A recent Law 360 by Piper Hudspeth Blackburn, “Sabre Says US Airways Not Entitled to Fees For $1 Win,” reports that Sabre urged a New York federal court to reject a magistrate judge's recommendation that the airline booking giant cover attorney fees for US Airways after a decade of antitrust litigation that resulted in a $1 jury award to the airline.  Sabre claims that U.S. Judge James L. Cott made a series of errors in his April 10 report, particularly in applying the Supreme Court's decision in Farrar v. Hobby, which established the standard for deciding whether a plaintiff prevailed in a civil rights case.  According to the report, Farrar applies only to the reasonableness of fee awards in civil rights cases and not mandatory fee statutes.

However, Sabre argued that the Supreme Court ruling shows that the "reasonable attorney's fee" due when a plaintiff obtains only nominal damages is no fee at all.  Courts have continued to apply this ruling in cases that include fee awards under the Clayton Act, Sabre continued.  US Airways, now owned by American Airlines, has insisted that the small amount of damages it received shouldn't affect its ability to recover costs and attorney fees.  Sabre also asked the court to reject Judge Cott's finding "that the meaning of 'reasonable attorney's fee' in the civil rights fee statute differs from the meaning of identical language in the Clayton Act."

In his report, Judge Cott pointed toward a Second Circuit decision on United States Football League v. National Football League because it contained issues nearly "identical" to this one.  In that case, the court had to determine whether a plaintiff is entitled to reasonable attorney fees "after decade-long antitrust litigation resulting in a $1 jury verdict only on Sherman Act Section 2 grounds."  Not only did the court decide that the plaintiff could recover attorney fees, it "further explained that civil rights cases are inapposite as they concern discretionary awards of fees, while Section 4 mandates them," the report continued.

However, Sabre said that the USFL decision is actually in line with its position, claiming that it bolsters the argument that Congress intended that the amount of fees awarded under "the civil rights statute 'be governed by the same standards which prevail in other types of equally complex Federal litigation, such as antitrust cases.'"