Stollings v. Ryobi Technologies, Inc. et al

Filing 400

MEMORANDUM Opinion and Order Written by the Honorable Gary Feinerman on 7/22/2013.Mailed notice.(jlj)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS
EASTERN DIVISION
BRANDON STOLLINGS,
Plaintiff,
vs.
RYOBI TECHNOLOGIES, INC., ONE WORLD
TECHNOLOGIES, INC., and HOME DEPOT U.S.A,
INC.,
Defendant.

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08 C 4006
Judge Feinerman

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER
Brandon Stollings was injured while operating a table saw and sued Ryobi
Technologies, Inc., One World Technologies, Inc., and Home Depot USA, Inc., which were
involved in the saw’s manufacture, distribution, and sale. The court denied Defendants’
summary judgment motion, 2011 WL 211008 (N.D. Ill. Jan. 21, 2011), and the case was tried to
a jury. Stollings dismissed his claims against Home Depot during trial, the jury returned a
verdict in favor of Ryobi and One World (together, “Ryobi”), and the court entered judgment
consistent with the verdict. Docs. 337-339, 349.
Ryobi seeks $54,671.53 in costs pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 54(d)(1) and
28 U.S.C. § 1920. Doc. 355; Doc. 366 at 7. Stollings objects to the requested costs on several
grounds, including that he is indigent. Doc. 362. Given Stollings’s assertion of indigency, the
court requested a memorandum from Stollings indicating whether he or his lawyers are
responsible for paying any cost award. Doc. 373. Stollings submitted the memorandum and his
retention agreement. Doc. 374. The retention agreement does not provide that Stollings’s
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counsel shall pay a cost award in the event costs are awarded against him, which means that the
legal obligation to pay any cost award remains with Stollings. Cf. Leahy v. Edmonds Sch. Dist.,
2009 WL 529577, at *5 (W.D. Wash. Mar. 2, 2009) (“Defendants indicate that costs are
justifiable in this case pursuant to both 28 U.S.C. § 1920 and 28 U.S.C. § 1927. The former is
the more commonly used statute to justify the imposition of costs and is borne by the client,
whereas the latter statute is reserved for situations where ‘[a]ny attorney … who so multiplies
the proceedings in any case unreasonably and vexatiously’ will be personally responsible for
costs.”) (quoting 28 U.S.C. § 1927) (alterations in original), citing In re TCI Ltd., 769 F.2d 441,
445 (7th Cir. 1985) (noting that § 1927 “permits a court to transfer any award of fees from a
client to the offending lawyer”).
Recoverable costs include (1) “[f]ees of the clerk and marshal”; (2) fees for transcripts
“necessarily obtained for use in the case”; (3) “[f]ees and disbursements for printing and
witnesses”; (4) “[f]ees for exemplification and the costs of making copies of any materials where
the copies are necessarily obtained for use in the case”; (5) docket fees; and (6) “[c]ompensation
of court appointed experts, compensation of interpreters, and salaries, fees, expenses, and costs
of special interpretation services.” 28 U.S.C. § 1920. “Although a district court has discretion
when awarding costs, the discretion is narrowly confined because of the strong presumption
created by Rule 54(d)(1) that the prevailing party will recover costs.” Contreras v. City of
Chicago, 119 F.3d 1286, 1295 (7th Cir. 1997) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted).
Stollings concedes that Ryobi is the prevailing party, but raises several objections to its bill of
costs. It is necessary to consider only one of Stollings’s objections—that he is indigent and
therefore should not be subjected to a cost award.
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“Since 1983, [the Seventh Circuit] has held that it is within the discretion of the district
court to consider a plaintiff’s indigency in denying costs under Rule 54(d).” Rivera v. City of
Chicago, 469 F.3d 631, 634 (7th Cir. 2006) (internal quotation marks omitted). Rivera directs
district courts to undertake a two-step analysis when presented with a claim of indigency:
First, the district court must make a threshold factual finding that the losing
party is incapable of paying the court-imposed costs at this time or in the
future. The burden is on the losing party to provide the district court with
sufficient documentation to support such a finding. This documentation
should include evidence in the form of an affidavit or other documentary
evidence of both income and assets, as well as a schedule of expenses.
Requiring a non-prevailing party to provide information about both
income/assets and expenses will ensure that district courts have clear proof
of the non-prevailing party’s dire financial circumstances. Moreover, it will
limit any incentive for litigants of modest means to portray themselves as
indigent.
Second, the district court should consider the amount of costs, the good
faith of the losing party, and the closeness and difficulty of the issues raised
by a case when using its discretion to deny costs. No one factor is
determinative, but the district court should provide an explanation for its
decision to award or deny costs.
Id. at 635-36 (citations and internal quotation marks omitted).
Stollings has satisfied the first step by showing via competent evidence—a declaration
executed by Stollings himself, Doc. 362-1—that he “is incapable of paying the court-imposed
costs at this time or in the future.” Rivera, 469 F.3d at 635 (internal quotation marks omitted).
The injury that led to this lawsuit, the severing of two of Stollings’s fingers by the Ryobi saw,
has left him unable to perform carpentry or other contracting work. Stollings has found work at
a factory, where he earns eleven dollars per hour, which results in take-home pay of about
$1,350 per month. His documented and modest monthly expenses of $1,540 exceed his takehome pay; he has no college education, no assets, no bank account or savings, no retirement
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plan, and outstanding debts of $4,000; and his car was repossessed in February 2012. Stollings’s
injuries make it unlikely that his earning capacity will improve in the future. On this record, the
court finds that Stollings is unable to pay the cost award now and will be unable to do so in the
future. See King v. Schieferdecker, 2011 WL 5325645 (C.D. Ill. Nov. 4, 2011) (finding that the
plaintiff was incapable of paying the cost award of approximately $1,150).
Stollings has satisfied the second Rivera step as well. The costs sought by Ryobi are
enormous, over $54,000. Stollings pursued this case in good faith; he sustained a serious injury,
and his defective design claim survived summary judgment. And although the evidence at trial
amply supported the jury’s verdict for Ryobi—among other considerations, Stollings never read
the instructions that came with the saw, the technology that Stollings says Ryobi should have
incorporated into the saw would have dramatically increased the saw’s price, and the principal
expert presented by Stollings’s attorneys had a patently obvious economic incentive to testify
that the saw was defectively designed (or so the jury could find)—a verdict for Stollings likely
would have survived a defense motion under Rule 50 for judgment as a matter of law.
For these reasons, the court denies Ryobi’s request for costs.

July 22, 2013
United States District Judge

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