This case was a class action lawsuit filed on behalf of all school-age handicapped children in Mississippi, alleging that state officials violated the Education of the Handicapped Act, Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, the Fourteenth Amendment, and 42 U.S.C. § 1983 in administering special education programs. After extensive discovery, the court granted plaintiffs' motion for summary judgment in 1977, and in 1979 approved a comprehensive consent decree resolving all claims except attorneys' fees. Plaintiffs then moved for interim attorneys' fees and expenses under 42 U.S.C. § 1988 as the prevailing party. The court awarded a total of $165,263.39 after applying the Johnson v. Georgia Highway Express factors, local billing standards, and reviewing itemized time records and expenses, finding the amounts reasonable and necessarily incurred.
In Cantrell v. Vickers, a public school teacher sued the Starkville Municipal Separate School District after her dismissal, seeking reinstatement and damages under federal civil rights law. The court had previously granted a preliminary injunction and, after a three-day trial, made it permanent while awarding the plaintiff $2,500 in compensatory damages plus costs. The present decision addresses the plaintiff's motion for attorney's fees under 42 U.S.C. § 1988. Applying the twelve Johnson factors from the Fifth Circuit, the court found some duplication of effort and excessive time charges, then awarded reduced fees totaling $11,578.75 to the three attorneys involved along with $2,482.34 in approved out-of-pocket expenses.
In this case, plaintiffs who had prevailed in a civil rights lawsuit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, obtaining injunctive relief for alleged violations of First and Fourteenth Amendment rights, sought an award of attorney's fees and litigation expenses under 42 U.S.C. § 1988. The court found the plaintiffs were prevailing parties entitled to fees with no special circumstances barring recovery and applied the Johnson v. Georgia Highway Express factors to determine a reasonable fee amount. It reduced the total claimed hours from 832.5 to 750 to account for duplication of effort among counsel and the use of estimates rather than actual records, set an hourly rate of $75 for lead counsel, and approved certain documented expenses while disallowing others such as undocumented research costs. The decision awarded specific sums for fees and expenses based on these calculations.
In Thompson v. F. W. Woolworth Co., a Tennessee resident sued the seller and two out-of-state manufacturers in Mississippi federal court after sustaining injuries in Tennessee when a shotgun fell from a gun rack in his vehicle and discharged. The manufacturers moved to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction, arguing that Mississippi’s long-arm statute did not authorize service on non-resident defendants in a case with no connection to Mississippi. The court granted the motions, holding that the statute permits non-residents to invoke it only when the tort occurs in whole or in part within the state; prior case law and the 1980 amendment confirmed that the statute does not extend jurisdiction over foreign corporations merely doing unrelated business in Mississippi for out-of-state claims.
The case involved a lawsuit by plaintiff Wildmon against Hustler Magazine and others for libel, slander, and invasion of privacy based on an article published in the November 1978 issue of Hustler. The defendants moved for summary judgment, arguing the claim was barred by Mississippi's one-year statute of limitations for such actions. The court granted the motion, holding that under the single publication rule adopted by Mississippi courts, the limitations period began to run from the date of first publication no later than October 5, 1978, making the October 9, 1979 filing untimely.
This case is a wrongful death action brought by the son of a pedestrian struck and killed by the defendant's pickup truck in Mississippi, seeking damages for the decedent's children and widow under the state's wrongful death statute. The court found that the defendant was negligent for dimming his headlights unnecessarily, which reduced visibility, and for failing to maintain proper control and lookout to avoid the collision. It also determined that the decedent was negligent by walking in the center of an unlit, wet road while intoxicated and failing to yield the right-of-way. Because the parties were equally at fault, the court applied Mississippi's contributory negligence rule to reduce the total damages by 50 percent. The awarded amount, covering lost life value, pain and suffering, medical and funeral expenses, and loss of companionship, was halved to $22,742.73.