Background
Oakland County foreclosed on the plaintiffs’ homes for unpaid property taxes and retained equity exceeding the taxes owed. The plaintiffs brought two lawsuits, Sinclair and Hall, alleging among other things that the County’s retention of that equity violated the Takings Clause. The district courts initially dismissed both cases.
On appeal, the Pacific Legal Foundation represented the Hall plaintiffs pro bono and obtained a published ruling recognizing a viable takings claim. The Sixth Circuit then summarily reversed the dismissal of Sinclair’s corresponding claim. After remand, the County conceded liability, the district courts denied class certification, and the parties settled the individual plaintiffs’ claims for a combined $500,000.
Plaintiffs’ counsel sought more than $4.2 million in attorney fees, based on over 4,800 hours and a requested 2.0 multiplier. The district court reduced the hours by 40%, applied a 1.1 multiplier, and awarded $1,361,476.51. Oakland County appealed.
The Court’s Holding
The Sixth Circuit held that the district court abused its discretion by failing to exclude or sufficiently reduce several categories of unreasonable billing. It ordered the exclusion of all 573 hours spent pursuing unsuccessful class certification, 189 hours spent litigating against other defendants, and 32.5 hours devoted to a motion to reopen that was never filed. The court reasoned that the named plaintiffs could not properly be charged for unsuccessful work undertaken on behalf of a proposed class and that the certification motions were nearly certain to fail under circuit precedent.
The court also capped compensable appellate work by Scott Smith and McAlpine PC at 75 of the 1,643 hours claimed, finding that the Pacific Legal Foundation had performed the decisive work in Hall and that the Sinclair appellate brief largely reproduced the Foundation’s arguments. It separately limited Mark McAlpine to 10 compensable hours, which were not subject to the appellate cap. For the remaining hours, the court retained the district court’s 40% reduction and 1.1 multiplier but required use of a blended hourly rate of $325.
The court vacated the fee order and remanded with instructions to calculate a reduced award under that formula. It also held that plaintiffs could recover no fees for this appeal because they lost nearly every issue presented, while permitting the district court to reaward $5,108.96 in litigation expenses.
Key Takeaways
- A prevailing party must exercise billing judgment and exclude excessive, redundant, vague, or unnecessary time from a fee request under 42 U.S.C. § 1988.
- Unsuccessful class-certification work was not compensable where it did not benefit the named plaintiffs and controlling precedent made certification nearly certain to fail.
- The Sixth Circuit sharply limited compensation for duplicative appellate work and for a lawyer whose billing records showed little concrete contribution to the litigation.
- A district court must meaningfully address a supported challenge to proposed hourly rates; here, the Sixth Circuit imposed a $325 blended rate.
Why It Matters
The decision is a pointed warning that an inflated fee petition can undermine the credibility of the entire request. Courts may categorically remove discrete types of noncompensable work, estimate reasonable time when billing records are vague or padded, and impose percentage reductions on what remains.
The ruling also clarifies the financial risk of pursuing class certification in an individual civil-rights case. When certification fails, counsel may be unable to shift that work to the defendant—particularly when the work did not advance the named clients’ recovery and existing precedent made the motion untenable.