New Falls Corporation v. Soni Holdings, LLC

Opinion

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT EASTERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK

NEW FALLS CORPORATION, ORDER Plaintiff, 19-CV-00449 (HG) (LGD)

v.

SONI HOLDINGS, LLC, KUNAL SONI, ANJALI SONI, 632 MLK BLVD JR LLC, OM P. SONI, SONI CAPITAL RESOURCES, LLC, WEANONA HUGIE, and RICHARD SPEARS,

Defendants.

HECTOR GONZALEZ, United States District Judge: Since August 2019, Defendants have been subject to a preliminary injunction that prohibits them from “selling, transferring, conveying, hypothecating, mortgaging, liening, encumbering, or otherwise disposing of” certain real property located in Newark, New Jersey. ECF No. 64. Defendants have twice been found to have been in contempt of that injunction, once by Judge Feuerstein, who previously presided over this case, and once by this Court. ECF Nos. 120, 171. In each instance, the contempt decisions found that awarding attorneys’ fees and costs to Plaintiff was an appropriate sanction and referred to the assigned magistrate judge the task of taking further evidence necessary to provide a report and recommendation as to the appropriate amount of fees and costs. Magistrate Judge Dunst accepted various written submissions from the parties and held an evidentiary hearing on Plaintiff’s request for attorneys’ fees and costs on March 27, 2023. ECF No. 208. Judge Dunst has issued a report and recommendation, which recommends that Plaintiff be awarded $12,423.96 in attorneys’ fees and costs. ECF No. 225. No party has submitted any objection to that report and recommendation, and the parties’ time to submit any objections has expired. The Court must review de novo the portions of a report and recommendation to which any party has objected. Fed. R. Civ. P. 72(b)(3); 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1)(C). For any portions of a

report and recommendation “to which no timely objection has been made, a district court need only satisfy itself that there is no clear error on the face of the record in order to accept it.” Logan v. World Luxury Cars, Inc., No. 15-cv-248, 2023 WL 156878, at *1 (E.D.N.Y. Jan. 11, 2023) (internal quotation marks omitted). The Court has reviewed Judge Dunst’s thorough and well-reasoned report and recommendation, concurs with its conclusions, and adopts it in full. The Court therefore GRANTS in part Plaintiff’s motions seeking attorneys’ fees and costs associated with Defendants’ contempt of the Court’s preliminary injunction. See ECF Nos. 127, 174. Defendants are hereby ORDERED to pay Plaintiff a total of $12,423.96 in attorneys’ fees and costs on or before October 6, 2023.

SO ORDERED. /s/ Hector Gonzalez HECTOR GONZALEZ United States District Judge Dated: Brooklyn, New York September 7, 2023