McKeon Rolling Steel Door Co., Inc. v. U.S. Smoke & Fire Corp.
- Andrew Carter
- 1:23-cv-08720
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 5
McKeon Rolling Steel Door v. U.S. Smoke & Fire: Judge Tarnofsky granted the fee application in part and awarded $6,458.43 for discovery-related work.
McKeon Rolling Steel Door Co., Inc. received an attorneys’ fee award of $6,458.43. U.S. Smoke & Fire Corp. and the other defendants were the parties against whom the discovery-related fee award was sought.
What happened
In McKeon Rolling Steel Door Co. v. U.S. Smoke & Fire Corp., the plaintiff sought attorneys’ fees after obtaining substantial relief on a discovery motion concerning the defendants’ incomplete document production. The plaintiff requested $6,597.22 for work preparing a filing and preparing for a conference.
The defendants argued that any award should cover only work on successful discovery requests. The court had previously found that the defendants’ lack of adequate care required compensation under the federal discovery rule, and it determined that the billed tasks were compensable and that the time spent was reasonable.
Judge Robyn F. Tarnofsky granted the fee application in part and awarded the plaintiff $6,458.43 in attorneys’ fees. She reduced the requested paralegal hourly rate to $200 but accepted the discounted attorney rates as reasonable.
The detailed version
- McKeon Rolling Steel Door Co., Inc. v. U.S. Smoke & Fire Corp. · No. 1:23-cv-08720
- Andrew Carter
- Feb. 5, 2025
Background
McKeon Rolling Steel Door Co., Inc. filed a discovery-related letter-motion after the defendants did not timely complete document production required by an earlier court order. McKeon sought an order requiring completion of the production and attorneys’ fees related to the discovery motion. The court ordered the defendants to complete production by a specified date and substantially granted the additional relief, although that relief was minor.
The defendants did not initially respond to the request for fees. After a conference, the court awarded McKeon the reasonable costs of a later filing but did not compensate McKeon for work preparing the earlier discovery filing because that filing sought relief the court declined to grant. The court then set a schedule for McKeon’s separate application for fees related to the later filing and conference preparation. McKeon requested $6,597.22. The defendants argued that any award should be limited to work on successful discovery requests.
Legal standard
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 37(a)(5)(A) generally requires a party whose conduct necessitated a successful motion to compel discovery to pay the requesting party’s reasonable expenses, including attorneys’ fees. The rule has exceptions when the movant did not first make a good-faith effort to obtain the discovery without court action, the opposing party’s nondisclosure or objection was substantially justified, or other circumstances would make an award unfair. The court found that none of those exceptions applied.
Fee calculation
McKeon supported its application with a declaration from its counsel, Lisa A. Ferrari, and invoice excerpts for Ferrari, associate Keren Dadon, and paralegal Nancy Gonsalves. The court determined that the billed tasks were within the scope of the work for which compensation had been authorized and that the time spent was reasonable.
The court calculated the award using the lodestar method, which generally multiplies reasonable hourly rates by reasonable hours worked. After discounts, the requested rates were $787.50 for Ferrari, $504 for Dadon, and $373.50 for Gonsalves. The court found Ferrari’s and Dadon’s rates reasonable but reduced Gonsalves’s reasonable rate to $200 per hour. Applying those rates to the time billed produced an award of $6,458.43.
Disposition
The court granted the plaintiff’s attorneys’ fee application in part and awarded McKeon Rolling Steel Door Co., Inc. $6,458.43 in attorneys’ fees connected with its largely successful discovery motion.
Read the full 5-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.