Christina Saccomano v. Andrew Saul
- Joseph Spero
- 3:18-cv-02624
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 3
In Saccomano v. Saul, Judge Spero ordered briefing before deciding counsel’s request for Social Security fees from past benefits.
Christina Saccomano, her counsel Harvey Sackett, and the Commissioner of Social Security; the order concerned whether Sackett should receive fees from Saccomano’s past-due benefits.
What happened
In Christina Saccomano v. Andrew Saul, the court had previously granted Saccomano summary judgment and sent her Social Security case back for further administrative proceedings. The Commissioner later found her disabled and awarded $125,893 in past benefits.
Saccomano’s lawyer, Harvey Sackett, asked for fees from those past benefits under a federal law allowing reasonable fees of up to 25 percent. The court found that Saccomano’s fee agreement set only a 25-percent maximum and did not specify how the actual fee should be calculated.
Judge Spero did not award or deny the requested fees. He ordered Sackett to explain by August 28, 2020, why the requested amount should be awarded, required him to provide the order to Saccomano, and asked the Commissioner to submit a supplemental response.
The detailed version
- Christina Saccomano v. Andrew Saul · No. 3:18-cv-02624
- Joseph Spero
- Aug. 10, 2020
Background
The court stated that it had previously granted Christina Saccomano’s motion for summary judgment and remanded the case for further administrative proceedings. Those proceedings resulted in Andrew Saul, the Commissioner of Social Security, finding Saccomano disabled and entitled to $125,893 in past benefits.
Saccomano’s counsel, Harvey Sackett, moved for an award of attorney’s fees from Saccomano’s past-due benefits under 42 U.S.C. § 406(b). That statute permits a court to award a reasonable fee for representation, capped at 25 percent of the claimant’s past-due benefits, payable from—not in addition to—those benefits.
Fee Agreement and Court’s Concern
The fee agreement provided that Saccomano would pay Sackett no more than 25 percent of her past-due benefits if she received a favorable decision after an unfavorable or partially favorable administrative-law-judge decision. The court found that the agreement stated only a maximum fee and gave no guidance about the particular amount to be awarded. The court therefore concluded that Sackett’s statement that Saccomano had contracted to pay 25 percent of past-due benefits did not accurately describe the agreement.
The court also noted, without deciding whether Sackett’s requested effective hourly rate was reasonable, that his motion gave inconsistent information about his non-contingent hourly rate and the information supporting that rate.
Order
The court ordered Sackett to show why the amount of fees he requested should be awarded. It required him to file a response by August 28, 2020, provide Saccomano with a copy of the order by August 14, 2020, and file proof that he had done so. Saccomano could, but was not required to, file her own response by August 28 if she opposed an award from her past-due benefits.
The Commissioner had filed an evaluation of Sackett’s fee request. The court asked the Commissioner to file a supplemental response by August 28 addressing how the court should determine an appropriate fee under the governing Supreme Court standard when the fee agreement states only a maximum limit. The order did not grant or deny the fee request.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.