Bollom v. Brunswick Corporation

Background

Patrick Bollom and Colleen Bollom purchased a new 2015 Sea Ray Venture 370 Sport Cruiser from MarineMax, Inc. The boat was manufactured by Sea Ray Boats, a division of Brunswick Corporation. The purchase agreement was governed by Minnesota law and required the buyers to pay the seller’s costs, including reasonable attorneys’ fees, if the seller had to hire a lawyer to enforce the agreement or defend a lawsuit arising from it, unless the seller lost and the plaintiffs received all relief sought.

The Bolloms sued Sea Ray and MarineMax, asserting claims under the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act, breach of express and implied warranties, and revocation of acceptance. In an earlier summary-judgment order, the court granted summary judgment for MarineMax and dismissed all claims against it with prejudice. MarineMax then moved under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 54(d) for $134,847.05 in attorneys’ fees and $13,401.88 in nontaxable costs. In its reply, MarineMax also requested $16,656 for responding to the Bolloms’ opposition to the fee motion.

Court’s Analysis

The Bolloms did not dispute that MarineMax was the prevailing party or that the purchase agreement required payment of fees and costs necessarily incurred in defending the lawsuit. They argued instead that MarineMax did not need to hire its own lawyers because a separate Sales and Service Agreement potentially required Sea Ray to defend or indemnify MarineMax. The court rejected that argument. Because MarineMax was sued, it was necessary for the corporation to hire counsel; a corporation cannot represent itself in Minnesota state or federal court. The separate agreement gave Sea Ray an option to defend and applied only to certain claims involving Sea Ray’s negligence or breach of that agreement. The Bolloms’ claims did not fall within those categories, and there was no assertion that Sea Ray exercised the option to defend MarineMax.

The court also found that MarineMax had incurred the fees and costs because it became legally liable for them and paid them. It rejected the Bolloms’ request for a jury trial, explaining that federal law governs the right to a jury in federal court and that a post-judgment request for contractual attorneys’ fees is decided by the court under Rule 54(d).

The court evaluated the request under the lodestar method, which generally calculates reasonable fees by multiplying reasonable hours by a reasonable hourly rate. It approved lead attorney Anthony Finnell’s rate and the rates for other associates, the paralegal, librarian, and electronically stored data professionals. It reduced the rates charged by partners Bruce Jones and Daniel Connolly to $650 per hour. The court generally found the hours reasonable, including time spent on research, depositions, discovery, privilege review, and dispositive motions.

The court made several reductions. It struck time spent drafting an unnecessary motion to amend the answer, a duplicate 1.9-hour entry, other duplicative entries totaling 1.6 hours, attorney Isabella Chammas’s 0.8 hours, and certain other billing time. It reduced the hours for the motion to certify judgment to four hours and reduced paralegal Chemaine Athias-Williams’s time preparing billing records for the fee motion to 12 hours. The court did not reduce time spent preparing for the pretrial conference, conducting research, preparing for depositions, litigating a discovery dispute, or preparing dispositive motions. It also found the additional $16,656 requested for responding to the fee opposition reasonable.

Ruling

Judge Michael J. Davis ordered that MarineMax’s Motion for Award of Attorneys’ Fees and Nontaxable Costs was GRANTED IN PART and DENIED IN PART. The court entered judgment for MarineMax and against Patrick Bollom and Colleen Bollom for $156,461.93, consisting of $143,060.05 in attorneys’ fees and $13,401.88 in nontaxable costs. The opinion states that the court reduced MarineMax’s attorneys’ fee request by $8,443.