Justia Legal Ethics Opinion Summaries

After the jury returned a verdict in favor of ING on its breach of contract claims, the jury awarded ING attorney's fees under Georgia law. UPS moved under Rule 59(e) to amend the judgment to set aside the award of attorney's fees or, alternatively, for a new trial on the issue of attorney's fees. The court held that the district court erred in setting the verdict aside in light of UPS's failure to move for relief under Rule 50(a) and the existence of evidentiary support in the record for the jury's verdict. The court also concluded that a new trial was not warranted. Accordingly, the court reversed the order granting UPS's motion and remanded with instructions to reinstate the verdict and resolve ING's motion to set attorney's fees. View "ING Global v. United Parcel Service Oasis Supply Corp." on Justia Law

The district court entered a Rule 60(a) clarifying order imposing sanctions on plaintiffs' attorney, Peter A.T. Sartin. Sartin hired the McNair Firm to represent him and to appeal the clarifying order, but the McNair Firm filed the notice of appeal two days late. The appeal was voluntarily abandoned. Sartin then filed a malpractice suit against the McNair Firm and the district court granted the Firm's motion for summary judgment. The court concluded that the district court's original intent was to impose sanctions on Sartin individually and, therefore, that the district court did not abuse its discretion in giving effect to that intent in its Rule 60(a) clarification order. Because the court concluded that the district court's earlier case properly employed Rule 60(a), the court affirmed the district court's conclusion in this case that the McNair Firm's failure to appeal the earlier Rule 60(a) clarification order caused Sartin no injury. The court disposed of Sartin's remaining arguments and affirmed the judgment of the district court.View "Sartin v. McNair Law Firm PA" on Justia Law

Montanez sued the City of Chicago and Officers Fico and Simon, alleging that Fico used excessive force while arresting him for drinking on a public way and Simon failed to intervene. He sustained minor injuries and sought damages under 42 U.S.C. 1983 and state-law. The state-law claims were dismissed as time-barred. The city conceded its obligation to indemnify, so the section 1983 claims proceeded to trial. Fico was found liable, Simon was cleared, and the jury awarded $1,000 in compensatory damages and $1,000 in punitive damages. Montanez’s lawyers submitted a bill for more than $426,000 in attorneys’ fees and about $6,500 in costs and expenses. The judge scrutinized the bill line-by-line, discounted entries where more than one partner oversaw the same activities, or where the lawyers researched or drafted motions that were never filed, excluded hours spent on a full-day mock trial and entries related to matters that were essentially administrative matters, and reduced the hourly billing rates. After these and other reductions, the final award of costs was $3,051.94 and the court awarded $108,350.87 in fees. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, referring to the city’s “scorched-earth” defense strategy and the need for trial judges to exercise their broad discretion to adjust bloated bills for attorney’s fees after the fact and case-management authority during the litigation. View "Montanez v. Simon" on Justia Law

After the attacks of September 11, 2001, thousands of lawsuits were filed against the City, private contractors, and the WTC Captive. Following years of litigation and extensive negotiations, the parties agreed on a comprehensive settlement process. In these consolidated appeals, three of the district court's orders regarding the settlement process are at issue. The court vacated the order of the district court with respect to the Bonus Payment and remanded for further proceedings in this respect; reversed the order of the district court as to the Contingent Payment; affirmed the order of the district court denying a contingency attorneys' fees as to the Bonus Payment; and dismissed the appeal from the order denying a contingency attorneys' fee as to the First Contingent Payment.View "Cirino et al. v. City of New York et al." on Justia Law

