Earlier this year, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher notched a big win in a minority voting rights case in Albany, New York, that it originally took pro bono. But when the firm sought a fee award in the case, U.S. District Judge Lawrence Kahn slashed its request from $6.3 million to just under $1.2 million. The hourly rates that Gibson Dunn lawyers in Manhattan and Washington, D.C., charge for civil rights litigation won’t fly in upstate New York, the judge said.
“The court finds that plaintiffs have not met their burden of showing that out-of-district rates are warranted,” Kahn wrote in his September ruling. The judge also said the firm’s billing entries were at times “impermissibly vague,” describing some tasks simply as “appeal work” or “settlement efforts.”
