Crowley v. L.L. Bean, Inc., 03-1678.

• Decision Date: 17 March 2004
• Docket Number: No. 03-1678.,03-1678.
• Citation: 361 F.3d 22
• Parties: Eileen CROWLEY, Plaintiff, Appellant, v. L.L. BEAN, INC., Defendant, Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — First Circuit

361 F.3d 22

Eileen CROWLEY, Plaintiff, Appellant, v. L.L. BEAN, INC., Defendant, Appellee.

No. 03-1678.

United States Court of Appeals, First Circuit.

Heard December 5, 2003.

Decided March 17, 2004.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Gerald F. Petruccelli, with whom Petruccelli, Martin & Haddow, LLP, were on brief for appellant.

Peter J. Brann, with whom Brann & Isaacson, were on brief for appellee.

Before BOUDIN, Chief Judge, TORRUELLA, Circuit Judge, and STAHL, Senior Circuit Judge.

STAHL, Senior Circuit Judge.

Following a jury trial, plaintiff-appellant Eileen Crowley prevailed on civil rights claims against defendant-appellee L.L. Bean, Inc. Several weeks after this court affirmed the judgment, Crowley applied to the district court for attorneys' fees. The district court denied the application, finding it to be untimely, and held that Crowley had complied neither with its own order nor with Maine Local Rule 54.2. We affirm the district court's denial of attorneys' fees.

I. BACKGROUND

In June, 2000, Crowley asserted several civil rights claims against her employer, L.L. Bean. On June 14, 2001, after a jury trial, the district court awarded judgment to Crowley.

On June 26, 2001, L.L. Bean filed a renewed motion for judgment as a matter of law or, if denied, a motion for a new trial. On October 24, 2001, before any ruling on L.L. Bean's motion had issued, Crowley filed a document titled "Request for Clarification on Filing of Attorneys' Fees Application." In that submission, Crowley asked for "clarification on when the Court would like plaintiff to file her application for attorneys' fees as the prevailing party in this matter." That day, the district court entered an order stating: "It is hereby ordered the attorneys' fees application be filed with this Court within 30 days of the disposition of any appeal."

On November 8, 2001, the district court denied L.L. Bean's motion for a new trial and amended its judgment in favor of Crowley. L.L. Bean appealed, and on September 19, 2002, this court affirmed the judgment below. Crowley v. L.L. Bean, Inc., 303 F.3d 387 (1st Cir.2002). The mandate was issued on October 21, 2002; it was received by the district court on November 4, 2002, and was filed in the electronic docket on November 6.

On January 17, 2003, Crowley filed her petition for attorneys' fees in district court pursuant to Local Rule 54.2. That rule provides the time frame for filing such petitions:

An application for attorneys' fees in those cases in which fees have been contracted for or in any case in which no notice of appeal has been filed shall be filed within 30 days of the expiration of the time for filing a timely appeal.

An application for fees in all other cases shall be filed within 30 days of the filing of the appellate mandate providing for final disposition of any appeal.

A claim for fees filed before the final disposition of any appeal shall have no effect and a new application must be filed within the prescribed time as described herein.

Me. Loc. R. 54.2 (2001).¹

On January 31, L.L. Bean filed a motion to strike Crowley's petition as untimely, which the district court granted. Crowley then filed a motion for reconsideration, which was denied. Thereafter, she appealed from the order granting the motion to strike.²

II. ARGUMENT

Here, Crowley advances two related arguments: (1) Local Rule 54.2 should be construed to permit the filing of her application for attorneys' fees, and (2) even if her application was untimely under the rule, the district court nonetheless should have considered it.

Although we typically review the interpretation of a federal procedural rule de novo, Blake v. Pellegrino, 329 F.3d 43, 46 (1st Cir.2003), we accord "a special degree of deference — above and beyond the traditional standards of decisionmaking and appellate oversight — ... to a court's interpretation of its own local rules." In re Jarvis, 53 F.3d 416, 422 (1st Cir.1995). Moreover, we have held that the application of a district court's local rule is reviewed for abuse of discretion. NEPSK, Inc. v. Houlton, 283 F.3d 1, 5 (1st Cir.2002) (citing CMM Cable Rep, Inc. v. Ocean Coast Props., Inc., 97 F.3d 1504, 1528 (1st Cir.1996)); see also Air Line Pilots Ass'n v. Precision Valley Aviation, 26 F.3d 220, 224 (1st Cir.1994) (applying "broad latitude in administering local rules").³ While a district court may forgive a party's violation of a local rule, United States v. Diaz-Villafane, 874 F.2d 43, 47 (1st Cir.1989), we review deferentially its refusal to do so. NEPSK, Inc., 283 F.3d at 9.

