Simon v. Maple Beach Ventures LLC

Background

Marcy Simon and Maple Beach Ventures, LLC entered into a consulting agreement in 2014. After a dispute arose, the parties submitted it to arbitration. On January 13, 2021, the arbitrator issued a corrected final award in Simon’s favor, including fees and expenses from the arbitration.

Simon petitioned the court to confirm the arbitration award and enter judgment. The defendants did not oppose that petition. On March 12, 2021, the court granted the petition and entered judgment in Simon’s favor. Simon later requested $46,986.25 in attorneys’ fees and $1,661.76 in costs for the court proceedings confirming the award.

Attorneys’ Fees

The consulting agreement stated that, in a related arbitration, legal action, or other proceeding, the losing party would pay the prevailing party’s actual attorneys’ fees and expenses, including those incurred in enforcing a judgment. The defendants did not dispute that this provision could support an award for the confirmation proceeding. They instead challenged the reasonableness of the amount requested.

The court used the lodestar method, which generally calculates a reasonable fee by multiplying reasonable hours by a reasonable hourly rate. The court found that Simon’s counsel was not entitled to fees for 6.75 hours spent researching and preparing for service through the U.S. Marshals Service because the defendants agreed to accept service within a week and that work did not meaningfully contribute to Simon’s success.

The court also applied a 10 percent reduction to the total fee request because the billing records used broad categories and did not show how much time was spent on particular tasks. The court declined to impose the defendants’ requested 20 percent across-the-board reduction based solely on quarter-hour billing.

The court further reduced each requested hourly rate by one-third because Simon did not provide competent evidence establishing prevailing rates for comparable attorneys in the relevant community. The resulting rates were $400 per hour for Kerry Garvis Wright, $383.33 for Thomas R. Burke, $300 for Tania Seanpanah, $273.33 for Allison Gipson, and $100 for Randy Carlos. The court calculated the attorneys’ fee award at $28,098.99.

Costs

Simon requested $1,661.76 in costs, including photocopies, online legal research, U.S. Marshals fees, shipping, and the civil filing fee. The defendants did not substantively dispute the costs. The court excluded $904.80 for photocopies prepared for service through the U.S. Marshals Service, reasoning that those costs were unreasonable for the same reasons as the related service-preparation work. It awarded Simon $756.96 in costs.

Disposition

The court granted in part and denied in part Simon’s motion for attorneys’ fees and costs. Judge Phyllis J. Hamilton awarded $28,098.99 in attorneys’ fees and $756.96 in costs.