Lawson v. FMR LLC
Decision Date | 12 July 2018 |
Docket Number | CIVIL ACTION NO. 08-10466-DPW |
Citation | 320 F.Supp.3d 249 |
Parties | Jackie Hosang LAWSON, Plaintiff, v. FMR LLC, dba Fidelity Investments; FMR Corp., dba Fidelity Investments; and Fidelity Brokerages Services LLC, dba Fidelity Investments, Defendants. |
Court | U.S. District Court — District of Massachusetts |
Paul F. Kelly, James A.W. Shaw, Segal Roitman, LLP, Catherine Elizabeth Murillo, Laura R. Studen, Mary Katherine M. Geraghty, Robert D. Friedman, Burns & Levinson LLP, Boston, MA, for Plaintiff.
Andrea G. Hood, Milbank, Sean M. Murphy, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy LLP, New York, NY, Alexandra G. Watson, William H. Kettlewell, Hogan Lovells US LLP, Rachel M. Shapiro, Massachusetts Attorney General's Office, Victoria L. Steinberg, Todd & Weld, Boston, MA, for Defendants.
Along the path to an unsuccessful jury verdict with respect to her claim of alleged illegal retaliation by her employer Fidelity Investments, the plaintiff, Jackie Hosang Lawson, achieved an important interlocutory victory in the Supreme Court affirming the right to pursue such a theory under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, 18 U.S.C. § 1514A. Lawson v. FMR LLC , 571 U.S. 429, 134 S.Ct. 1158, 188 L.Ed.2d 158 (2014).1 Ms. Lawson now seeks a partial award of attorney fees for that interlocutory success.
Ms. Lawson's right to attorney fees turns on whether she may be termed a prevailing party in a case where judgment on the merits of her substantive claims ultimately entered for the defendant. Hewitt v. Helms , 482 U.S. 755, 759, 107 S.Ct. 2672, 96 L.Ed.2d 654 (1987) (). She asserts she is a prevailing party to the degree of her interlocutory victory because the first of the prayers she made for relief in her complaint was for a declaration that the defendant "Fidelity Investments, as a contractor and/or a subcontractor to Fidelity Mutual Funds, is a covered employer under 18 U.S.C. § 1514A." That is the legal issue as to which she was successful in the Supreme Court.
As a formal procedural predicate for attorney fees on this basis, Ms. Lawson seeks to amend the judgment in this case to recognize by means of a separate declaration her interlocutory procedural victory. I decline to engage in that sleight of hand. The core purpose of a declaratory judgment is the termination of the case or controversy before the court on the basis of largely undisputed facts. 28 U.S.C. § 2201(a) ( ); see Hewitt , 482 U.S. at 760-63, 107 S.Ct. 2672 ( )(emphasis in original). This case was never in that posture. I would not in the ordinary course enter a declaratory judgment that did not serve the core purpose of the declaratory judgment procedure. To do otherwise would be to issue an advisory opinion.
More specifically, I conclude that in the context of this litigation, the declaration sought in Ms. Lawson's prayer for relief does not exist as a standalone claim. Rather, it is a procedural dimension to the substantive claim Ms. Lawson unsuccessfully pursued. Achieving an interlocutory procedural victory in a case where final judgment enters for the opposing party, does not confer prevailing party status upon the party against whom final judgment enters. See Buckhannon Bd. & Care Home, Inc. v. West Virginia Dep't of Health & Human Res. , 532 U.S. 598, 603, 121 S.Ct. 1835, 149 L.Ed.2d 855 (2001) (); Hewitt , 482 U.S. at 760, 107 S.Ct. 2672 ( ); Hanrahan v. Hampton , 446 U.S. 754, 758-59, 100 S.Ct. 1987, 64 L.Ed.2d 670 (1980) (...
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Lawson v. FMR LLC
...Supreme Court. I declined to award fees because Ms. Lawson was not ultimately the prevailing party in the litigation, Lawson v. FMR LLC, 320 F. Supp 3d 249 (D. Mass. 2018). The First Circuit upheld the judgment and the denial of attorneys fees on appeal. Lawson v. FMR LLC, No. 17-2220, 2019......