Court Opinion

ID: 9611251
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 03:54:13.559463+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:00:55.028072
License: Public Domain

CLIFTON, Circuit Judge, with whom Chief Judge KOZINSKI joins,
concurring in part and dissenting in part:
I agree with the majority that the district courts did not apply the proper standard in determining the amounts of fees awarded to the attorneys who represented the claimants in these cases. I thus concur in sections I, II, III-A, and III-B of the majority opinion.
I do not agree with the majority’s order that claimants’ attorneys be awarded the amounts they requested, however, and from that order I respectfully dissent. The cases should instead be remanded so that the respective district courts can determine reasonable fees by applying the proper standard. That is a task assigned to the district courts, not to us, and it is the expertise of the district courts that the Supreme Court referenced in Gisbrecht v. Barnhart, 535 U.S. 789, 808, 122 S.Ct. 1817, 152 L.Ed.2d 996 (2002)- (“Judges of our district courts are accustomed to making reasonableness determinations in a wide variety of contexts, and their assessments in such matters, in the event of an appeal, ordinarily qualify for highly respectful review.”)
The majority opinion sets a poor example for district courts to follow. It orders payments that translate into hourly rates, for the time of both attorneys and paralegals, of $519 in Washington, $875 in Crawford, and $902 in Trejo. But, as described in more detail in Judge Bea’s dissenting opinion, the majority opinion provides no serious explanation of why these awards are reasonable or why they do not represent “windfalls.” It instructs district courts to “look at the complexity and risk involved in the specific case at issue to determine how much risk the firm assumed in taking the case,” supra at 1153, but it does not comply with that requirement itself, not even in the Washington case, where the district court found that claimant’s counsel faced “very little risk.” It acknowledges, supra at 1146, the finding by the district court in the Trejo case that 1.4 hours of reported attorney time and 1.5 hours of paralegal time did not properly relate to the federal court action, but it still awards the claimant’s attorney the full amount of fees requested, with no reduction for the inappropriate time entries.
It is not obvious to me that there is no “windfall” in any of the fee requests made by claimants’ attorneys. It would not necessarily constitute an abuse of discretion for a district court to decline to award the full amounts requested. Awarding the attorneys what they ask for brings an end to *1154this matter without requiring a remand, but it does not satisfy our obligation under the statute to protect the interests of the claimants themselves, from whose past benefits the money is taken. In future cases, the district courts should do as we say, not as we do.