MEMORANDUM OPINION
Royce
C. Lamberth United States District Judge
The
Court previously granted plaintiff Wye Oak's motion to
require defendants, Republic of Iraq (Iraq) and the Ministry
of Defense of Iraq (MoD), to pay Wye Oak's reasonable
attorney's fees associated with Wye Oak's motion for
discovery sanctions for Iraq and MoD's failure to produce
Rule 30(b)(6) witnesses for deposition. ECF No. 321. Now
before the Court is Wye Oak's application detailing
attorney's fees expended in opposing Iraq and MoD's
untimely motion for a protective order regarding Wye
Oak's Rule 30(b)(6) deposition notices [326], Wye
Oak's application detailing attorney's fees expended
in preparing Wye Oak's motion for sanctions [326], and
Iraq and MoD's response to Wye Oak's application for
such attorney's fees [332].
Wye Oak
originally stated that the total attorney's fees expended
for its opposition to Iraq and MoD's motion for a
protective order regarding Wye Oak's Rule 30(b)(6)
depositions was $11, 148.5c.[1] Wye Oak filed a reply [334]
correcting some of the timekeeper entries originally provided
to the Court.[2] The corrected total attorney's fees
expended for Wye Oak's opposition filing is $9,
671.[3]
Wye Oak
originally stated that the total attorney's fees expended
for Wye Oak's motion for sanctions and accompanying reply
was $41, 972.[4] Wye Oak again corrected some of the
timekeeper entries originally provided to the Court in a
reply filing [334]. The corrected total attorney's fees
expended by Wye Oak for its sanctions motion and reply in
support of that motion is $41, 592.[5]
Iraq
and MoD oppose these awards as unreasonable on numerous
grounds. Iraq and MoD allege that numerous time entries are
block:billed, partially redacted, and include
vague descriptions, making it difficult to determine whether
the entry was actually related to the issue on Which fees
were awarded. They also argue that Wye Oak's staffing of
the work was unreasonable because Wye Oak did not
sufficiently delegate work to more junior attorneys. Further,
they contend Wye Oak included fees for work unrelated to the
relevant opposition filing or sanctions motion. Finally, Iraq
and MoD believe that the fees claimed by Quinn, Racusin &
Gazzola are unreasonable because they are duplicative of the
work done by Whiteford, Taylor & Preston LLP and because
Wye Oak is not obligated to pay attorney's fees to Quinn,
Racusin & Gazzola.
The
Court has significant discretion in determining the amount of
a fee award. Hensley v. Eckerhart, 461 U.S. 424, 437
(1983). The Court will first analyze the attorney's fees
expended for Wye Oak's opposition to Iraq and MoD's
motion for protective order regarding Wye Oak's Rule
30(b)(6) depositions. Subsequently, the Court will analyze
the total attorney's fees expended for Wye Oak's
motion for sanctions and reply in support of this motion.
I.
Attorney's Fees Expended in Preparing Wye Oak's
Opposition Filing
The
Court finds that an appropriate sanctions award for Wye
Oak's attorney's fees expended in preparing its
opposition to Iraq and MoD's motion for a protective
order regarding Wye Oak's Rule 30(b)(6) depositions is
$6, 592.50. Wye Oak successfully opposed Iraq and MoD's
motion for a protective order because Iraq and MoD filed this
motion in an untimely manner and therefore waived any
objections to the Rule 30(b)(6) depositions. ECF No. 320.
Rule 37(d)(3) states that "the court must require the
party failing to act, the attorney advising that party, or
both to pay the reasonable expenses, including attorney's
fees, caused by the failure [to appear for a deposition],
unless the failure was substantially justified or other
circumstances make an award of expenses unjust."
Fed.R.Civ.P. 37(d)(3). Iraq and MoD's failure to produce
deposition witnesses pursuant to Rule 30(b)(6) was not
substantially justified and requiring them to pay Wye
Oak's reasonable attorney's fees is not unjust.
Accordingly, the Court will award Wye Oak for the fees
expended in having to oppose Iraq and MoD's motion for a
protective order.
Although
Wye Oak contends that total attorney's fees expended for
Wye Oak's opposition filing was $9, 671, the Court finds
that the entry made on March 17, 2018 by Mr. Eric Rowe is
unacceptably vague. This entry contained the description:
"Revise and edit discovery motions." ECF No. 326-2.
