A recent Texas Lawyer story, “Judge Issues $4.5M Judgment, but Slashes Plaintiffs’ Lawyer Fees,” reports that plaintiff lawyers won a jury trial and a $4.5 million final judgment for their client, an alleged victim of sexual abuse by a former school principal.  The plaintiff won the judgment against the South San Antonio Independent School District, based on a claim under Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, which bars sex discrimination.  The school district is appealing the judgment.

The plaintiffs lawyers, however, didn’t fare as well when they sought $140,000 in attorney fees from Senior U.S. District Judge Harry Lee Hudspeth of the Western District of Texas.  In a order, Hudspeth slashed their fees to $74,800—half of what they requested—and presented a list of problematic issues with their fee request.

In his order, Hudspeth described the “eye-opening 45 percent contingency” that the lawyers had sought in an agreement with the client.  Hudspeth also noted the lack of record keeping of hours worked by the evolving team of plaintiffs lawyers, which included Omar Cura Jr. of San Antonio; Brendan K. McBride of San Antonio; and Ricardo Garcia and Lino Ochoa of the firm of Garcia Ochoa Mask of McAllen.

In his order slashing the fees, Hudspeth specifically pointed to the time sheets of the Garcia Ochoa firm lawyers, who served as lead during trial, and noted that hours were exaggerated and showed unnecessary duplication of lawyers' efforts.  He also cited improper billing of travel and administrative time.

He also noted that both the Garcia Ochoa lawyers and Cura were personal injury lawyers, not experts in civil rights and education-related litigation.  Their lack of expertise became evident in their pleadings and pretrial motions, Hudspeth wrote.  The judge noted the lawyers' poor draftsmanship of the original complaint.  He also noted the plaintiffs lawyers' failure to mention an essential element of the prevailing claim, until they were prompted by the court to do so.