D. Montana cuts employment fee award 57.3%, including for clerical work

What happened

Staton sought $688,845.66 in Title VII fees for 2,065.4 hours. The court reduced the hours by 40 for clerical work billed as legal work and by 10 for travel time, then cut the claimed hours to 1,400 for excessive hours. It applied an additional 30% reduction for limited success and lowered counsel's hourly rates. The court awarded $294,000, a reduction of $394,845.66.

What the court said

The Court finds that reducing Staton's claimed hours by 40 proves appropriate to account for these clerical billing entries.

The court also reduced the award for: travel time, excessive hours, limited success, hourly rate reduced.

Why it matters

The ruling shows that courts review time entries for tasks that are clerical rather than legal and reduce hours accordingly, and that recordkeeping problems can combine with other grounds, such as excessive hours and limited success, to produce a substantial cut.

How to keep this out of your fee petition

• Leave purely clerical work off the fee petition.
• Describe paralegal tasks so the substantive work is clear.
• Split mixed entries into their substantive and clerical parts.

Cite this ruling

See hourly rates the D. Montana approves.

Figures and quotes are taken from the opinion and checked against its text. Spot an error? Email team@legaltime.ai with the case name and we will correct it. Summaries of public court opinions. Not legal advice.