Chavez v. Netflix, Inc

In Chavez v. Netflix, Inc. (2008) 162 Cal.App.4th 43, the trial court used percentages of the recovery that a hypothetical enhanced fee would represent to establish a benchmark for determining the enhanced lodestar amount. The Court found no error or abuse of discretion in the court's methodology and held that an attorney fee award of 27.9 percent of the class benefit awarded was "not out of line with class action fee awards calculated using the percentage-of-the-benefit method: 'Empirical studies show that, regardless whether the percentage method or the lodestar method is used, fee awards in class actions average around one-third of the recovery.' ." (Id. at p. 66, fn. 11.)