Alflex Corporation v. Underwriters Laboratories, Inc.

The district court granted summary judgment in favor of respondent Underwriters Laboratories (UL) in a suit brought by appellant Alflex Corporation (Alflex). We affirmed the summary judgment in an unpublished disposition.

In this appeal, Alflex challenges the district court’s award of costs to UL for the expenses UL incurred in obtaining a copy of the transcript of each deposition taken by Alflex and in hiring private process servers to serve deposition subpoenas. Alflex contends that these items are not properly taxable as costs in light of the Supreme Court’s decision in Crawford Fitting Co. v. J.T. Gibbons, Inc., 482 U.S. 437 , 107 S.Ct. 2494 , 96 L.Ed.2d 385 (1987).

We review the district judge’s award of costs for abuse of discretion. Maxwell v. Hapag-Lloyd Aktiengesellschaft, 862 F.2d 767, 770 (9th Cir.1988). We affirm the district court and hold that the taxing of costs for copies of depositions and private service of process fees was proper.

In Crawford, 482 U.S. 437 , 107 S.Ct. 2494 , 96 L.Ed.2d 385 (1987), the Supreme Court held that courts do not have discretion under Fed.R.Civ.P. 54(d) to tax whatever costs seem appropriate; rather, courts may tax only costs defined…