Maxwell v. US Dept of Interior ( 2001 )

IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT
_____________________
No. 00-10581
_____________________
JOEL F. ARNOLD; ET AL.,
Plaintiffs,
BOBBY MAXWELL,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
versus
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF INTERIOR,
Defendant-Appellee.
_________________________________________________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court for the
Northern District of Texas
USDC No. 3:96-CV-3077-P
_________________________________________________________________
March 19, 2001
Before FARRIS*, JOLLY and DAVIS, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:**
Bobby Maxwell, one of three plaintiffs in a Title VII lawsuit
against the U.S. Department of the Interior, appeals the district
court’s award of attorneys’ fees. In the underlying lawsuit, a
jury found that the U.S. Department of the Interior had
*
Circuit Judge of the Ninth Circuit, sitting by designation.
**
Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion should not be published
and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set forth in 5TH CIR. R. 47.5.4.
discriminated against the three plaintiffs by considering race and
gender in its promotions. Of the three plaintiffs, however, the
district court found that only Bobby Maxwell was entitled to
compensatory damages. The court also granted summary judgment
against the other two plaintiffs on their claim of retaliation.
See Arnold v. U.S. Dep’t of the Interior, 213 F.3d 193 (5th Cir.
2000) (describing the facts and affirming the district court’s
ruling that the other plaintiffs were not entitled to compensatory
damages).
In computing attorneys’ fees, the district court found that
all three plaintiffs in the suit were prevailing parties, entitled
to an award of fees under Title VII. See 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-5(k).
After calculating a revised lodestar amount, the district court
reduced the fee by 35 percent, noting that the total fee award of
$211,469.25 for all three plaintiffs was not reasonable due to the
limited success of the lawsuit. Maxwell, the only plaintiff to
appeal this ruling, now argues that the district court should have
considered the plaintiffs’ success on an individual basis, and
should not have reduced his award, because he was fully successful
in his suit.
We review the district court’s determination of an attorneys’
fee award for abuse of discretion. Hadley v. VAM P T S, 44 F.3d
372, (5th Cir. 1995). In determining an appropriate fee award in
a situation where only some claims were successful, a district
court can consider the overall result obtained if the claims
involve a common core of facts or related legal theories. Hensley
v. Eckerhart, 461 U.S. 424, 435 (1983). Here, although there were
three separate plaintiffs, they were represented by the same
attorneys. The plaintiffs submitted a joint complaint arising out
of the same core of facts and based on the same legal theories, and
also submitted a joint application for attorneys’ fees. Although
it might have been preferable for the district court to consider
attorneys’ fees on an individual basis, we cannot conclude that the
district court abused its discretion by considering the fee award
for the case as a whole. Furthermore, the district court did not
abuse its discretion in reducing the award as excessive in relation
to the results obtained.
Because we find that the district court did not abuse its
discretion in reducing the total attorneys’ fee award by 35
percent, the judgment of the district court is
A F F I R M E D.