Court Opinion

ID: 9745393
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 22:53:40.240431+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:25:00.037449
License: Public Domain

PRESIDING JUSTICE GREIMAN, dissenting: The majority finds that Harris Bank’s fee petition is sufficiently specific to support the trial court’s award of attorney fees and further reaches the conclusion that the trial court made a proper evidentiary determination of the reasonableness of the fee petition. I believe that Harris Bank’s fee petition is insufficient and thus a determination of the reasonableness of the fees requested could not properly be reached. A fee petition “must specify the services performed, by whom they were performed, the time expended thereon and the hourly rate charged therefor.” (Kaiser v. MEPC American Properties, Inc. (1987), 164 Ill. App. 3d 978, 984, 518 N.E.2d 424, citing Fiorito v. Jones (1978), 72 Ill. 2d 73, 377 N.E.2d 1019, and Ealy v. Peddy (1985), 138 Ill. App. 3d 397, 485 N.E.2d 1182.) In a case involving legal fees accrued in a dissolution of marriage proceeding, the Ealy court held that the fee petitioners “should be required to produce detailed facts and computations upon which the claimed fees are predicated.” (Ealy, 138 Ill. App. 3d at 400.) Referring to an attorney prosecuting a class action case, the Illinois Supreme Court found that “[bjecause of the importance of the time element, it is incumbent upon the attorney to keep detailed time records during the course of the litigation.” Fiorito, 72 Ill. 2d at 88. In Kaiser, where the defendant lessor sought costs and attorney fees from the plaintiff lessee pursuant to a provision in their commercial lease agreement, the court disallowed a portion of the attorney fees because the time records were too vague and general. Kaiser, 164 Ill. App. 3d at 986. This court specifically recognized that under the rule established in Kaiser “no recovery of reasonable hourly fees is allowed pursuant to a contract unless the attorneys present detailed time records.” (Johns v. Klecan (1990), 198 Ill. App. 3d 1013, 1019, 556 N.E.2d 689.) In Johns, this court expressly found that contingent fee attorneys are not required to account for their time with the same specificity and exactitude of hourly fee attorneys. (Johns, 198 Ill. App. 3d at 1019.) The Johns case concerned a personal injury action where attorneys were hired pursuant to a contingency fee contract. Accordingly, in Johns, we found that Kaiser was “inapposite because it did not involve either a contingent fee arrangement or a request for a quantum meruit recovery of fees in a contingent fee setting.” (Johns, 198 Ill. App. 3d at 1023.) Johns specifically held that an attorney working on a contingency basis is not required to present evidence as detailed as that required in Kaiser. Johns, 198 Ill. App. 3d at 1024. Consequently, I believe that the contingency fee cases cited by the majority (Blankenship v. Dialist International Corp. (1991), 209 Ill. App. 3d 920, 568 N.E.2d 503 (the trial court did not abuse its discretion in awarding the contingency fee amount as reasonable attorney fees); Johns, 198 Ill. App. 3d 1013, 556 N.E.2d 689) are inapposite. Instead, the more exacting Kaiser standard of proof applies in the present case because the fee petitioners seek an award pursuant to an attorney fee provision in loan and guaranty agreements executed by the parties. Applying the Kaiser standard, this court denied attorney fees and costs which were based on a provision in a construction contract when the plaintiff failed to provide an adequate basis in his petition on which to predicate a fee award. (Mars v. Priester (1990), 205 Ill. App. 3d 1060, 563 N.E.2d 977.) In Mars, this court found the fee petition inadequate because it aggregated all the work performed within a given month into a single hourly total for that month and reasoned that “Kaiser held that it is impossible to determine exactly what amount of time was expended on each task when the time for all work performed by an attorney on a given day has been aggregated into a single hourly total for that day.” Mars, 205 Ill. App. 3d at 1065. The case at bar presents the same defect as stated in Mars, i.e., aggregate amounts of time listed for an attorney. The itemized bill submitted by Harris Bank covers a five-month period from February to June 1990. The bill contains numerous entries which combine multiple tasks into a single time total for one day. For example, on March 15, 1990, the entry provides the name of counsel and indicates a draft of the complaint was completed, a conference regarding litigation strategy and another conference in connection with payments were held, and a memorandum for other attorneys was prepared. On that date there is a notation of 5.8 hours having been spent with no breakdown between the four items noted. Similar combinations of services performed in 1990 are set out as follows: three hours on March 7, March 9, March 13, March 20, and April 23; 2.5 hours on March 2, March 6, March 19, and April 24; 4.3 hours on April 25; and 4.5 hours on March 12. On March 27, 1990, there is an item which suggests that the attorney spent seven hours to “finalize verified complaint,” “attention to binding of same,” “conferences,” and “research.” Certainly a defendant who is called upon to pay the attorney fees of another is entitled to know how much time was expended on “finalizing the complaint” or “attention to binding of same.” On March 28, 1990, counsel notes that he spent five hours to “personally attend to filing of complaint, Lis Pendens and accompanying documents; conference with court clerk re: motion for appointment of special process server.” Therefore, on March 28, 1990, counsel picked up the documents, carried them from 111 West Monroe Street in Chicago, the offices of Chapman & Cutler, to the Daley Center, where the court clerk’s office is located, stood in line and filed the complaint. Perhaps he was then required to go to the recorder’s office which is located in the Cook County building across the street from the Daley Center and file the lis pendens notice. Thereafter, it appears he had a conference with the court clerk concerning the appointment of a special process server. It would seem appropriate that a defendant ought to be told whether counsel spent most of his five hours walking the two blocks from Monroe Street to Washington Street in Chicago or sitting with a court clerk to discuss a perfunctory motion for the appointment of a special process server. The actual time spent on each task cannot be determined. Such entries do not satisfy the standard of proof enunciated in Kaiser and Mars. Without sufficiently detailed data, the reasonableness of the requested fees cannot be ascertained. The burden of providing the trial court with sufficient evidence of the reasonableness of the fees always rests with the party seeking an award of attorney fees. Mars, 205 Ill. App. 3d at 1064; Corkill Electric Co. v. City of Chicago (1990), 196 Ill. App. 3d 838, 554 N.E.2d 1027 (the complaining party waived any claim that the fee award was unreasonable by failing to object). Moreover, reasonableness of a charge cannot be determined on the basis of conjecture or on the opinion or conclusions of the attorney seeking fees. Kaiser, 164 Ill. App. 3d at 984. To determine the reasonableness of attorney fees, a thorough and conscientious hearing must be conducted. “Without a full, complete and detailed hearing on this matter [the reasonableness of a fee award], and without a ruling on each billing entry, taking into careful consideration the elements delineated in Kaiser and keeping in mind that the plaintiff is the burdened party, there can be no way of determining what a reasonable fee might be in this case.” Fitzgerald v. Lake Shore Animal Hospital, Inc. (1989), 183 Ill. App. 3d 655, 662, 539 N.E.2d 311 (the cause was remanded for another hearing on the plaintiff’s petition for attorney fees). For these reasons, I would return this matter to the trial court to allow plaintiff to amend its petition and for a new hearing.