Wielgos v. Commonwealth Edison Co.

127 F.R.D. 135, 1989 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 7923, 1989 WL 79661
CourtDistrict Court, N.D. Illinois
DecidedJuly 10, 1989
DocketNo. 84 C 1222
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 127 F.R.D. 135 (Wielgos v. Commonwealth Edison Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, N.D. Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Wielgos v. Commonwealth Edison Co., 127 F.R.D. 135, 1989 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 7923, 1989 WL 79661 (N.D. Ill. 1989).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

SHADUR, District Judge.

Stanley Wielgos (“Wielgos”) initially filed this class action against Commonwealth Edison Company (“Edison”) and several underwriters (“Underwriter Defendants”), asserting violations of Securities Act of 1933 § 11, 15 U.S.C. § 77k (“Section 11”). After the litigation had experienced an extended and checkered history (most of it before this Court’s then colleagues Honorable Thomas McMillen and Honorable George Leighton), this Court granted defendants’ motion for summary judgment in “Opinion I,” 688 F.Supp. 331 (N.D.I11.1988).

Edison then moved for the imposition of sanctions as to part of Wielgos’ litigation activities, seeking to recover attorney’s fees and expenses1 under Fed.R.Civ.P. (“Rule”) 11, 28 U.S.C. § 1927 (“Section 1927”) and Section 11(e). This Court granted that motion in “Opinion II,” 123 F.R.D. 299 (N.D.I11.1988).2

Wielgos then moved for reconsideration of Opinion II,3 a motion this Court granted orally to the limited extent of “the quantification of the award, not the substance of [137]*137it” (December 9,1988 Tr. 7). Nevertheless, Wielgos has again sought to raise a number of issues as to the basic propriety of a fees sanction as well as to its quantification. For the reasons stated in this memorandum opinion and order, Wielgos’ new motion for reconsideration is denied and this Court grants Edison’s requests for (1) 40% of its fees encompassed within its original request, (2) all fees incurred since those embraced within that original request and (3) all expenses referred to in both fee requests.

Background and Procedural History

While this case was still on Judge Leigh-ton’s calendar, Wielgos’ then-pending Second Amended Complaint (“SAC”) had alleged Edison’s shelf Registration Statement filed with the SEC on September 22, 1983 had violated, in addition to Section 11, Securities Exchange Act of 1934 § 10(b) (15 U.S.C. § 78j(b)) and SEC Rule 10b-5 (17 C.F.R. § 240.10b-5) (together “Section 10(b)”). When both sides moved for summary judgment on the SAC, Judge Leigh-ton denied Wielgos’ motion and requested oral argument on defendants’ motion—but before that could occur Wielgos moved to file a Third Amended Complaint (“TAC”). That proposed pleading abandoned the Section 10(b) claim and many of the allegations of the Section 11 claim. Over defendants’ strenuous objections Judge Leighton granted leave to file the TAC.

Both sides then renewed their summary judgment motions, this time directed to the TAC.4 It was at that point that this Court inherited the case and, in Opinion I, held that defendants must prevail entirely on the merits of Wielgos’ claims.5 Thereafter Edison moved for payment of attorney’s fees and expenses for its having had to defend against the allegations in the SAC that were later abandoned in the TAC. Opinion II at 307 granted that motion under Rule 11, Section 1927 and Section 11(e), finding Wielgos and his counsel Weaver jointly and severally liable in the sum of (1) $159,035 plus (2) fees and expenses on the fees motion plus (3) unrecovered expenses in the Bill of Costs.

Edison has continually offered to limit the amount of its fee request to a modest portion of the actual sum incurred, so long as Wielgos did not contest the amount requested. When Edison originally brought its motion, it offered to limit the total liability to $40,000 (Defendants’ Motion for Costs and Attorneys’ Fees 118). When Wielgos requested briefing on that motion, Edison offered to stipulate to fees totalling at most $130,000. Ultimately Edison requested only 40% of the actual fees incurred (that is, 40% of $384,246) and 75% of expenses (that is, 75% of $7,116). As already stated, Opinion II granted Edison its requested relief—$159,035. On Wielgos’ motion for reconsideration, Edison renewed its request for 40% of fees, although it also suggested the possibility the award might range up to 70%—a suggestion flowing naturally from this Court’s warning that if Wielgos’ continual objections to the fee award were to force this Court to resolve the dispute, rather than the amount being agreed upon by the parties, this Court would not be bound by the 40% reduced measure of Edison’s recovery (December 9, 1988 Tr. 5).

Wielgos’ Motion for Reconsideration

Wielgos’ arguments seeking reconsideration fall into two categories:

1. Monetary sanctions are inappropriate in this case.
2. Edison’s requested amount is grossly excessive.

But those arguments must be viewed against the backdrop of the limited function of the so-called “motion for reconsideration” (a motion without specific sanction in the Rules), as so cogently stated in Above the Belt, Inc. v. Mel Bohannan Roofing, Inc., 99 F.R.D. 99, 101 (E.D.Va.1983):

[138]*138The motion for reconsideration would be appropriate where, for example, the Court has patently misunderstood a party, or has made a decision outside the adversarial issues presented to the Court by the parties, or has made an error not of reasoning but of apprehension. A further basis for a motion to reconsider would be a controlling or significant change in the law or facts since the submission of the issue to the Court. Such problems rarely arise and the motion to reconsider should be equally rare.6

Certainly the quantification of fees was “outside the adversarial issues presented to the Court by the parties” in the initial motion, so it might well qualify for reconsideration if that procedure were necessary to deal with the issue.7 But Wielgos. attempts to go far beyond that: His current submissions also tender new legal theories on the appropriateness of any imposition of monetary sanctions—theories never advanced in Wielgos’ original memorandum on the appropriateness of sanctions and therefore inappropriate as a subject of the present motion (Publishers Resource, 762 F.2d at 561).

There seems every likelihood that this dispute will not end here (Wielgos has already appealed this Court’s decision on the merits). Out of an abundance of caution and to make this Court’s views available for review on every potentially available ground—whether procedurally barred or not—this opinion will deal (in some cases quite swiftly) with all such matters. Nonetheless, such treatment should not be mistaken for a disavowal of the independent Publishers Resource ground for rejecting Wielgos’ newly-proffered arguments that should have been made, but were not, the first time around.

Appropriateness of Monetary Sanctions

Wielgos advances four arguments as to the appropriateness of any monetary sanctions:

1. Such sanctions are improper under Rule 11 in this case.
2. This Court must conduct an evidentiary hearing to .impose sanctions at all.
3.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
127 F.R.D. 135, 1989 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 7923, 1989 WL 79661, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/wielgos-v-commonwealth-edison-co-ilnd-1989.