A Florida paralegal left her employer/law firm and then hired another lawyer to sue the firm on her behalf. She said she had worked more than 40 hours a week and wanted the firm to pay her back overtime wages. Neither she nor her attorney told the firm the suit was coming—and that had some significant consequences.

What happened. “Sawyer” worked as a paralegal for a period of time—it isn’t specified in the court opinion—at the firm of Prugh, Holliday & Karatinos in Tampa. Having resigned, she hired another attorney to sue the Prugh firm and its three partners.

When the defendants asked Sawyer to tell them how many overtime hours she had worked, she refused to say, and offered no records to her lawyer. Records of settlement discussions show that she asked for either $25,000 or $35,000, without documentation of why she felt she was owed that much. Eventually, the defendants offered to settle with her for $3,500, with neither side admitting any wrongdoing—a solution permitted under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Sawyer accepted that amount, and, as is usual in cases brought under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act, asked the court to award attorney’s fees and costs—$13,800 for her lawyer and $1,841 for costs.

A federal district court judge ruled that because he had never told the Prugh, Holliday firm that his client wanted to sue them nor asked for a specific amount, Sawyer’s lawyer did not deserve his fees or court costs. He and his client appealed to the 11th Circuit, which covers Alabama, Florida, and Georgia.

What the court said. Appellate judges stressed that the ruling they made in this case was very “fact intensive.” They meant that in most similar cases, the plaintiff has every right to ask for reimbursement of costs and fees and that they did not intend to set a precedent. But in this case, they felt the attorney had abused his role. He showed, they said, “conscious disregard for lawyer-to-lawyer collegiality and civility.” They also said, “A lawyer’s duties as a member of the bar—an officer of the court—are generally greater than a lawyer’s duties to the client.” So they affirmed the district judge’s decision to deny fees and costs. Sahyers v. Prugh, Holliday & Karatinos, U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, No. 08-10848 (2009).

Point to remember: Judges’ primary point was that the lawsuit wasted the valuable time of two courts and four judges. Sawyer’s lawyer should have contacted the Prugh firm to discuss the matter and seek a settlement without suing. They may also have felt the small amount for which Sawyer was willing to settle implied that her suit was frivolous and had no merit.