Sandoval v. Apfel’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

1 federal appellate · 1 district ·

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 13 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “''[A] court shall award to a prevailing party other than the United States fees and other expenses, in addition to any costs awarded pursuant to subsection (a), incurred by that party in any civil action (other than cases sounding in tort), including proceedings for judicial review of agency action, brought by or against the United States in any court having jurisdiction of that action, unless the court finds that the position of the United States was substantially justified or that special circumstances make an award unjust.””

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Murkeldove v. Astrue · 454 F. Supp. 2d 631 - Chargois v. Barnhart

2. “Moreover, the Commissioner’s objections [to the request for fees performed by non-admitted contract attorneys] are questionable when carefully analyzed in the context of an EAJA fee application. He concedes that Bohr is a specialist in social security appeals. Given the comparatively modest cap on EAJA fees— which means that specialists cannot bill at significantly higher rates than might be expected of non-specialists — it would appear to be in the government’s interest for disability claimants to be represented by persons whose experience and expertise permits them to complete necessary legal services in less time than might otherwise be required. When evaluating potentially time intensive pro cesses such as research and brief writing — compared, for example, to administrative functions — it is often difficult to say that an attorney should have expended fewer hours than he did or to quantify the part that is excessive. When services are performed by a specialist, the person’s professional expertise can serve as a de facto governor against excessive fees. And it should matter little to the Commissioner whether Weisbrod performed a service himself or delegated it to Bohr, provided that Weisbrod and Bohr in fact performed the services for which fees are claimed, that they did not engage in wasteful duplication, and that Bohr’s time expenditures were reasonable.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Priestley v. Astrue