Traffic Tech Incorporated v. Clean Bottling Incorporated

• Court: District Court, D. Arizona
• Decided: July 25, 2025
• Docket: 2:25-cv-01356
• Status: Unknown

Opinion

1 2 WO 3 4 5 6 IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 7 FOR THE DISTRICT OF ARIZONA

9 Traffic Tech Incorporated, No. CV-25-01356-PHX-JJT

10 Plaintiff, ORDER

11 v.

12 Clean Bottling Incorporated,

13 Defendant. 14 15 At issue is Plaintiff’s Motion for Attorneys’ Fees (Doc. 17, Motion), supported by 16 a Declaration (Doc. 18), to which Defendant did not respond. The Court, having reviewed 17 Plaintiff’s Motion and Declaration, and good cause appearing, will grant the Motion. 18 I. Legal Standard 19 Under Local Rule of Civil Procedure 54.2, a party seeking an award of attorneys’ 20 fees and related non-taxable expenses must show that it is eligible for an award, entitled to 21 an award, and that the requested award is reasonable. LRCiv 54.2(c). Eligibility and 22 entitlement to an award depends on the applicable statutory, contractual, or legal authority 23 “upon which the movant seeks an award.” LRCiv 54.2(c)(1)–(2). The Court finds that 24 Plaintiff complied with the requirements of LRCiv 54.2 in filing its motion. 25 II. Discussion 26 Plaintiff contends that it is eligible for an award of attorneys’ fees because it filed 27 suit against Defendant to enforce the agreed-upon terms of the Settlement Agreement 28 between them, which specifically provided for the award of fees incurred during any 1 proceeding necessary to enforce the agreement. (Mot. at 5; Doc. 1, Ex. A at 1.) The Court’s 2 granting of a default judgment (Doc. 15) on Plaintiff’s breach of contract claim following 3 Defendant’s nonresponse indicates that Plaintiff prevailed in the underlying suit, justifying 4 its eligibility for recovery of attorneys’ fees. See Gary v. Carbon Cycle Arizona LLC, 398 5 F. Supp. 3d 468, 475 (D. Ariz. Aug. 16, 2019) (“Plaintiffs may be considered ‘prevailing 6 parties’ for attorney’s fees purposes if they succeed on any significant issue in litigation 7 which achieves some of the benefit the parties sought in bringing suit.”). 8 Additionally, the Court finds that Plaintiff is entitled to the reasonable attorneys’ 9 fees incurred in the drafting and filing of the present Motion. As the Court found in Gary, 10 398 F. Supp. 3d at 479, “it would be inconsistent to dilute a fees award by refusing to 11 compensate attorneys for the time they reasonably spent in establishing their rightful claim 12 to the fee.” (See Mot. at 5.) Consequently, the Court finds that Plaintiff is entitled to the 13 attorneys’ fees incurred in preparing the Motion. 14 With regard to the reasonableness of Plaintiff’s fee request, the Court finds the 15 hourly rate charged by the responsible counsel, both individually and as aggregated, to be 16 within the market rate and consistent with the factors for reasonableness set forth in LRCiv 17 54.2(c)(3). The number of hours billed for the work necessary in this truncated matter— 18 investigating and formulating the Complaint, Motion for Default Judgment, and the instant 19 Motion—are reasonable given the straightforward nature of the underlying dispute. The 20 fees billed are also within the range of similar awards granted by this Court, as cited by 21 Plaintiff. See Lemus v. Blackrock CM Inc., No. CV-24-02561-JAT (D. Ariz. Feb. 11, 22 2025); ReBath LLC v. Baths & More of Georgia LLC, No. 19-cv-05276-PHX-MTL (D. 23 Ariz. Dec. 4, 2020). Accordingly, the Court finds the requested amount of fees reasonable. 24 Although Plaintiff included a summary of costs in its Motion (Mot. at 6), Plaintiff has duly 25 filed a Bill of Costs under LRCiv 54.1, which the Court will address separately. 26 IT IS THEREFORE ORDERED granting Plaintiff’s Motion for Attorneys’ Fees 27 (Doc. 17) and awarding Plaintiff $7,654.50 in attorneys’ fees. 28 . . . 1 IT IS FURTHER ORDERED directing the Clerk of Court to enter a supplemental 2|| judgment of an award of attorneys’ fees against Defendant Clean Bottling, Inc. and in favor of Plaintiff Traffic Tech, Inc. in the amount of $7,654.50, plus post-judgment interest at the statutory rate. 5 Dated this 25th day of July, 2025. CN

7 wefehlee— Unifga StatesDistrict Judge 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28

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