Judge: Kristin S. Escalante , Case: 22STCV22296, Date: 2023-04-20 Tentative Ruling

Case Number: 22STCV22296    Hearing Date: April 20, 2023    Dept: 24

Plaintiff’s motion for attorney fees, costs, and expenses

Granted in part, in that the court awards plaintiff attorney fees of $37,129.00, and costs of $886.73.  The court does not award a multiplier.

The opposition papers make a number of good points.  Among other things, there were no depositions, no third-party discovery, no expert discovery or reports, no motion practice, and no trial preparation.  Most if not all of the documents used by plaintiff in this particular litigation were manifestly based on templates used in previous cases.

The court concludes a proper blended rate in this case is $420.  The court agrees with defendant that a reduction of some of the hours in certain categories identified by defendant are warranted.  Excessive hours were billed for the preparation of routine, template-based discovery.  Also, it appears that plaintiff did not make appropriate use of lower-billing attorneys for more routine tasks. 

The court concludes that a reduction of 23.4 hours is appropriate.  The reductions are as follows: (a) 4.7 hours for work prior to the retainer agreement is disallowed, (b) 4.2 for drafting discovery (the requested 10.2 is too high); (c) 3.8 for reviewing discovery, (the requested 7.8 is too high), and 10.7 for the attorney fees motion (the requested 16.6 is too high).  23.4 times 420 is 9,828.00.  Reducing $9,828.00 from the lodestar amount sought by plaintiff, $46,957, plaintiff’s attorney fees reward is $37,129.00.  Since defendant has apparently agreed that the plaintiff’s request for costs of $886.73 is proper, the court shall award costs in the amount of $886.73.

Moving party is ordered to give notice.