In re Johnson

110 B.R. 13, 1988 Bankr. LEXIS 2645, 1986 WL 31943
CourtUnited States Bankruptcy Court, D. Montana
DecidedMay 16, 1988
DocketBankruptcy No. 86-20718
StatusPublished

This text of 110 B.R. 13 (In re Johnson) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering United States Bankruptcy Court, D. Montana primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
In re Johnson, 110 B.R. 13, 1988 Bankr. LEXIS 2645, 1986 WL 31943 (Mont. 1988).

Opinion

ORDER

JOHN L. PETERSON, Bankruptcy Judge.

At Butte in said District this 16th day of May, 1988.

In this Chapter 11 case, the Debtors have filed a Motion to Alter or Amend the Order of April 12, 1988, awarding an oversecured creditor, Jean L. King, the sum of $14,-500.00 in attorney fees under Section 506(b) of the Bankruptcy Code. The Order further directed that such sum be paid within 90 days from confirmation. The Debtors’ motion places into issue the hourly rate effectively awarded and the term of payment. In response, King contends that an hourly rate plus other considerations are appropriate in fixing the fee and that the time of payment is consistent with Montana statutory law dealing with award of costs, i.e., Section 71-1-233, M.C.A.

The principal elements applied in award of attorney fees is hours times an hourly rate, which is known as the “lodestar” test. Lindy Bros. Builders, Inc. v. Am. Radiator & Standard Sanitary Corp., 487 F.2d 161 (3rd Cir.1973) (Lindy I), and 540 F.2d 102 (3rd Cir.1976) (Lindy II).

Prior to lodestar, the predominant method of evaluation involved consideration of various factors of which the hourly rate was but one variable. Johnson v. Georgia Highway Express, Inc., 488 F.2d 714, 717-719 (5th Cir.1974), a Title VII matter, is the leading case in this area. It listed twelve factors, the first of which is the time and labor involved. The additional factors are (2) the novelty and difficulty of the problems, (3) the skill required to perform the legal services, (4) preclusion of other employment, (5) customary fees in the type of work involved, (6) whether the fee is fixed or contingent, (7) time limitations composed by the client or the circumstances, (8) the amount involved and the results obtained, (9) experience, reputation and ability of [14]*14counsel, (10) undesirability of the case, (11) nature and length of the professional relationship with the client, and (12) awards in similar cases.

Application of the above elements of variables can be difficult, as was articulated in Pennsylvania v. Delaware Valley Citizens’ Council for Clean Air, 478 U.S. 546, 106 S.Ct. 3088, 92 L.Ed.2d 439 (1986) (Delaware I), in which the Supreme Court stated:

“This approach [Johnson'] required trial courts to consider the elements that go into determining the propriety of legal fees and was intended to provide appellate courts with more substantial and objective records on which to review trial court determinations. This mode of analysis, however, was not without its shortcomings. Its major fault was that it gave very little actual guidance to District Courts. Setting attorney’s fees by reference to a series of sometimes subjective factors placed unlimited discretion in trial judges and produced disparate results.” Id. 478 U.S. at 563, 106 S.Ct. at 3097, 92 L.Ed.2d at 455.

Thus, lodestar has been employed with increasing frequency in recent years. In the Ninth Circuit, the transition is illustrated by In re Yermakov, 718 F.2d 1465 (9th Cir.1983), which, while alluding to the various criteria set forth in Johnson, stated “The primary method used to determine a reasonable attorney fee in a bankruptcy case is to multiply the number of hours expended by an hourly rate.” Id. at 1471. As in Yermakov, criteria employed by courts in considering attorney fees in non-bankruptcy settings are now applied in bankruptcy cases. See In re Baldwin-United Corp., 79 B.R. 321 (Bankr.S.D.Ohio 1987); In re Kero-Sun, Inc., 59 B.R., 630, 633-634 (Bankr.D.Conn.1986); In re Jensen-Farley Pictures, Inc., 47 B.R. 557 (Bankr.D.Utah 1985).

Delaware I, supra, considered the propriety of an attorney’s fee award pursuant to Section 304(d) of the Clean Air Act [42 U.S.C. § 7604(d)], which provides that in any action to enforce the Act, the Court may award costs of litigation including a reasonable attorney’s fee. The Delaware I Court stated:

“[In Hensley v. Eckerhart, 461 U.S. 424, 103 S.Ct. 1933, 76 L.Ed.2d 40 (1983) ], We ... adopted a hybrid approach that shared elements of both Johnson and the lodestar method of calculation ...
We further refined our views in Blum v. Stenson, 465 U.S. 886 [104 S.Ct. 1541, 79 L.Ed.2d 891] (1984). Blum restated the proper first step in determining a reasonable attorney’s fee is to multiply ‘the number of hours reasonably expended on the litigation times a reasonable hourly rate’ ...
Blum also limited the factors which a district court may consider in determining whether to make adjustments to the lodestar amount. Expanding on our earlier finding in Hensley that many of the Johnson factors ‘are subsumed within the initial calculation’ of the lodestar, we specifically held in Blum that the ‘novelty [and] complexity of the issues,’ ‘the special skill and experience of counsel,’ the ‘quality of representation,’ and the ‘result obtained’ from the litigation are presumably fully reflected in the lodestar amount, and thus cannot serve as independent bases for increasing the basic fee award. Although upward adjustments of the lodestar figure are still permissible, such modifications are proper only in certain ‘rare’ and ‘exceptional’ cases, supported by both ‘specific evidence’ on the record and detailed findings by the lower courts.
A strong presumption that the lodestar figure — the product of the reasonable hours times a reasonable rate — represents a ‘reasonable’ fee is wholly consistent with the rationale behind the usual fee shifting statute, including the one in the present case.” Id. [478 U.S. at 564-65, 106 S.Ct. at 3098], 92 L.Ed.2d at 455-56.

In Blum v. Stenson, 465 U.S. 886, 104 S.Ct. 1541, 79 L.Ed.2d 891 (1984), the Court held that virtually all of the Johnson elements were subsumed into lodestar except for the factor of contingency. In re Powerine Oil Co., 71 B.R. 767 (9th Cir. BAP 1986), decided prior to Pennsylvania v. [15]*15Delaware Valley Citizens’ Council for Clean Air, 483 U.S. 711, 107 S.Ct. 3078, 97 L.Ed.2d 585 (1987) (Delaware II), affirmed allowance of a substantial increment to the lodestar figure because of a strong element of contingency, despite the absence of a contingent fee agreement as provided for by 11 U.S.C. § 328. In a bankruptcy setting this element can still be applicable, although there may now be reason to reexamine this issue because of Delaware II. This case, by a bare plurality (4 justices), may have folded the remaining unsub-sumed element, that of contingency, into lodestar stating:

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110 B.R. 13, 1988 Bankr. LEXIS 2645, 1986 WL 31943, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/in-re-johnson-mtb-1988.