A federal judge says the appeals backlog is not "egregious."

Plaintiffs attorneys in a $4.1 million negligence case can keep most of the $1.3 million in legal fees granted by a lower court as “reasonable” reimbursement, an Illinois panel has ruled.

The decision hinged on whether lawyers suing Clare Oaks’ nursing home for negligence and wrongful death on behalf of a former resident’s estate proved their fees were justified.

Under Illinois law, plaintiffs’ attorney in medical malpractice actions can recover fees equal to one-third of damages awarded to their clients. That one-third happened to be the contingency fee set by the attorneys for Susan R. Grauer and Thomas M. Trendel, independent co-executors of the estate of Dolores Trendel.

The executors alleged Dolores Trendel suffered a stroke in 2011, two weeks after she stopped receiving Coumadin for her atrial fibrillation. She died on March 15, 2015.

The $4.1 million in damages awarded in the case made it the largest under the state’s Nursing Home Care Act.

Clare Oaks, which operates Assisi Healthcare Center at Clare Oaks, appealed both the verdict and the awarding of attorneys’ fees, as well as about $150,000 in related costs. The Illinois First District Appellate Court recently upheld both rulings in favor of the estate.

Clare had argued that Trendel’s attorneys only documented time spent on the case afterward and that they should have to prove the time worked through the discovery process. 

In the 3-0 decision issued June 28, Presiding Justice Fitzgerald Smith disagreed, adding that contemporaneous record keeping was only one factor courts could consider in establishing rightful payment. 

“A trial court is permitted to use its own knowledge and experience to assess the time required to complete particular activities involved in a case,” Smith noted. “The trial court can also rely on its own observation of the progression of the case and the work involved on the part of the attorneys seeking fees.”

Attorneys for the nursing home argued the Nursing Home Care Act was confusing in its attempts to define how lawyer fees and costs should be calculated. 

In one respect, the court agreed.

It found that because damages were paid under both wrongful death and Nursing Home Compare claims, the lower court had to revise downward the total amount to remove the wrongful death damages. The one-third fee should only be based on Nursing Home Care-related damages.