Source manufactures water reservoirs in which drinking water can be stored inside backpacks for use during outdoor activities and is the assignee of the 276 patent, which focuses on a reservoir with a hermetic seal to prevent leakage and a wide opening for easier cleaning and filling. Attorney Yonay prosecuted the 276 patent application. Yonay and his partner signed the complaints in an infringement action against Hydrapak, which also manufactures a flexible hydration reservoir, the Reversible Reservoir. Hydrapak served a sanctions motion under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 11, which allows the party against whom the sanctions will be sought 21 days to withdraw the offending claim. Source declined to withdraw its amended complaint. The district court granted Hydrapak summary judgment and sanctions, stating that there was “nothing complicated or technical” about the claim limitation “slot being narrower than the diameter of the rod,” and that none of the words of this limitation “requires definition or interpretation beyond its plain and ordinary meaning.” The court determined that in Hydrapak’s products the slot is larger than the diameter of the rod, even under Source’s proposed construction. After the Federal Circuit affirmed and denied Hydrapak sanctions for a frivolous appeal, the district court imposed a sanction of $200,054.00. The Federal Circuit affirmed.View "Source Vagabond Sys., Ltd. v. Hydrapak, Inc." on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit alleging that defendants violated the automatic-stay provision of 11 U.S.C. 362(a). The court held that an attorney preparing an order for a judge is not entitled to quasi-judicial immunity. The court did not reach the question of whether such an action violated the automatic stay, or whether it was actionable under 11 U.S.C. 362(k).View "Burton v. Infinity Capital Management" on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983, alleging that New York City officers used excessive force when arresting her. On appeal, plaintiff primarily seeks a new trial on damages and challenges portions of the district court's order awarding attorney's fees and costs incurred prior to the date of defendants' Rule 68 Offer. The court concluded that the district court did not err in refusing to give a separate charge as to future damages and plaintiff failed to establish that any potentially improper conduct by defense counsel prejudiced the jury's award of punitive damages. The district court properly applied Rule 68 and did not abuse its discretion by reducing the reasonable hourly rate of plaintiff's lead counsel. The court held that Rule 68 offers need not, as a per se rule, expressly apportion damages among multiple defendants. With respect to apportionment, a Rule 68 offer is operative so long as it is capable of being compared to the prevailing plaintiff's ultimate recovery. Because the Offer meets this standard, the court affirmed the district court's decision. The court rejected plaintiff's claim that the district court erred in reducing the amount of her awardable attorney's fees. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment and order of the district court.View "Stanczyk v. City of New York, et al." on Justia Law

This appeal is a companion to Baker v. Martin Marietta Materials, Inc. The appeal concerns action the district court took while purporting to exercise jurisdiction over that dispute, namely, disqualifying plaintiffs' counsel (Zerger and Mauer). Greenwood sought Zerger and Mauer's disqualification due to a conflict of interest out of the attorneys' former representation of Greenwood and its current representation of plaintiffs. The district court entered the disqualification order based on its inherent need to manage its bar and uphold the rules of professional conduct. The record supported the district court's determination that the two matters were substantially related and there was a conflict of interest. Therefore, although the court concluded that the district court lacked jurisdiction over the merits case, the court concluded that the district court had authority to disqualify counsel and did not abuse its discretion in doing so. View "Zerger & Mauer v. City of Greenwood" on Justia Law

AF Holdings, represented by Prenda Law, filed suit in district court against 1,058 unnamed John Does who it alleged had illegally downloaded and shared the pornographic film "Popular Demand" using a file-sharing service known as BitTorrent. Prenda Law's general approach was to identify certain unknown persons whose IP addresses were used to download pornographic films, sue them in gigantic multi-defendant suits that minimized filing fees, discover the identities of the persons to whom these IP addresses were assigned by serving subpoenas on the Internet service providers to which the addresses pertained, and then negotiate settlements with the underlying subscriber. The providers refused to comply with the district court's issuance of subpoenas compelling them to turn over information about the underlying subscribers, arguing that the subpoenas are unduly burdensome because venue is improper, personal jurisdiction over these Doe defendants is lacking, and defendants could not properly be joined together in one action. The court agreed, concluding that AF Holdings clearly abused the discovery process by not seeking information because of its relevance to the issues that might actually be litigated here. AF Holdings could not possibly have had a good faith belief that it could successfully sue the overwhelming majority of the John Doe defendants in this district. Although AF Holdings might possibly seek discovery regarding individual defendants in the judicial districts in which they are likely located, what it certainly may not do is improperly use court processes by attempting to gain information about hundreds of IP addresses located all over the country in a single action, especially when many of those addresses fall outside of the court's jurisdiction. Given AF Holdings' decision to name and seek discovery regarding a vast number of defendants who downloaded the film weeks and even months apart - defendants who could not possibly be joined in this litigation - one can easily infer that its purpose was to attain information that was not, and could not be, relevant to this particular suit. Accordingly, the court vacated the order and remanded for further proceedings, including a determination of sanctions, if any, for AF Holdings' use of a possible forgery in support of its claim.View "AF Holdings, LLC v. Does 1-1058" on Justia Law

After defendant Elem suffered injuries in a car accident, she and her attorney conspired to hide and disburse settlement funds from an employee welfare benefit plan she received after the accident. The parties filed cross motions for summary judgment and the district court granted summary judgment for the employer, as well as awarded attorney's fees and costs to the employer. The court affirmed, concluding that the district court had the authority to sanction defendants for their bad faith. The court also concluded that defendant's claim that the district court misapplied Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 70 was moot and dismissed the appeal. View "AirTran Airways, Inc. v. Elem, et al." on Justia Law