City of Almaty, Kazahkstan v. Mukhtar Ablyazov
- John Koeltl
- 1:15-cv-05345
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 13
City of Almaty v. Mukhtar Ablyazov: Judge Parker awarded $221,285.31 in attorneys’ fees against Ilyas Khrapunov for discovery misconduct.
The award benefits Plaintiffs City of Almaty, Kazakhstan and BTA Bank JSC and requires Defendant Ilyas Khrapunov to pay $221,285.31 within 30 days. The opinion states that no costs were awarded.
What happened
In City of Almaty, Kazakhstan v. Mukhtar Ablyazov, the plaintiffs asked for $245,133.29 in attorneys’ fees tied to Ilyas Khrapunov’s discovery misconduct. The fees covered efforts to obtain documents, a sanctions motion, and the fee application itself.
The court found that the requested hourly rates were reasonable, but reduced the award for work outside the earlier sanctions order and made other adjustments to the hours claimed. It awarded the plaintiffs $221,285.31 in attorneys’ fees and no costs. Ilyas Khrapunov was ordered to pay within 30 days.
Judge Katharine H. Parker also rejected Khrapunov’s argument that the court lacked authority to award fees for discovery violations. The order terminated the fee motion.
The detailed version
- City of Almaty, Kazahkstan v. Mukhtar Ablyazov · No. 1:15-cv-05345
- John Koeltl
- May 4, 2022
Background
The court had previously found that Defendant Ilyas Khrapunov engaged in substantial discovery misconduct and had awarded the plaintiffs fees and costs associated with that misconduct. The plaintiffs then filed a fee application seeking $245,133.29. The application covered work performed from September 2017 through November 2021, including motions to compel discovery, a motion for sanctions, and the fee application.
The discovery disputes included requests for documents from personal email accounts, documents connected to the “Kazaword” website, and additional searches for documents. The court had previously ordered production and later granted the plaintiffs’ sanctions motion against the Khrapunovs for discovery misconduct. The district judge affirmed that sanctions order. The court also had previously determined that it retained authority to impose monetary sanctions against Ilyas Khrapunov even after the claims against the Khrapunovs were dismissed.
Fee analysis
The court applied the lodestar method, which generally calculates a reasonable fee by multiplying a reasonable hourly rate by the reasonable number of hours worked. It found the proposed hourly rates reasonable based on the attorneys’ qualifications, the complexity of the litigation, and rates approved in similar matters in the Southern District of New York.
The court nevertheless found that some of the claimed hours were not compensable. It deducted $18,361.20 for work on a 2017 protective order because that work was outside the scope of the earlier sanctions award. For the sanctions motion, the plaintiffs had sought only 25% of the time because the motion concerned misconduct by all four defendants. The court found that allocation appropriate but made several additional reductions for work involving other defendants or another motion. It approved $22,768.10 for the Kazaword-related discovery work, $171,326.21 for the sanctions motion, and $27,191 for the fee application.
Ruling
The court awarded the plaintiffs attorneys’ fees of $221,285.31. Defendant Ilyas Khrapunov was ordered to remit that amount within 30 days. The court awarded no costs because the plaintiffs had not applied for them. The court also rejected Khrapunov’s argument that a magistrate judge lacked authority to award attorneys’ fees for discovery violations, explaining that such discovery matters are non-dispositive. The order terminated the fee motion at ECF No. 1467.
Read the full 13-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.