LTC Management Services, LLC. et al v. Steele et al

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF MISSOURI
WESTERN DIVISION
LTC MANAGEMENT SERVICES, LLC, and 	)
HEALTH SYSTEMS, INC., 	)
)
Plaintiffs, 	)
)
vs. 	) 	Case No. 	4:25-00926-CV-DGK
)
JONATHAN STEELE, 	)
STEELE LAW FIRM, LLC, 	)
STEELE LAW FIRM II, LLC, 	)
STEELE CHAFFEE, LLC, 	)
MICHELLE WHITE, 	)
STEPHANIE ALEXANDER, 	)
)
Defendants. 	)
ORDER SETTING AMOUNT OF ATTORNEYS’ FEES
This case arises from Plaintiffs’ allegations that Defendants maliciously prosecuted a
nursing home negligence action against them by utilizing false affidavits and fabricating trial
exhibits. 	Defendants deny the allegations.
Plaintiffs filed suit in the Circuit Court of Jackson County, Missouri. 	Defendants Jonathan
Steele, the Steele Law Firm, LLC, Steele Law Firm II, LLC, and Steele Chaffee, LLC (collectively
“the Steele Defendants”) removed to federal court by invoking the Court’s diversity jurisdiction.
On April 23, 2026, the Court granted Plaintiffs’ motion to remand and awarded Plaintiffs their fees
and costs pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1447(c) after holding Defendants lacked an objectively
reasonable basis for removal.
Now before the Court is Plaintiffs’ Fee Application. 	ECF No. 37. 	Plaintiffs are
requesting a fee award of $33,770.00. 	Defendants object to this amount, arguing it is egregious
for the work performed. 	For the reasons discussed below, the application is GRANTED IN
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PART. 	The Court awards $11,550 in attorneys’ fees and expenses.
Standard
With respect to determining a reasonable award of attorneys’ fees, the starting point is the
lodestar calculation, which is calculated by multiplying a reasonable hourly rate by the number of
hours reasonably expended. 	Hensley v. Eckerhart, 461 U.S. 424, 433 (1983). 	In making this
calculation, the Court also considers (1) the time and labor required; (2) the novelty and difficulty
of the questions presented in the case; (3) the skill requisite to perform the legal service properly;
(4) the preclusion of employment by the attorney due to acceptance of the case; (5) the customary
fee; (6) whether the fee is fixed or contingent; (7) time limitations imposed by the client or the
circumstances; (8) the amount involved and the results obtained; (9) the experience, reputation,
and ability of the attorneys; (10) the “undesirability” of the case; (11) the nature and length of the
professional relationship with the client; and (12) awards in similar cases. 	Id. at 343 n.3. 	There
is a strong presumption that the lodestar calculation represents a reasonable fee award. 	City of
Burlington v. Dague, 505 U.S. 557, 562 (1992).
Discussion
As for the lodestar, Plaintiffs’ counsel Douglas Carter argues the reasonable hourly rate for
his work on the motion to remand is $800 an hour.1 	He contends this rate is regularly paid by
several fee-paying clients, courts have approved this rate in other fee-shifting cases he has had, the
prevailing market rate for attorneys of his “experience and standing” is $800 an hour, affidavits
from other attorneys attest this rate is reasonable, and billing rates reported by Missouri Lawyers
Media document a range extending to over $1,100 an hour for legal work in Missouri. 	Plaintiffs’
1 They also seek $150 an hour for paralegal work. 	The Steele Defendants do not object to the requested hourly rate
for the paralegal’s time.
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counsel also argues the total amount of time spent on the motion and related fee application, 47.9
hours,2 is reasonable.
The Steele Defendants argue the relevant factors weigh in favor of an hourly rate of no
more than $300–400 per hour. 	They also intimate that the total time spent on the matter is high;
they note Plaintiff’s counsel is essentially claiming his office spent an entire week briefing a
motion to remand.
Applying the above twelve factors to the present case, the Court rules as follows.
As for the first factor, the time and labor required, Plaintiffs’ counsel wrote two briefs and
a fee application, but there was no hearing or oral argument. 	This did not, or should not, require
an inordinate amount of time or labor. 	As for the second and third factors, the novelty or difficulty
of the questions presented and the skill required, this was not a complex matter. 	A competent
second-year associate should have been able to handle this matter. 	Hence the Court finds a
reasonable amount of time for Plaintiffs’ counsel to spend on this matter was 35 hours.
As for the fourth and seventh factors, the Court finds there was no preclusion of other
employment by Plaintiffs’ counsel due to filing this motion, nor were there time limitations
imposed by the client or the circumstances. 	The fact that his office was able to spend almost
forty-eight hours on this matter indicates the office was not declining meritorious cases because of
the attention required to litigate this one, or that the circumstances imposed time limitations on
him or otherwise complicated this work.
The fifth factor, what a reasonable fee customarily charged would be, also weighs against
the amount requested by Plaintiffs. 	Based on the Court’s extensive experience reviewing attorney
2 Plaintiffs report Mr. Carter spent forty hours (40.1 hours) on the motion to remand and fee application, and his
paralegal spent seven hours on the same.
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bills and fee applications, the Court finds a reasonable rate to litigate this matter would be between
$250–350 per hour with the total bill expected to be around $10,000.
Turning to the sixth factor, this case appears to have been taken on a contingency fee basis.
