Judge Wingate Awards 21% of Requested Attorney's Fees and Expenses in Jackson Firefighters Sexual Harrassment Case
One of the first posts on this blog was this post in February 2009 about the issue of attorney's fees and expenses in the City of Jackson Firefighters sexual harassment case to be decided by Judge Henry Wingate. Judge Wingate issued his ruling yesterday. Here is the 41 page Order.
Background:
The City lost the trial, but Judge Wingate ordered a new trial in this order due to attorney misconduct by plaintiffs' counsel at trial. Basically, plaintiff's counsel could not follow instructions from the judge during trial. That or they chose not to, which I do not believe based on what I saw.
As I stated in my original post on this case, I watched a bit of the trial and thought that plaintiffs' counsel suffered from a severe case of deer-in-the-headlights due to inexperience. I suspect that their heart rates were so high from nervousness that they could not process Judge Wingate's evidentiary rulings and adjust on the fly.
Judge Wingate was still unhappy about a lying plaintiff, which I described in my last post:
Judge Wingate was not impressed by one plaintiff who testified on cross-examination that the money for her car payment came directly from God who placed it into her account every month. Frankly, I thought this was a little cheap on God's part. Couldn't God have delivered the car without a note, or at least paid it all off at one time?
In the latest order, Judge Wingate quotes some of the testimony by the lying plaintiff:
Q: And who pays that [car] note?
A: By the the grace of God, supernaturally, it's paid every month.
Q: So you pay it yourself?
A: No. Supernaturally, it's paid for every month.
Q: [Say what?]
A: When I say 'supernaturally', I mean money come up in my account every month to pay it because the lord is the one who blessed me with it.
The jury awarded this lady $160,000. It appears that Judge Wingate still cannot believe it.
The Ruling on the Motion for Attorney's Fees:
After Judge Wingate ordered the new trial, the parties settled for $250,000 and agreed that the Court would decide the issue of attorney's fees.
Plaintiffs sought $1,237,812.26 in attorney's fees and expenses. Judge Wingate awarded $263,901.78, which was 21% of the request. The Court got there by reducing the requested rate, cutting some of the hours and reducing the remaining hours to 40% due to the result of the case.
My Take:
Judge Wingate's ruling was a win for the City of Jackson, which stood to lose another million dollars in the case. But what I really find interesting is the lying plaintiff.
Lawyers like to believe that if they can prove that the opposing party is lying, then the impeaching lawyer's side will win the case. That is probably true a lot of the time. But this case shows that it is not always true. Here, a plaintiff lied and won anyway.
This means that a case is not won just because you prove that a witness lied. It is also probably a testament to the power of confirmation bias. People view issues and disputes with pre-conceived opinions and notions and discount evidence that it inconsistent with their pre-conceived views. This is a big factor in it being so hard to get a plaintiff's verdict in many Mississippi counties. The jury in this case probably concluded that the fact that one of the plaintiffs lied was not important and focused on the evidence that supported plaintiffs' case.
You omit to consider that the jury may have found it completely plausible that God was depositing money into the plaintiff's account.
wow. It only took Judge Wingate about 2 years to rule on this post trial motion. Someone must have lit a fire under the bench.
Wingate's tardiness has becoming an endearing quality.
That time frame is normal for Wingate. I had a case where he heard argument and then concluded by saying, "Counsel, I will have a decision to you by Friday." Of course, he didn't say which Friday and our order came out about 2 years later.