18th Annual Workplace Class Action Report - 2022 Edition

226 Annual Workplace Class Action Litigation Report: 2022 Edition perverse incentive of thereby encouraging lawyers to pursue their own financial interests rather than those of their clients. Id . at *18. Accordingly, the Court awarded attorneys’ fees of $1, which it noted was still more than the lawyers would have received if Plaintiff had not accepted the offer of judgment. Finally, Plaintiff’s counsel requested $1,241.00 in costs, including costs for a private process server, filing fee, and copies. The Court stated that the $825 cost for a private process server was not recoverable under 28 U.S.C. § 1920.76. Accordingly, the Court awarded costs of $416. Editor ’ s Note: The result here may have been the lowest awarded attorneys’ fee in the United States over the past year. Vines, et al. v. Welspin Pipes Inc., 2021 U.S. App. LEXIS 24600 (8th Cir. Aug. 18, 2021). Plaintiffs brought a wage & hour class and collective action alleging violations pursuant to the FLSA and the Arkansas Minimum Wage Act (“AMWA”). The parties entered into a settlement agreement for the wage claim that included payment of attorneys’ fees. On the parties’ joint motion for preliminary settlement approval, the District Court denied the motion on the basis that the claim and attorneys’ fees were not negotiated separately. Subsequently, the parties moved the District Court for settlement approval again, this time presenting the District Court with only the wage- claim portion of the settlement. In that respect, the District Court approved the wage-claim settlement. Afterwards, Plaintiffs moved for an award of attorneys’ fees and costs, and the District Court partially granted the motion, awarding $1.00 in fees only. Alternatively, the District Court noted that it would award $25,000 in fees if $1.00 was improper. Plaintiffs appealed and challenged the District Court’s determination that the amounts were not separately negotiated and the District Court’s award of $1.00 for attorneys’ fees. Plaintiffs raised three issues on appeal, including: (i) that the District Court erred in denying the motion for approval of the settlement; (ii) that the District Court abused its discretion in awarding $1.00, or alternatively $25,000 as reasonable attorneys’ fees; and (iii) that if the case were to be remanded, that it be reassigned to a different judge. The Eighth Circuit held that the District Court did not clearly err when it denied the parties’ joint motion for approval of their settlement because the record supported the District Court’s conclusion that the FLSA claims and the attorneys’ fees were not separately negotiated. Notably, the record established that the parties simultaneously negotiated the wage claim and the attorneys’ fees by exchanges of email, and in some of those emails, the settlement was listed as a lump sum, inclusive of the wage claim, attorneys’ fees, and costs, while in other emails, the amounts were listed separately. Additionally, the parties’ joint motion for approval of the settlement indicated that the attorneys’ fees were not primarily based on counsel’s total amount of billings to date, but instead on the likely total amount of billing should the case proceed through extensive discovery, pre-trial, and trial. The District Court reasoned that if the wage claim and attorneys’ fees had been negotiated separately, Defendant would not have been worried about additional lawyers’ fees exposure from discovery or trial, because they would have known there was not going to be additional discovery or trial. The Eighth Circuit concluded from a review of the record that the District Court did not determine the number of hours reasonably expended, and therefore it determined that the District Court could not have multiplied that number by the hourly rate. Consequently, the Eight Circuit found that the District Court did not calculate the lodestar as it was required to do under applicable case law precedent. Accordingly, because there was no supporting rationale based on a lodestar calculation and reduction, the Eighth Circuit held that the District Court’s award of $1 in attorneys’ fees was improper, as was its alternate award of $25,000. Thus, because the record contained no lodestar calculation, the Eighth Circuit vacated the District Court’s award of attorneys’ fees. Finally, as to Plaintiffs request that the case be reassigned to a different judge on remand, the Eighth Circuit ruled that Plaintiffs failed to show under a plain error review standard that the District Court would be unable to adequately award attorneys’ fees on remand, and therefore it denied Plaintiff’s request to have the case reassigned. In sum, the Eighth Circuit vacated the District Court’s award of attorneys’ fees and remanded the matter to the District Court. Wilson, et al. v. Schlumberger Technologies, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 106065 (D. Colo. June 7, 2021). Plaintiff, a measurement-while-drilling ("MWD") operator, filed a class and collective action alleging that Defendant failed to pay overtime compensation in violation of the FLSA and the Colorado Wage Claim Act. At trial, a jury found that Plaintiff worked more than 40 hours during at least some workweeks and awarded him overtime compensation as damages in the amount of $39,129. Plaintiff filed a motion to alter or amend the judgment and requested that the Court add liquidated damages, costs, attorneys’ fees, and interest. As to liquidated damages, the Court found that based on the evidence presented by Defendant, as well as the