Statutory Award Of Attorneys' Fees Need Not Be Proportional To The Recovery
ANDERSON v. AB PAINTING AND SANDBLASTING (August 20, 2009)
Under its collective bargaining agreement, AB Painting and Sandblasting was required to make contributions to several union benefit plans. The trustee of the plans brought an action under ERISA to collect overdue contributions. The court granted summary judgment to the fund for the entire amount claimed ($6,500). The court awarded attorneys’ fees of only $10,000, however, on a request in excess of $50,000. The amount claimed, stated the district court, was “disproportionate” to the amount at stake. The trustee appealed.
In their opinion, Judges Bauer, Manion and Sykes reversed and remanded. The Court noted that ERISA requires an award of “reasonable” attorneys’ fees in a successful action to recover overdue contributions. The district court should begin with the “lodestar” (hours times a reasonable rate)and adjust it upon consideration of a number of factors, including the amount at stake and the results obtained. The Court cited its own jurisprudence, however, where it has rejected any requirement of proportionality between the result and the fee award. In fact, one of the policy reasons behind fee-shifting statutes is the promotion of meritorious claims that would not be brought otherwise. In a situation where Congress has spoken by including a fee-shifting provision in a statute, a court should only look at whether the time expended was a reasonable approach to the desired end. Here, the lower court did not opine on the reasonableness of the hours spent achieving the outcome. The Court remanded for such a recalculation.
