Madrid

We must decide whether the attorney’s fee-limitations provisions of the Prison Litigation Reform Act of 1995 apply to cases which were pending at the time of its enactment.

I

This case arose as a prisoner civil-rights class action challenging the conditions of confinement at the Pelican Bay State Prison in California. Plaintiffs-Appellees Madrid and others (“prisoners”) alleged a multitude of constitutional violations, including a pattern and practice of excessive force against them, provision of inadequate medical and psychiatric care, and failure to maintain humane housing conditions. After a three-month trial, the district court verified many of the prisoners’ complaints. Finding numerous constitutional infirmities, and concluding that Defendants-Appellants California Department of Corrections Director Gomez and others (“prison officials”) would not rectify these problems on their own, the court ordered the parties to collaborate in developing and implementing a remedial plan.

Anticipating that the district court would also order the prison officials to pay the prisoners’ legal expenses during the remedial phase — and seeking to minimize the procedural burdens associated…