Lopez v. Tristate Linen, Inc.
- Valerie Caproni
- 1:22-cv-09271
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Lopez v. Tristate Linen, Judge Valerie Caproni approved the parties’ individual settlement and ordered the case closed.
Jean Luis Lopez, Tristate Linen, Inc., and Vaso Nikprelovic were bound by the approved individual settlement. The settlement did not operate on behalf of other similarly situated people, and the case was closed.
What happened
In Lopez v. Tristate Linen, Inc., the parties asked the court to approve a proposed settlement. The case was brought by Jean Luis Lopez individually and on behalf of others similarly situated against Tristate Linen, Inc. and Vaso Nikprelovic.
The settlement provided a total recovery of $9,000. Lopez would receive $4,774, while his lawyers would receive $3,600 in fees and $626 in costs. Lopez estimated that his claims were worth about $7,240 if fully recovered, making his settlement 65.94% of that estimate.
Judge Valerie Caproni approved the settlement as fair and reasonable, although she said the attorneys’ fees were at the top of what she considered reasonable. She ordered the Clerk of Court to close the case and remove the language referring to others similarly situated because the settlement applied only to Lopez and the defendants.
The detailed version
- Lopez v. Tristate Linen, Inc. · No. 1:22-cv-09271
- Valerie Caproni
- Dec. 14, 2022
Background
Jean Luis Lopez sued Tristate Linen, Inc. and Vaso Nikprelovic individually and on behalf of all others similarly situated. On December 9, 2022, the parties submitted a proposed settlement for court approval under the Second Circuit’s requirements for reviewing employment settlements. The opinion does not describe the underlying claims in detail.
Settlement Terms
The proposed agreement provided for a total recovery of $9,000. Lopez’s recovery was $4,774. The agreement allocated $3,600, or 40% of the total recovery, to Lopez’s attorneys for fees and $626 for costs, totaling $4,226 in fees and costs. Lopez estimated that his claims were worth approximately $7,240 assuming a full recovery; his settlement therefore represented 65.94% of that estimated value.
The court also considered supplemental information from Lopez’s counsel. Counsel stated that the attorney had practiced since 2001 and had practiced in wage-and-hour matters for more than five years.
Ruling
Judge Valerie Caproni ordered that the proposed settlement agreement be approved as fair and reasonable. The court stated that the attorneys’ fees were at the top of what it considered reasonable but approved them. The Clerk of Court was directed to close the case and amend the caption by deleting the language “individually and on behalf of all others similarly situated” after Lopez’s name. The court explained that the settlement operated only between Lopez and Tristate Linen, Inc. and Vaso Nikprelovic.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.