Attorney’s request for fees for defendant’s appeal of his plea-based conviction; Whether the requested fees were excessive or unreasonable; In re Ujlaky Attorney Fees; In re Attorney Fees of Jamnik; The trial court’s reliance on the Smith v Khouri factors; Pirgu v United Servs Auto Ass’n; Michigan Appellate Assigned Counsel System (MAACS)

Holding that the trial court abused its discretion in ruling that the $1,725 requested attorney fees for defendant’s plea-based appeal were excessive or unreasonable, the court reversed the order denying appellant-attorney’s request for fees, and remanded. Appellant successfully moved to withdraw “defendant’s plea on the basis that defendant was ‘misled into believing that he would receive jail credit.’” The trial court also granted “appellant’s request to give defendant a 21-day” period to reconsider his motion. It later entered an order leaving the plea intact based on defendant’s letter to the trial court stating he no longer wished to withdraw his plea. Appellant “submitted a MAACS voucher detailing an itemized bill of services, totaling 23 hours.” The trial court approved payment of $1,125 in attorney fees. While the trial court provided “some justification for the attorney fee award, it did not consider ‘the reasonableness of the fee’ in relation to the ‘actual services rendered, as itemized by the appellant’” as called for in Ujlaky. Instead, it appeared to simply conclude “that the case could have been handled in 15 hours. Although the court indicated that 15 hours was the ‘standard maximum fee’ for a plea-based appeal as established by MAACS, that reasoning alone is insufficient to establish that the requested fees for services rendered beyond 15 hours were unreasonable.” The court noted that, pursuant to Jamnik, the “trial court could not ‘simply deny’ eight of the claimed hours.” In addition, it could not simply “characterize the claimed amount as ‘unreasonable’ with no explanation as to why the services performed by appellant were unreasonable.” The court found that, in light of “the lack of justification” provided, it was left to wonder what services he performed “and specifically delineated on his bill were unwarranted.” The court noted that it did “not mean to suggest that the trial court must accept appellant’s claimed hours at face value. If” it determines on remand “that the amount of time spent on services was unreasonable, it must state, with specificity, those services which it finds unreasonable and articulate a basis for that conclusion.” Absent this analysis, the court could not say that its “attorney-fee award was a principled outcome.” Extensive analysis is not required but the trial court “must indicate how the claimed hours are being adjusted.”