Judge won't allow $200 hourly fee for newbie associate who worked on case partly as law clerk
A federal judge in Buffalo, N.Y., has slashed an attorney fee request by nearly $60,000 in a class action filed on behalf of exotic dancers.
Chief U.S. District Judge William Skretny cut the fee request for nearly $138,000 to about $79,000, the New York Law Journal reports.
The law firm Getman & Sweeney had requested fees as high as $550 per hour for a name partner, but Skretny reduced fees to $300 for Dan Getman and $235 for Michael Sweeney, the story says.
Skretny also criticized as “inappropriate” a $200 requested fee for a newbie associate. Skretny said the amount was particularly high since about a third of the time the new lawyer spent on the case was work done as a law clerk before she obtained her license.
Skretny wrote that “the padding of neither the bill nor the brief will be tolerated,” the story says.
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