This factor weighs little in the analysis, however, because the fee award here does not cover an
entire case, just a motion to remand. 	Further, there was little risk undertaken by Plaintiffs’ counsel
in filing the motion. 	The merits weighed heavily in Plaintiffs’ favor from the beginning; there
was binding Eighth Circuit caselaw precluding the Steele Defendants’ theory of removal, which is
why the Court is awarding Plaintiffs their reasonable attorneys’ fees under 28 U.S.C. § 1447(c).
With respect to the eighth factor, the amount of money involved and the results obtained,
the amount of money involved in the litigation appears fairly high, and the result here—remand to
state court—was what Plaintiffs sought, although an expected one since controlling Eighth Circuit
caselaw dictated the outcome.
The ninth factor, the experience, reputation, and ability of the attorneys, is the most
contested one. 	At the outset, the Court notes it is weighing this factor in the context of the motion
at hand, a motion to remand where existing controlling caselaw dictated the result. 	The motion
required competency, nothing more. 	Assuming for the sake of argument Plaintiffs’ counsel is, as
he suggests, a gifted and experienced trial attorney, the motion at issue did not require exercising
these talents, and the Court declines to approve a premium hourly rate for routine work which
could reasonably be expected to be performed at a much lower rate.
The Court is unmoved by Plaintiffs’ counsel’s arguments in favor of an $800 hourly rate.
Although his affidavit asserts this rate is regularly paid by his hourly-paying clients, the Court
gives this affidavit little weight because it is fatally short on crucial details. 	The affidavit does
not specify how many clients pay this rate, what kind of clients they are (out-of-state market
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Fortune 500 companies who do not blink at paying such rates?), for what kinds of services these
clients pay $800 an hour (expert testimony? trial work in complex, bet-the-company litigation?),
and whether there are other caveats or restrictions on the amount charged, such as an overall cap
on the bill, which would render the $800 an hour rate illusory.
Plaintiffs’ counsel’s observation that other judges have approved an $800 an hour rate for
his work is also unconvincing. 	The fee award in this case is limited to a straightforward motion
to remand which Plaintiffs’ counsel likely would have made regardless of whether there was a
statutory attorneys’ fees provision available or not. 	On the other hand, the fee awards in the cases
cited by Plaintiffs’ counsel are for entire cases undertaken on a contingency fee basis and settled
or tried to a large jury verdict. 	These cases involved different, more complex legal issues, the
litigation 	was 	protracted, 	and 	the 	litigation 	involved 	a 	significant 	risk 	of 	non-recovery.
Consequently, these cases are not sufficiently analogous to provide a useful guide for an hourly
rate applicable here.
The affidavits submitted by other attorneys in support of Plaintiffs’ counsel’s request are
even less persuasive. 	Most of the affiants appear to have had co-counsel relationships with
Plaintiffs’ counsel and/or perform plaintiff’s-side contingency fee work almost exclusively and
who no doubt would like a court to approve an $800 an hour rate in their cases. 	So, it is hardly
surprising that they would opine a rate of $800 an hour is reasonable in this case.
The Court is also unmoved by Plaintiffs’ counsel’s citation to market survey data published
in Missouri Lawyers Media. 	This survey—a combination of self-reported rates and a small
number of decisions about court-approved attorneys’ fees in reported cases—is not the product of
reliable methodologies. 	While Missouri Layers Media doubtlessly strove to make its article as
accurate as possible, it suffers from its inherent limitations.
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Finally, the Court is not swayed by Plaintiffs’ counsel’s suggestion that the Court should
ignore the rate Defense counsel is charging here—$260 an hour—as an insurance-defense rate
“outlier” that is not a reliable market benchmark. 	While this rate may be on the low end of the
market (and a rate Defense counsel can offer to such clients because they will guarantee a certain
amount of work), this rate is still part of the market. 	And in the Court’s experience, $260 an hour
is much closer to the market average than $800 an hour.
The tenth and eleventh factors, the “undesirability” of the case and the nature and length
of the professional relationship with the client, are not particularly applicable here since the Court
is making a fee award with respect to the motion to remand only. 	Hence, these factors do not
impact the analysis.
Finally, with respect to the twelfth factor—awards in similar cases—Plaintiffs’ counsel
notes that courts in other cases have found between 60 and 233 hours to be a reasonable amount
of time to spend on a motion to remand. 	While this is true, this observation is of limited value
here because there is no indication the motion to remand in any of those cases was analogous to
the one in this case. 	That is, Plaintiffs’ counsel has not shown they are similar cases.
After reviewing the law and the record in this case, the Court finds the amount of time
counsel spent on this case is slightly excessive and the requested hourly rate is very excessive.
For the work performed in this case and in this legal market, the Court finds the lodestar here
should be $300 an hour for the attorney work multiplied by thirty-five hours of attorney time, for
a total of $10,500 in attorneys’ fees. 	The requested amount for paralegal work, seven hours of
work at $150 an hour, is reasonable. 	Thus, the Court awards Plaintiffs a total of $11,550 in
reasonable attorneys’ fees and expenses.
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Conclusion
Plaintiff’s fee application is GRANTED IN PART. 	After reviewing the record and the
law, and informed by the Court’s familiarity with the rates charged in this legal market and
extensive experience in fee awards generally, the Court finds a reasonable award of attorneys’ fees
and expenses in connection with Plaintiffs’ motion to remand is $11,550. 	The Steele Defendants
shall pay this amount within twenty-one days of the date of this order.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
Date: 	June 4, 2026 	/s/ Greg Kays
GREG KAYS, JUDGE
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
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