Krueger v. Commissioner Social Security Administration ( 2020 )

1 CHAD HATFIELD Attorney at Law 2 Hatfield Law Office 8131 W Klamath Ct, Ste D 3 Kennewick, WA 99336 4 Telephone: (509) 378-3696 Attorney for Plaintiff 5 6 IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT DISTRICT OF OREGON 7 PENDLETON DIVISION 8 DEREK KRUEGER, 9 10 Plaintiff, Case No. 2:19-cv-01044-MK 11 vs. 12 Acting Commissioner of the Social 13 Security Administration, ORDER GRANTING PLAINTIFF’S 14 Defendant. PETITION FOR EAJA FEES 15 16 BEFORE THE COURT is Plaintiff’s motion for an award of attorney fees pursuant to the 17 Equal Access to Justice Act (EAJA), 28 U.S.C. §2412. (Ct. Rec. 24.) Attorney CHAD 18 HATFIELD represents Plaintiff; Assistant United States Attorney Renata Gowie and Special 19 Assistant United States Attorney Katherine B. Watson, represent the Defendant. 20 21 On July 13, 2020, this Court issued its PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR SUMMARY 22 JUDGMENT/ORDER GRANTING PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT 23 (Ct. Rec. 22/23.) Plaintiff now moves for an award of attorney fees pursuant to EAJA (Ct. Rec. 24 24.) 25 The EAJA provides for an award of attorney fees to private litigants who both prevail in 26 27 civil actions (other than tort) against the United States and timely file a petition for fees. 28 28 U.S.C. §2412(d)(2)(A). Under the EAJA, the court shall award attorney fees to the prevailing 1 party unless it finds the government’s position was “substantially justified or that special 2 circumstances make such an award unjust.” 28 U.S.C. §2412(d)(1)(A). 3 Plaintiff seeks attorney fees of $7,065.45, based on an attorney fee rate of $205.25 per 4 hour for 4.0 hours in 2019, $206.77 per hour for 30.2 hours worked in 2020. Accordingly, after 5 review, 6 7 IT IS ORDERED: 8 (1) The Plaintiff’s Motion (Ct. Rec. 24.) is GRANTED. The Commissioner is 9 directed to pay Plaintiff EAJA fees of $7,065.45. 10 (2) The award to plaintiff shall be delivered or otherwise transmitted to plaintiff’s 11 attorney of record. Address for the attorney for the Plaintiff: 12 13 Chad Hatfield 8131 W Klamath Ct, Ste D 14 Kennewick, WA 99336 15 (3) EAJA fees, expenses, and costs are subject to any offsets allowed under the 16 Treasury Offset Program (TOP), as discussed recently in Astrue v. Ratliff, U.S. 17 (2010), 130 S. Ct. 2521, 2522 (2010). No costs or expenses are awarded. 18 (4) The District Court Executive is directed to file this Order, provide a copy to 19 20 plaintiff as the prevailing party, plaintiff’s counsel, and defendant’s counsel, and CLOSE the 21 file. 22 IT IS SO ORDERED. 23 DATED this 4th day of No _v_e_m_b_e_r____ , 2020. 24 25 _s_/_ M__u_s_ta_f_a_ T_._ K__a_s_u_b_h_ai________________ 26 MUSTAFA T. KASUBHAI UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE 27 28