C.W. Ex Rel. K.S. v. Capistrano Unified School District

Opinion by Judge WARDLAW; Partial Concurrence and Partial Dissent by Judge REINHARDT.

ORDER

The opinion filed on March 2, 2015 [ 779 F.3d 956 ] is hereby amended, and an amended opinion is filed concurrently with this order.

With that amendment, Judges Wardlaw and Callahan have voted. to deny, and Judge Reinhardt has voted to grant, appellants’ petition for rehearing. The panel has voted to reject the suggestion for rehearing en banc.

The full court has been advised of the suggestion for rehearing en banc and no active judge has requested a vote on whether to rehear the matter en banc. Fed. R. App. P. 35.

Thus, the petition for rehearing is denied and the suggestion for rehearing en banc is rejected. No further petitions for rehearing or for rehearing en banc will be entertained. The mandate shall issue forthwith.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

OPINION

C.W. appeals the district court’s award of attorney’s fees and costs to Capistrano Unified School District, (“the District”), as the prevailing defendant in an action alleging violations of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (“IDEA”). In addition to the IDEA claims, attorneys for C.W. also claimed violations of the Americans…

concurring in part and dissenting in part:

This case is about a mother who engaged in IDEA litigation principally to secure an independent educational evaluation for occupational therapy for her child, who indisputably has special education needs. In the course of litigating her IDEA claim, the mother alleged that her child’s school district violated not only the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), but also the Rehabilitation Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), and § 1983 by improperly threatening to seek sanctions against her and her counsel if they appealed the administrative denial of the child’s IDEA claims.

At the conclusion of the mother’s unsuccessful attempt to obtain an independent educational evaluation in the district court, the district judge of his own accord invited the school district to file a motion for attorney’s fees. The district judge — expressing a “degree of frustration” with the child’s mother and her counsel, Maj. Op. at 1249 • — then awarded the school district nearly $100,000 in fees and costs, finding not only that each of the mother’s claims was frivolous, but that they were brought for improper purposes — “namely, to…

FOR PUBLICATION

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

C. W., a minor, by her Mother, K.S., No. 12-57315 Guardian Ad Litem; K.S., Guardian Ad Litem, D.C. No. Plaintiffs-Appellants, 8:11-cv-01157-

DOC-RNB

v.

CAPISTRANO UNIFIED SCHOOL OPINION

DISTRICT,

Defendant-Appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of California David O. Carter, District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted August 5, 2014—Pasadena, California

Filed March 2, 2015

Before: Stephen Reinhardt, Kim McLane Wardlaw, and Consuelo M. Callahan, Circuit Judges.

Opinion by Judge Wardlaw; Partial Concurrence and Partial Dissent by Judge Reinhardt SUMMARY*

Attorney’s Fees

The panel affirmed in part and reversed in part the district court’s award of attorney’s fees and costs to Capistrano Unified School District as the prevailing defendant in an action alleging violations of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, and 42 U.S.C. § 1983.

The panel agreed with the district court that the ADA…