A. Whether Crowley's petition for fees was untimely

Crowley contends that the district court misinterpreted Local Rule 54.2, and that her petition for attorneys' fees in fact was timely filed. We begin with the text of the rule.

As the parties now seem to agree, the first paragraph of Local Rule 54.2 does not apply to Crowley's fee application, as this is not a case in which fees were contracted for or in which no notice of appeal was filed.⁴ Rather, the timeliness is governed by the second paragraph, which states, "An application for fees in all other cases shall be filed within 30 days of the filing of the appellate mandate providing for final disposition of any appeal." L.R. 54.2.

The crux of the dispute lies in the words "final disposition of any appeal." L.L. Bean contends, consistent with the district court's opinion, that this phrase refers to an appeal to this court. Crowley filed her petition for fees ten weeks after this court issued its appellate mandate and eight weeks after the mandate had been filed in district court. Under this interpretation of Rule 54.2, her petition was indisputably untimely.

Crowley, however, reads the phrase "any appeal" more broadly to include certiorari petitions to the Supreme Court. Specifically, she contends that a prevailing plaintiff is required to file her petition for attorneys' fees within thirty days after the "expiration date" of the opposing party's right to appeal. The thirty-day period should not begin, she says, until there has been (1) express waiver of further review on certiorari; (2) denial of certiorari; (3) passage of the deadline to seek certiorari; or (4) the Supreme Court's decision, whichever is latest. Here, L.L. Bean had ninety days from the filing of the Court of Appeals mandate to file for certiorari with the Supreme Court. After that time passed with no certiorari filing, Crowley argues, she had an additional thirty days in which to submit her petition.

A plain reading of L.R. 54.2, however, indicates that the district court reasonably interpreted "any appeal" to refer solely to an appeal to this court. First, the rule makes no explicit reference to certiorari, only to "appeals."⁵ The Supreme Court no longer adjudicates "appeals" in cases such as this. See Pub.L. 100-352, § 1, 102 Stat. 662 (June 22, 1988) (repealing 28 U.S.C. § 1252, thereby eliminating nearly all of the Supreme Court's mandatory appellate jurisdiction).

Second, the Rule's reference to "appellate mandate providing for final disposition of any appeal" reasonably refers to action by this court, not the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court generally does not issue appellate mandates. If it denies a petition for certiorari, it does not issue a mandate; rather, the clerk prepares, signs, and enters an order to that effect. See Sup.Ct. R. 45(3). If the Court instead grants plenary review, "a formal mandate does not issue unless specifically directed; instead, the Clerk of [the Supreme] Court will send the clerk of the lower court a copy of the opinion or order of [the Supreme] Court and a certified copy of the judgment." Sup.Ct. R. 45(3).⁶ Accordingly, the local rule's reference to "filing of the appellate mandate" can reasonably be construed as pertaining only to action of this court.

It is true that in other contexts, the term "final disposition" has been interpreted to refer to action taken by the Supreme Court or to additional appeals. See, e.g., Clay v. United States, 537 U.S. 522, 123 S.Ct. 1072, 1075, 155 L.Ed.2d 88 (2003) (holding that for the purpose of starting the clock on § 2255's one-year limitation period, a judgment of conviction "becomes final" when the time expires for filing a petition for certiorari contesting the appellate court's affirmation of the conviction); Adams v. Sec. and Exchange Comm'n, 287 F.3d 183, 187 (D.C.Cir.2002)(holding that thirty-day period for filing for fees pursuant to Equal Access to Justice Act does not run until the period in which an appeal can be brought has expired). These decisions are specific to legal contexts unrelated to those in the case at bar, however. See, e.g., Clay, 123 S.Ct. at 1075 ("the relevant context is postconviction relief, a context in which finality has a long-recognized, clear meaning"). There is no uniformity of interpretation as to the term "final disposition" and similar phrases; other cases use these terms to refer to judgments of the district court, a reading that plainly is inapplicable here. See, e.g., Roell v. Withrow, 538 U.S. 580, 123 S.Ct. 1696, 1698, 155 L.Ed.2d 775 (2003); Cunningham v. Hamilton County, Ohio, 527 U.S. 198, 202-03, 119 S.Ct. 1915, 144 L.Ed.2d 184 (1999); Swint v. Chambers County Comm'n, 514 U.S. 35, 51, 115 S.Ct. 1203, 131 L.Ed.2d 60 (1995). Reading the Rule 54.2 as a whole, we conclude that the district court's interpretation was not erroneous, and that Crowley's application for attorneys' fees was untimely.

Crowley points to the detailed information contained in her fee petition and maintains that it is improper for the opposing party to have access to it before the litigation is complete. The likelihood of the Supreme Court granting certiorari on any given case is exceedingly slim, however. The risk of confidential information being shared with an opposing party who might somehow use it to its advantage in litigation before the Supreme Court is minimal, and does not change the...