Judge grows testy over city lawsuit filings

Also on this page: Lawyers seek almost $1 million in fees, costs.

Nov. 14 -- The lawyers in the city police reverse discrimination suit are still squabbling like children on a long car ride, and the judge driving in the case is pretty sick of it.

"This court would like an opportunity to address the merits of the issues involved in this case before the National Football League concludes its season," a testy U.S. District Judge Thomas Curran wrote.

The city already has lost the lawsuit, but the lawyers continue sniping over legal fees.

Attorney William R. Rettko's law office represented 17 white men from the Milwaukee Police Department who won a discrimination suit against the city and former Police Chief Arthur Jones. A jury awarded the 17 a total of $2.2 million in compensatory and punitive damages, and Curran added an additional $1.5 million for the loss of the higher salaries and the pensions they would have earned had they been promoted fairly.

Rettko, who is asking for double fees and costs, recently asked Curran for even more money. He orignally originally sought $466,513 in straight time fees and costs, and to have that amount doubled.

In a later filing, however, Rettko upped the ante: the correct straight time fee and cost amount is $648,619.24, he said, and that amount should still be sweetened as he requested before.

The city, not suprisingly, disagreed and asked to strike the new request.

Curran was displeased with both sides..

"This court has been deluged with documents since the trial portion of the case has been concluded," Curran wrote.

The back-and-forth over the fees is the latest example, he said, and likely would result in more paper if he did not take a stand.

Curran made clear that he recognized the potential flaws in Rettko's latest flurry, and said the city did not need to start a new round of filings. He denied the city's request to do so, and denied Rettko's request to be paid for the time spend preparing the request for more money.

To read Curran's order, click here.

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Lawyer in police case seeks almost $1 million in fees and costs

Sept. 26, 2005 -- The lawyer who won a reverse discrimination lawsuit against the Police Department wants double fees and costs as a reward for taking such a risky case, according to federal court documents.

Attorney William R. Rettko is seeking a total payment of $933,026.25. He also is asking U.S. District Judge Thomas Curran to order the city to reimburse police officers involved in the case $29,971.91 for the vacation and comp time they burned up to watch the trial.

Rettko's law office represented 17 white men from the Milwaukee Police Department who won a discrimination suit against the city and former Police Chief Arthur Jones. A jury awarded the 17 a total of $2.2 million in compensatory and punitive damages, and Curran added an additional $1.5 million for the loss of the higher salaries and the pensions they would have earned had they been promoted fairly.

Rettko said in a brief that he spent 1,429 hours on the case, and a paralegal put in 521 hours. Rettko also asked that the city be ordered to pay the full cost of the special master who helped determine lost wages. Curran previously had ordered that cost to be shared by the plaintiffs and the city.

Rettko said he charged $250 an hour for the case, and the paralegal charged $90.The firm's expenses were an additional $62,39, he said..

The full fees and costs through Aug. 31 were $466,513, he said.

In seeking to have the amount doubled, Rettko wrote: "The plaintiffs went to just about every large law firm in the cities of Milwaukee and Madison to find a firm to represent them in this matter, but found no takers. In most cases, the plaintiffs were simply told they could not prevail in a reverse discrimination case against the City of Milwaukee."

In similar circumstances, he wrote, a federal court in San Francisco doubled fees and costs due an attorney "to ensure that counsel would accept civil rights contingency fee cases," he said.

Rettko said he is seeking double fees "due to the undesirability of the case, the risk involved for the attorney that took the case, the complex nature of the issues involved, the daily and continuous motions filed by the defense in their Stalingrad defense, and due to the exceptional results achieved."

Rettko also said he could find no case explicitly allowing the officers to recover costs for using vacation and comp time to attend the trial, but he couldn't find any cases prohibiting it, either.

"Simply put, the plaintiffs case benefited from their attendance and was a necessary use of the time for the benefit of their individual cases and of the group," he wrote. "The defendants should not be allowed to benefit from their denial of this reimbursement."