted significant success. 21 The Supreme Court disagreed. Justice Scalia pointed out that Helms had obtained no relief whatever on any claim in litigation--no judgment, no damages, no injunctive relief, and no declaratory relief. The most that he obtained was an interlocutory ruling that his complaint should not have been dismissed for failure to state a constitutional claim. Hewitt, 482 U.S. at 760, 107 S.Ct. at 2675 (emphasis added). The Supreme Court refused to equate the Third Circuit ruling with declaratory relief, since the interlocutory ruling could not conceivably alter the legal relationship between the parties 12 in the face of a final judgment against the plaintiff ..., id. at 763, 107 S.Ct. at 2677 (emphasis added), and the litigation resulted in no other relief which affect[ed] the behavior of the defendant[s] towards the plaintiff, id. at 761, 107 S.Ct. at 2676 (emphasis in original). 22 We are not persuaded that Hewitt can be considered analogous authority for withholding prevailing party status on the ground that a final judgment for nominal damages is no different than the Third Circuit interlocutory ruling declaring a violation of Helms' due process rights. Moreover, as the Court clearly explained in Hewitt: 23 Respect for ordinary language requires that a plaintiff receive at least some relief on the merits of his claim before he can be said to prevail. See Hanrahan v. Hampton, 446 U.S. 754, 757 [,100 S.Ct. 1987, 1989, 64 L.Ed.2d 670] (1980). Helms obtained no relief. Because of the defendants' official immunity he received no damages award. No injunction or declaratory judgment was entered in his favor. Nor did Helms obtain relief without benefit of a formal judgment--for example, through a consent decree or settlement. See Maher v. Gagne, 448 U.S. 122, 129 [,100 S.Ct. 2570, 2575, 65 L.Ed.2d 653] (1980). The most that he obtained was an interlocutory ruling that his complaint should not have been dismissed for failure to state a constitutional claim. That is not the stuff of which legal victories are made. Cf. Hanrahan, supra, [446 U.S.] at 758-59 [100 S.Ct. at 1990]. 482 U.S. at 760, 107 S.Ct. at 2675-76. 13 24 The Fifth Circuit recently vacated a section 1988 fee award to plaintiffs whose only relief on the merits of their claims was a judgment for nominal damages, stressing the principles set forth in [Hewitt ] and applied in Rhodes [v. Stewart ].... Estate of Farrar v. Cain, 941 F.2d at 1311, 1317 (5th Cir.1991), cert. granted sub nom., Farrar v. Hobby, --- U.S. ----, 112 S.Ct. 1159, 117 L.Ed.2d 407 (1992). With respect, and recognizing the closeness of the question, we would ascribe a somewhat different intendment to the principles enunciated in Hewitt and applied in Rhodes; that is, as not precluding prevailing party status for the claimant who obtains sufficient relief to effect a material alteration in the legal relationship out of which the claim for relief arose. In other words, we think the principles enunciated in Hewitt portend no significant departure from earlier Supreme Court criteria for determining prevailing party status on the part of a plaintiff who obtains an enforceable judgment for nominal damages on a significant constitutional claim. 14 25 The other Supreme Court case discussed in Texas Teachers is Rhodes v. Stewart, 488 U.S. 1, 109 S.Ct. 202, 102 L.Ed.2d 1 (1988) (Per Curiam), a section 1983 action in which two prison inmates obtained a judgment declaring that their First and Fourteenth Amendment rights had been violated by prison officials who failed to comply with prison administrative procedures regulating magazine subscriptions by inmates. The district court judgment ordered compliance and awarded attorney fees. The Sixth Circuit affirmed the section 1988 fee award. The Supreme Court reversed, observing that [t]he case was moot before judgment issued, and the judgment therefore afforded the plaintiffs no relief whatsoever [,] id. at 4, 109 S.Ct. at 203-04 (emphasis added), since one plaintiff-inmate died and the other was released from custody prior to judgment. Whatever relief other inmates might realize from the judgment, 15 the plaintiffs, as former inmates, realized no relief and, therefore, were not entitled to prevailing party status. Id. Thus, we think Rhodes signifies no different result in the present context than would have been required under its predecessor, Hewitt. 26 At this point in our analysis, as we see it, the baseline standard for prevailing party status set out in Texas Teachers has been met. Domegan obtained an enforceable final judgment affording at least some relief against the defendant corrections officials who violated his procedural due process rights. 16 Furthermore, we consider the nominal damage award not only some relief on the merits of a significant constitutional claim, see Texas Teachers, 489 U.S. at 792, 109 S.Ct. at 1493 (quoting Hewitt, 482 U.S. at 760, 107 S.Ct. at 2675), 17 but relief commensurate with the intrinsically-nonpecuniary procedural due process deprivation established in litigation. 18 27