Santander Consumer USA v. The City of Yonkers

Background

Santander brought this action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a federal civil-rights statute, against the City of Yonkers, A.P.O.W. Towing, LLC, and Yonkers Towing & Recovery LLC. The court had previously granted partial summary judgment for Santander and found that Yonkers’s vehicle-impound policy violated Santander’s constitutional rights. The parties stipulated that the vehicle at issue was worth $22,000.

Santander then moved for compensatory damages, prejudgment interest, attorneys’ fees, and costs. The City of Yonkers disputed the requested prejudgment interest and challenged the amount of attorneys’ fees. It did not dispute Santander’s claimed $865.80 in costs.

Damages and Prejudgment Interest

The court awarded Santander $22,000 for the vehicle and held that Santander was also entitled to prejudgment interest. The court concluded that interest was appropriate to fully compensate Santander for the delay between the taking of the vehicle and the judgment. It accepted Santander’s method of calculating interest using average Treasury-bill rates.

The opinion’s discussion states that prejudgment interest totaled $2,241.22 and then describes the total damages award as $24,421.22. The conclusion likewise awards $24,421.22 in compensatory damages, although the earlier motion papers apparently sought $2,421.22 in prejudgment interest. The court also awarded $865.80 in costs.

Attorneys’ Fees

Under 42 U.S.C. § 1988, a prevailing party in a civil-rights action may receive reasonable attorneys’ fees and costs. The court found that Santander was a prevailing party because it obtained judgment that defendants violated its Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment rights and that Yonkers’s vehicle-impound policy was unconstitutional.

Santander requested $240,142.50 in attorneys’ fees, including fees for litigating the action and preparing the fee motion. The court approved hourly rates of $645 for Rudolph J. Meola, $585 for Nicholas A. Duston, $325 for Alexander R. Sokolof, and $200 for Jessica Deo Cunha. It did not award fees for 1.9 hours attributed to Charles Locascio because Santander provided no biographical information about him.

The court rejected a reduction based on Santander’s unsuccessful Fourth Amendment and New York Constitution claims. It found those claims closely connected to the successful claims because all concerned the constitutionality of Yonkers’s vehicle-impound policy. The court also rejected most challenges based on alleged inefficiency and work involving the Westchester County District Attorney’s Office.

The court did find that some billing entries used block billing, meaning they combined multiple tasks without showing the time spent on each task. It imposed a 15% reduction on the litigation lodestar. It separately reduced fees for preparing and defending the fee request by 30%, finding that the 51.3 hours claimed for that work exceeded what was normally compensable without special circumstances. The resulting attorneys’ fee award was $171,183.95.

Responsibility for Payment and Disposition

The court declined to divide the fee obligation among the defendants. It held that the defendants were jointly and severally liable, meaning Santander could seek the full fee award from any defendant or combination of defendants, subject to the defendants’ ability to resolve responsibility among themselves.

Judge Kenneth M. Karas granted in part Santander’s motion for damages and attorneys’ fees. The order awarded $171,183.95 in attorneys’ fees, $24,421.22 in compensatory damages as stated in the conclusion, and $865.80 in costs, and directed the Clerk to terminate the pending motion.