This description inadequately documents what Mr. Rowe was
working on. The Court cannot assess whether this entry was
truly related to Wye Oak's opposition. See In re
Meese, 907 F.2d 1192, 1203-04 (D.C. Cir. 1990). The
Court is especially unconvinced that this time was spent
working on the opposition filing because this entry came
several days prior to Mr. Rowe's March 24, 2018 entry
describing preparing the relevant opposition. ECF No. 236-2.
This leads the Court to think that the March 17 entry was
actually not for revising and editing the relevant opposition
filing, as this filing had apparently not yet been prepared.
Accordingly, the Court will reduce the award to Wye Oak by
the amount for the March 17 entry, $3, 078.50.
The
Court does not take any other issue with the fee entries
described in preparing Wye Oak's opposition filing. The
other entries adequately describe the work performed and
enable the Court to determine that the work done was related
to the opposition filing. The Court is not troubled by Wye
Oak's block billing and redactions for these entries
either. Counsel for Wye Oak, C. Allen Foster, filed a
declaration in support of Wye Oak's application for
attorney's fees stating that he eliminated entries that
could be construed as duplicative, reduced the amount of time
expended in certain instances, and excluded time spent
working on other issues. ECF No. 326-1. Wye Oak has indeed
apparently redacted descriptions that are not relevant to the
opposition filing and has reduced the time expended for these
redacted entries. The remaining descriptions and time ■
expenditures all appear to be related to the relevant filing
and to be reasonable fee amounts.
Further,
the Court does not believe that Wye Oak engaged in
overstaffing as Iraq and MoD allege. Mr. Rowe, counsel with
an hourly rate of $655, expended 7.8 hours (after the Court
removes the March 17, 2018 entry), and Mr. Adrian Snead, an
associate with an hourly rate of $345, expended 4.3 hours for
this opposition filing. The Court is not bothered that Mr.
Rowe spent slightly more time on this filing than Mr. Snead
even though his hourly rate was higher. Mr. Rowe was the
lawyer who prepared this opposition filing. The Court
recognizes that senior attorneys draft filings and are not
solely responsible for supervising associates' work. This
is not a situation in which a senior attorney conducted the
vast majority of work on an issue and did not delegate work
to a mid-level associate over an extended array of motions,
or in which a senior attorney expended a significant amount
of time doing administrative work. Thus, the Court does not
find Iraq and MoD's arguments persuasive for the fee
entries described in preparing Wye Oak's opposition
filing besides the entry made on March 17, 2018, which the
Court will not allow fees for. Accordingly, the Court will
award Wye Oak $6, 592.50 in attorney's fees for its
opposition filing.
II.
Attorney's Fees Expended in Preparing Wye Oak's
Motion for Sanctions and Reply
The
Court will not award Wye Oak all of its attorney's fees
expended for its motion for sanctions and reply in support of
this motion because Iraq and MoD largely prevailed on this
motion. ECF No. 321. Wye Oak sought to have the Court deem
numerous facts as established and to have the Court order
Iraq and MoD to pay expenses caused by the failure to appear
at the depositions, but only prevailed on the fees portion of
its motion. The Court did not deem any facts as established
as a result of this motion. Therefore, the Court does not
believe it would be appropriate to award Wye Oak all of its
attorney's fees for this motion and reply given that Wye
Oak did not prevail in the vast majority of what it asked the
Court to do. See Copelandv. Marshall, 641 F.2d 880,
891-92 (D.C. Cir. 1980). Nonetheless, Wye Oak still had to
file a motion for sanctions to have the Court grant this
motion based on Iraq and MoD's failure to produce Rule
30(b)(6) witnesses for deposition. The Court will therefore
award Wye Oak a percentage of the attorney's fees
expended on these filings.
Upon
analyzing Wye Oak's memorandum of points and authorities
in support of its motion for sanctions, the Court has
determined that only pages 1 and 10-21 of this 21 page
filing[6] are truly relevant to the sanctions at
issue. The other pages in this filing detail the background
to this case (which has been detailed in numerous filings
during this litigation), attack Iraq and MoD's proffered
defenses, and criticize Iraq and MoD's alleged failure to
adequately participate in discovery. These discussions were
unnecessary for the sanctions motion. Accordingly, the
Court' will only award Wye Oak the percentage of
attorney's fees expended that is commensurate with the
percentage of pages in this filing that were actually
relevant to the sanctions matter at issue. 13 out of 21 pages
in the motion were relevant, which amounts to 61.90%. The
Court will therefore award Wye Oak 61.90% of its ...