Posted on 07/04/2014 6:17:12 AM PDT by rellimpank
Gun-rights advocates have delivered a one-two punch to the city of Chicago.
The first blow came on Jan. 6 when a federal judge ruled the city’s longtime ban on gun stores was unconstitutional.
On Thursday, the second blow landed when the judge approved $940,000 in legal fees that the city must pay to the attorneys who challenged the ban. Charles J. Cooper, one of those plaintiffs’ attorneys, charged $975 an hour for his work.
Cooper, whose law firm Cooper & Kirk is based in Washington, is also looking for a big payout from the state. He submitted a $618,000 bill for work he and other plaintiffs’ attorneys performed in a gun-rights lawsuit against Attorney General Lisa Madigan.
But Madigan is fighting the bill, calling the fees “excessive” and “inflated” and arguing that he didn’t even win the case.
The lawsuit against Chicago was filed in 2010 by an Illinois offshoot of the National Shooting Sports Foundation. The plaintiffs included three Chicago residents who own guns.
(Excerpt) Read more at politics.suntimes.com ...
/johnny
The city and state should be made to pay heavily for their hysterical indulgence into oppressive attempts to nullify basic rights affirmed in the Bill of Rights.
They should be made to pay until it hurts so badly, the constituents who elect these rabid dogs are forced to vote them out of power.
Good. It should come out of the pocket of Rahm Emmanuel PERSONALLY.
That’s a drop in the bucket compared to the cost of graft by the city government to the Chicago taxpayer.
As much as I appreciate the work done by these lawyers, No Lawyer is worth $975 an hour. Especially in a profession where 30 minutes of actual work is generally billed out as an hour.
These are tax dollars going to these guys and although I relish in the idea that the City of Chicago is getting reamed for their stupidity and tyranny, ultimately it is the taxpayer that is the one who takes it on the chin.
If this money was coming out of the pockets of Rahm Emmanuel and his gang of Nazis, then I could care less, but when it is paid by the taxpayers, eventually that loss trickles down to all of us.
I expect this money will just be some of the “stimulus” trillions. The money was created out of thin air, so it is a tax on everyone holding dollars everywhere in the world.
A lawyer that sells you out can get pretty damn expensive too.
I was in the trenches as a courthouse rat for many years. Appellate practice is a small sub-specialty that is relatively rare (and generally needs to be supported by a large firm) and the top sub-specialists like Cooper & Kirk demand top dollar because they win big cases, and win them decisively.
Judges do not award attorney's fees as a matter of routine - only when permitted by statute and only when the losing party has clearly persisted in a real loser of a case. The amount will probably be trimmed somewhat - but not much. And padding the hours, while engaged in by some, is frowned on at this level (especially with opposing counsel ready to flyspeck every tenth of an hour).
When the denizens of Chitown get tired of paying through the nose, they'll have to throw the bums out. Or move.
Lisa Madigan just happens to be the daughter of the Dem Spaeker of the IL House, Michael Madigan, arguably the most powerful man in Illinois. Quite coincidentally Lisa Madigan hasn’t managed to find and prosecute a single case of public corruption in nearly 8 years as Attorney General. Not one.
L
There are no shortage of lawyers in any field in this country. The unemployment line for new associates would likely spread out from California to the New York Islands.
Why would the City of Chicago give a rats? If they need more money, they’ll demand more from the taxpayers. They’re just blood bags to be fed from by the so proclaimed gods ruling them. And if they blood bags don’t like it, the government gods will just SWAT team them...and the best part is, they get to pay for that as well.
All part of the whimsy of tyranny. Laugh it up.
The representatives of government that pass these policies and file these lawsuits to advance their leftist agendas do so with money that is not theirs and with no fear of repercussions as they will not be held personally accountable. Nothing to lose, and power to gain...What a country!
Unfortunately they will just raise taxes to cover this bill and pass a new ban on gun stores.
“I expect this money will just be some of the “stimulus” trillions.”
Better still, they can borrow it from Broke Hillary!
Bite me, Rahm! Oh, and pay up.
What we are talking about here is the top-flight ranks of litigators. There are not a whole lot of them, and usually you have to hire an appellate litigator because they are the only lawyers with extensive Constitutional law experience (as opposed to our mythical "Constitutional law professor" president). Your average practitioner may go 20 years without ever seeing a Constitutional case. I actually had two, won them both < bows > but that is a rarity.
To put it in non-legal terms, if you have a major corporation that is bleeding dollars and close to bankruptcy, you have to call in a respected CEO who is experienced in the specialty area of turnaround work. The fact that there are thousands and thousands of garden-variety corporate administrators and regional vice presidents is irrelevant because they don't have the skills for the job.
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