Harvey lawyers bill the city

Newport Beach city officials were offered a $1.25 million settlement to not take police Sgt. Neil Harvey’s discrimination civil suit to trial. Because they didn’t, and lost with the jury, they could be paying up to $3.3 million instead.

In a motion scheduled to be argued before Judge Peter Polos on May 14, Harvey’s attorneys are requesting that the city pay them $2.14 million in attorneys’ fees, on top of the $1.2 million the jury awarded Harvey.

In March, a jury found that Newport Beach police discriminated against Harvey, a 27-year veteran, by not promoting him to lieutenant as retaliation and based on false rumors that he was gay.

The motion for attorneys’ fees, filed last week, lists the thousands of hours Harvey attorneys Lawrence Lennemann and Jack Girardi spent on interviews, filing motions and preparing for court before and since Harvey’s suit was filed in April 2007.

In a Dec. 7, 2007, letter sent to Jim McDonald of Fisher & Phillips LLP, the firm representing Newport Beach in the suit, Lennemann laid out the crux of Harvey’s case and declared that he could see his client winning up to $5 million.

“However, please be advised that, at this time, Sgt. Harvey would be willing to resolve this matter for a single lump-sum payment of $1.25 million,” he concluded in the four-page letter. He gave the city two weeks, until noon Dec. 27, to consider the offer before it expired.

In a two-sentence response, McDonald wrote Jan. 25, 2008, more than six weeks after the offer had expired, “The Newport Beach City Council has reviewed your settlement proposal and rejected it. Although I appreciate your initiative in raising the issue of a possible resolution, your demand of $1.25 million is highly unrealistic and makes the prospect of any reasonable resolution of this case doubtful.”

McDonald was unavailable for comment.

In the motion, Lennemann and Girardi argue that traditionally, the victor in a civil suit also has attorneys’ fees covered, and the hours they spent multiplied by their hourly rates equals $1,070,715. Take that number, then double it under what the law calls a “multiplier.”

According to the motion, awarding more money to attorneys to cover hourly fees gives them an incentive to take on risky but worthwhile cases where plaintiffs may otherwise not be able to afford them.

Reporter JOSEPH SERNA may be reached at (714) 966-4619 or at joseph.serna@latimes.com.