Heifetz v. Monas Burgers Clayton LLC.
- Laurel Beeler
- 3:19-cv-02392
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 3
Heifetz v. Monas Burgers Clayton LLC.; Judge Beeler denied reconsideration and terminated as moot the defendant’s provisional clerical-error motion.
Shelby Heifetz, whose request to reconsider the attorney’s-fee award was denied, and Monas Burgers Clayton LLC., whose provisional clerical-error motion was terminated as moot.
What happened
In Heifetz v. Monas Burgers Clayton LLC., Shelby Heifetz sued over alleged violations of disability-access and state laws after she could not safely navigate the restaurant or reasonably reach its restroom. She accepted the defendant’s $8,001 offer of judgment and later sought attorney’s fees and expert costs.
The court had awarded Heifetz $4,193.75 in expert costs and $6,557.28 for work on the pleadings and mediation, for a total of $10,751.03. Heifetz asked the court to reconsider that fee award, arguing that it had relied only on the defendant’s description of the case.
Judge Laurel Beeler denied the reconsideration motion because Heifetz showed no qualifying mistake, surprise, neglect, or newly discovered evidence. The court also terminated as moot the defendant’s provisional motion to correct a clerical error and stated that the order disposed of both motions.
The detailed version
- Heifetz v. Monas Burgers Clayton LLC. · No. 3:19-cv-02392
- Laurel Beeler
- Mar. 29, 2021
Background
Shelby Heifetz sued Monas Burgers Clayton LLC. under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act, and other state statutes. The opinion says that she was unable to navigate the restaurant safely or reasonably get to the restroom. She accepted the defendant’s offer of judgment under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 68 for $8,001.
Heifetz then requested $44,150 in attorney’s fees and $4,193.75 in expert costs. In an earlier fees order, the court awarded the full $4,193.75 in expert costs, $3,156.75 for work on the pleadings, and $3,400.53 for mediation, totaling $10,751.03. The court did not award fees for other work because it found that work unnecessary and not compensable.
Motion for reconsideration
Heifetz moved for relief from the fees order under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b), which permits relief from a final judgment or order for specified reasons, including mistake, excusable neglect, newly discovered evidence, or another reason justifying relief. Her argument, as summarized by the court, was that the court had relied only on the defendant’s characterization of the case and therefore had chosen the wrong side.
The court rejected that characterization. It explained that it had not allowed fees for amending the complaint to correct deficiencies. After the defendant’s second motion to dismiss, the court concluded from the parties’ filings that the claims were essentially frivolous or outlier claims. The court also considered the defendant’s offers to remediate the barriers, its remediation of most barriers, and its work on the two doors at issue. Based on that context, the court awarded fees for the initial pleadings and mediation, with modest adjustments, but not for other work.
Ruling
Judge Laurel Beeler denied Heifetz’s motion for reconsideration. The court found no basis for reconsideration based on mistake, inadvertence, surprise, excusable neglect, or newly discovered evidence. Because it denied Heifetz’s motion, the court did not reach the defendant’s provisional motion to correct a clerical error; that motion sought relief only if Heifetz received relief on her motion. The court therefore terminated the defendant’s provisional motion as moot and stated that the order disposed of ECF Nos. 94 and 100.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.