The County of Lackawanna Transit System paid more than $123,000 in legal fees and could be on the hook for another $642,459 for attorneys who represented an atheist group that successfully sued for the right to place ads on the agency’s buses.
The American Civil Liberties Union and a private law firm recently filed the fee petition, seeking payment for work on a 2015 federal lawsuit they filed for the Northeastern Pennsylvania Freethought Society. In a reply, William McPartland, attorney for COLTS, argues the fee request is grossly excessive and includes multiple redundant entries. He notes the attorneys seek payment for 1,707.8 hours. That’s more than seven times the 237.3 hours defense counsel charged COLTS. He asks U.S. District Judge Malachy Mannion to entirely deny the petition or significantly reduce the fees.
Mannion’s ruling will have significant ramifications for taxpayers since the fees are not covered by insurance, which means any award will come from COLTS’ general fund.
The dispute centers on a five-year legal battle over a lawsuit that alleged COLTS violated the Freethought Society’s First Amendment right to free speech when it refused to run its ads because officials disagreed with the viewpoint of atheists, who do not believe in the existence of a supreme deity. COLTS maintained it bans all ads promoting or attacking religion because it could cause arguments among passengers, endangering their safety.
Mannion presided over a one-day nonjury trial and ruled in COLTS’ favor in 2018. The 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals overturned that decision in September 2019. The Freethought Society did not seek monetary damages, but COLTS is responsible for its attorney fees because the group prevailed in the case. In most civil cases, a plaintiff’s attorneys are paid by a percentage of a verdict. Civil rights cases that allege violation of federal rights differ, however, with attorneys billing for each hour of work.
Attorney Tim Hinton, COLTS solicitor, said there was no insurance coverage because the matter fell under an exclusion within the policy. The insurance company paid about $15,000 in defense legal fees before it denied coverage, leaving COLTS to pay $123,229.
The Freethought Society was represented by the ACLU and the Philadelphia law firm Schnader Harrison Segal & Lewis. The fee petition, filed by Stephen Shapiro of the Schnader firm and Mary Catherine Roper of the ACLU, seeks payment for eight attorneys, who charged between $317 and $600 per hour for a total of $633,337.80, plus $9,121.20 for litigation costs.
In a reply to the petition, McPartland cites multiple instances where the number of hours charged far exceed what would be considered reasonable. He cites prior court rulings which held a judge can entirely deny attorneys fees if its determined they were so excessive that they “shock the conscience.”
“Given the excessive fees sought by counsel for the litigation of this matter before this court, a finding that ‘shocks the conscience’ of the Court is warranted,” he said.
Mannion will take the matter under advisement and issue a ruling at a later date.
Contact the writer:
tbesecker@timesshamrock.com; 570-348-9137;
@tmbeseckerTT on Twitter
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