Court To Weigh Payment of Legal Fees in Rights Cases

By Mark Walsh

WASHINGTON--The U.S. Supreme Court last week agreed to decide whether attorneys' fees should be awarded to the plaintiffs in civil-rights lawsuits when they win only nominal damages.

The question could be significant for school districts because escalating legal fees are often more of a financial threat than the actual damages that districts might lose in such cases, legal experts said last week.

"The threat of [paying] attorneys' fees is often what schools' litigation strategy is based on,'' said Gwendolyn H. Gregory, the deputy general counsel of the...