Assistant Attorney General David Lochabay is not contesting the amount of costs, but is disputing attorney Douglas F. Cushnie’s requested fee award, which the AGO described as “unauthorized or unreasonable, both with respect to the hourly rates and the hours expended in connection with the case.
Cushnie is asking $350 for costs and $39,375 for attorney’s fees, representing 157.5 hours.
Cushnie filed a supplemental fee of submission, detailing the breakdown of his attorney’s fees, as required by visiting Senior Judge John C. Coughenour of the West District of Washington.
Cushnie also submitted affidavits of two local lawyers attesting to their prevailing attorney’s hourly rate of $200 to $250 per hour.
Lochabay said Cushnie’s $250 hourly rate is “not reasonable,” adding that Peter-Palican “has not carried her initial burden of producing satisfactory evidence that attorneys of similar experience in legal community are billing paying clients for civil rights works at the rates [the] plaintiff seeks.”
Lochabay said Cushnie’s number of hours expended is “unreasonable and subject to significant reduction.”
The federal court earlier ordered the CNMI government to pay Peter-Palican $216,049 in salary and certain benefits from April 15, 2006 to May 19, 2010.
Records showed that Benigno R. Fitial, as newly elected governor, terminated Peter-Palican from her position as special assistant for women’s affairs on Jan. 8, 2006.
She was an appointee of then-Gov. Juan N. Babauta who lost to Fitial in the 2005 elections.
