N.D. California cuts commercial fee award, including for missing contemporaneous records

What happened

Silicon Genesis, through Gaw | Poe LLP, sought sanctions fees. The court declined fees for 11.5 hours of counsel travel to and from the district. It lowered the rate for Austrian counsel because it lacked information on their experience, skill, and reputation. It applied a 25% reduction to the 21.167 hours spent responding to EVG's Austrian complaint, which lacked contemporaneous records, and a 25% reduction to Austrian counsel's entries, which did not segregate fees by task or category.

What the court said

SiGen fails to provide contemporaneous records of the 21.167 hours spent preparing a response to EVG's Austrian complaint.

Austrian counsel's description of services fails to 'segregate the fees by task or category, which makes it difficult to evaluate the reasonableness of the time expended'

The court also reduced the award for: travel time, hourly rate reduced.

Why it matters

The ruling shows that a fee applicant's time records must be contemporaneous and specific enough for the court to assess reasonableness. Where records are missing or entries do not separate tasks, the court may apply percentage cuts to the affected entries rather than accept the requested hours.

How to keep this out of your fee petition

• Record time the same day the work happens.
• Keep the original records, not only a cleaned-up summary.
• Be able to show when each entry was created.

Cite this ruling

See hourly rates the N.D. California approves and attorney fee motions in California federal courts.

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