Opinion ID: 717546
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Reasonableness of Hourly Rate

Text: 41 In his report and recommendation, adopted by the district court, the magistrate set a reasonable hourly rate for Andrade's counsel at $125. Andrade's counsel suggested an hourly rate of $200 for his services, citing his experience, a $200/hr. rate he had received in a similar case, and affidavits from two civil rights attorneys in the community attesting that they charged $175/hr. The magistrate, however, noted that JHA, Gross, and the Commissioners requested a $125 hourly rate and Self-Help and Jackson requested a rate within the $100 to $125 range. The magistrate set the rate for Andrade's attorney at $125/hr., reasoning that $200/hr. is not a reasonable rate for civil rights litigation in the Providence, Rhode Island, area, Andrade had not provided adequate support for the higher rate, and no reason presented itself why Andrade's attorney's rate should be more than the defense attorneys' rates. Andrade argues on appeal that in basing her counsel's fee on the amounts proposed by the defendants, the magistrate failed to apply the prevailing community rate for federal civil rights litigation and to account for the contingency and delay-in-payment factors that distinguish her counsel's rate from that of the defense attorneys. 42 In determining a reasonable hourly rate, the Supreme Court has recommended that courts use the prevailing market rates in the relevant community as the starting point. Blum v. Stenson, 465 U.S. 886, 895 n. 11, 104 S.Ct. 1541 & 1547 n. 11, 79 L.Ed.2d 891 (1984) (defining prevailing market rates as those prevailing in the community for similar services by lawyers of reasonably comparable skill, experience and reputation). While an attorney may inform the court's analysis by providing evidence of her customary billing rate and of prevailing rates in the community, the court is not obligated to adopt that rate. Moreover, the court is entitled to rely upon its own knowledge of attorney's fees in its surrounding area in arriving at a reasonable hourly rate, see Nydam v. Lennerton, 948 F.2d 808, 812-13 (1st Cir.1991); United States v. Metropolitan Dist. Comm'n, 847 F.2d 12, 19 (1st Cir.1988), as well as the defense attorneys' rates, cf. Liberty Mut. Ins. Co. v. Continental Casualty Co., 771 F.2d 579, 588 (1st Cir.1985) (comparing plaintiff's counsel's fee estimate to defendant counsel's estimate in attempting to ascertain how much of jury's damage verdict was based on fees that should not have been allowed). 43 The magistrate in the present case did not stray from these principles in determining a reasonable hourly rate. To the contrary, he determined the prevailing market rate for federal civil rights litigation by utilizing his knowledge and experience of the Providence, Rhode Island, market while considering the customary rates of Andrade's counsel, the defense attorneys, and two Providence civil rights attorneys. Accordingly, we cannot say that the district court, in adopting the magistrate's report and recommendation, misapplied the law or abused its discretion in setting an hourly rate of $125 for Andrade's counsel. 44 As for Andrade's contention that the magistrate's reliance on the defense attorneys' rates failed to account for her counsel's contingency and delay-in-payment factors, the Supreme Court has held that an attorney's contingent risk is ordinarily subsumed (at least to some extent) in the lodestar calculation, City of Burlington v. Dague, 505 U.S. 557, 562-63, 112 S.Ct. 2638, 2641, 120 L.Ed.2d 449 (1992), which is determined by multiplying the total number of hours reasonably spent by a reasonable hourly rate, Hensley v. Eckerhart, 461 U.S. 424, 433, 103 S.Ct. 1933, 1939, 76 L.Ed.2d 40 (1983) (holding that the lodestar provides the basis for determining a reasonable fee). In particular, the Dague Court found that an attorney's contingent risk results in part 8 from the difficulty of establishing the merits of the claim, and this difficulty is ordinarily reflected in the lodestar, i.e., in the higher number of hours expended to overcome the difficulty, or in the higher hourly rate of the attorney skilled and experienced enough to do so. Dague, 505 U.S. at 562-63, 112 S.Ct. at 2641-42. Accordingly, for Andrade's argument to survive, she must establish that the magistrate improperly assessed either one or both of these two factors. Upon reviewing the record, we perceive no such error. 45 Andrade cannot complain about the magistrate's determination of the first prong of the lodestar because he accepted as reasonable the 211.90 hours that her counsel requested. Nor can she complain about the second prong because we have already found the magistrate's choice of the $125/hr. rate to be reasonable. Because we find that the difficulty of the § 1983 claim was fully reflected in the number of billable hours recorded by Andrade's counsel and his special skill and experience was reflected in the reasonableness of the hourly rate, Andrade's contingency argument must fail. 46