Knox v. John Varvatos Enterprises, Inc.
- Gabriel Gorenstein
- 1:17-cv-00772
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 4
In Knox v. John Varvatos, Judge Gorenstein granted in part and denied in part a motion, increasing one judgment, denying an increase to another, and awarding supplemental fees.
The plaintiffs receive a $140,720.59 increase to the New York Equal Pay Act portion of the merits judgment and $215,340.00 in additional attorney’s fees. The defendant remains subject to the amended merits judgment, while the separate attorney’s-fee judgment was not increased during the pending appeal.
What happened
In Knox v. John Varvatos Enterprises, Inc., the plaintiffs asked the court to amend two judgments and award additional attorney’s fees. The unpaid merits judgment was $1,758,025.61, and the separate attorney’s-fee judgment was $748,321.21. The plaintiffs had appealed the fee judgment, but no appeal concerned the merits judgment.
The court applied New York’s rule automatically increasing certain unpaid judgments by 15%. Because no appeal was pending from the merits judgment, the court added $140,720.59 to the portion based on the New York Equal Pay Act. It did not apply an increase to the fee judgment while the plaintiffs’ appeal remained pending. The court also found the requested work compensable and the hours reasonable, but awarded $215,340 in additional fees rather than the $234,350.50 requested.
Judge Gorenstein ruled that the plaintiffs’ motion was granted in part and denied in part. He directed the Clerk to increase the merits judgment to $1,898,746.20 and awarded the plaintiffs $215,340 in additional attorney’s fees.
The detailed version
- Knox v. John Varvatos Enterprises, Inc. · No. 1:17-cv-00772
- Gabriel Gorenstein
- June 22, 2021
Background
The plaintiffs moved under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60 to amend two judgments and requested supplemental attorney’s fees. The defendant did not respond.
The first judgment was the final merits judgment, amended on January 29, 2021, after the defendant’s successful motion for a new trial or reduction of the award. It awarded the plaintiffs $1,758,025.61. The court had separately awarded $748,321.21 in attorney’s fees in a judgment filed February 17, 2021. The plaintiffs represented that they had not received payment on either judgment. The court accepted that representation despite the lack of a sworn statement.
The New York Equal Pay Act provides for an automatic 15% increase when amounts remain unpaid after the statute’s specified waiting period, subject to its provision concerning pending appeals. The plaintiffs stated that $938,137.30 of the merits judgment was attributable to their New York Equal Pay Act claim.
Increase to the judgments
The court held that the plaintiffs were entitled to a 15% increase on the New York Equal Pay Act portion of the merits judgment because no appeal from that judgment was pending. Fifteen percent of $938,137.30 was $140,720.59. The court therefore directed that the merits judgment be increased from $1,758,025.61 to $1,898,746.20.
The court reached a different conclusion regarding the separate attorney’s-fee judgment. Because the plaintiffs’ appeal from that judgment was still pending, the court interpreted the statute as barring the automatic increase until the appeal was decided. The court therefore did not apply a 15% increase to that judgment at that time.
Supplemental attorney’s fees
The plaintiffs’ counsel requested $234,350.50 for work involving three categories: preparing and supporting the fee motion, opposing the defendant’s post-judgment motions for a new trial or judgment as a matter of law, and attempting to enforce the judgment in the Southern District of New York and in a Delaware bankruptcy court.
The court found the first two categories compensable because they involved litigating the case. It also concluded that collection work, including bankruptcy-court litigation, could be compensable when the judgment debtor had declared bankruptcy. The court rejected a jurisdictional objection based on the pending appeal, reasoning that attorney-fee petitions are collateral to the merits and can be considered separately.
The court adhered to the hourly rates used in its earlier fee decision, applying the standard that requires determining the least expensive hourly rate that an effective attorney would have charged. It awarded Delaware counsel Mark Billion the requested rate of $450 per hour based on his experience and bankruptcy-law specialization. The court found the requested hours reasonable after reviewing the contemporaneous time records.
Disposition
The plaintiffs’ motion to amend the judgments and for fees was granted in part and denied in part. The court directed the Clerk to issue an amended judgment increasing the merits award to $1,898,746.20. It also awarded the plaintiffs $215,340.00 in additional attorney’s fees for work performed since the initial March 24, 2020 judgment. The court did not apply an automatic increase to the separate attorney’s-fee judgment while the appeal was pending.
Read the full 4-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.