Beaulieu v. Stockwell

Background

The court had previously granted summary judgment for the defendants and dismissed all of Allen Beaulieu’s claims against them with prejudice. Defendant Charles Willard “Chuck” Sanvik then submitted a bill of costs seeking $7,723.95 for deposition-related expenses. The clerk entered a cost judgment of $7,573.15 after denying certain transcript-delivery and expedited-transcript charges.

Beaulieu objected to all costs, arguing that he was indigent and that Sanvik had greater financial resources. He also specifically challenged the necessity and amount of costs for video recordings of his two depositions and argued that some transcript copies were unrelated to Sanvik’s summary-judgment motion.

Court’s Analysis

Under 28 U.S.C. § 1920 and Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 54(d), a prevailing party generally may recover allowable costs, subject to the court’s discretion. The party challenging the costs must show that the cost judgment is inequitable under the circumstances.

The court found that Beaulieu had not provided enough documentation to establish indigence. It also rejected his unsupported argument that the cost judgment was inequitable because Sanvik had more resources.

The court separately examined the video-related expenses. Sanvik argued that videotaping Beaulieu’s depositions was reasonably necessary because a complete recording was provided to the court, portions were played at a hearing, and the court cited the depositions in its summary-judgment order. But Sanvik did not explain why it was necessary to videotape only Beaulieu’s depositions. The court concluded that traditional deposition transcripts would have informed the court just as well at about half the cost.

The court therefore found that the video recording was not necessarily obtained for use in the case. It removed the recording and related fees for the first and second depositions—$1,435.00 and $585.00, respectively—and reduced the charges for the video-deposition transcripts by 50 percent. The court also found that the transcript copies challenged by Beaulieu were necessarily obtained and used to support Sanvik’s summary-judgment argument.

Disposition

The court granted in part and denied in part Beaulieu’s Objection to Costs. It ordered the clerk’s office to amend Sanvik’s cost judgment to reflect a reduction of $3,145.26, described in the order as the costs associated with video recording.