Domegan v. Ponte’s Empirical Analysis
972 F.2d 401 · 1992
Citation profile
29 federal appellate · 12 district · 1 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 49 later decisions (1 by the Supreme Court) — most recently December 2016 · most notably Farrar v. Hobby (1992), Lipsett v. Blanco (1992)
29 federal appellate · 12 district · 1 state decisions
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Relationships
Applies 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (Civil Rights Act of 1871 / Section 1983 (Ku Klux Klan Act)) · 42 U.S.C. § 1988
Relies on Hensley v. Eckerhart · Kentucky v. Graham · Blum v. Stenson · Carey v. Piphus · O'Shea v. Littleton
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 49 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“The legislative history ... indicates that the term “prevailing party” in the amendment has the same meaning as similar terms in other legislation.... By analogy, under 42 U.S.C. § 1988 , a prevailing party is one who “ ‘succeeds on any significant issue which achieves some of the benefits plaintiffs sought in bringing the suit’ ”.... The definition of a prevailing party is “ ‘a generous formulation that brings the plaintiff only across the statutory threshold.’” ... The Supreme Court stated that, at a minimum, to be considered a prevailing party for purposes of fee awards, “a plaintiff must be able to point to a resolution of the dispute which changes the legal relationship between itself and the defendant.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“Texas Teachers and its precursors are not prologue to the quantitative “prevailing party” test advocated by appellants. Instead, differences in the degree of success achieved are reflected in- the amount awarded; whereas differences in kind, as suggested by the Court's articulation of the residual de minimis success standard ("significance," "materiality"), require qualitative assessments pertaining principally to the claimant's eligibility for a fee award.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“In this circuit, “special circumstances” warranting a denial of attorneys’ fees under § 1988 ... exist where the fee application reflects “(1) no ‘good faith’ effort to exclude excessive, redundant, or otherwise unnecessary hours, (2) no reduction for time spent on unsuccessful claims, and (3) no allowance for the limited degree of success’ achieved by the plaintiff.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.