DISCUSSIONS ON POLITICS, CIVIL RIGHTS, PROPERTY RIGHTS, AND ANYTHING THAT TICKLES OUR FANCY "HOST BOB JOHNSON" CONTACT Us at A_DEMOCRACY@YAHOO.COM Please stay on topic and no personal attacks.
posted by Bob at Tuesday, May 13, 2008
A DEMOCRACY TOWN HALL HOME
Do you have a topic you want to discuss at the Town Hall? Email your request to A_Democracy@yahoo.com
“A DEMOCRACY” Disclaimer- While the administrators and moderators of this forum will attempt to remove or edit any generally objectionable material as quickly as possible, it is impossible to review every message. Therefore you acknowledge that all posts made to this forum express the views and opinions of the author and not the administrators, moderators (except for posts by these people) and hence will not be held liable.
You agree not to post any abusive, obscene, vulgar, slanderous, hateful, threatening, sexually-oriented or any other material that may violate any applicable laws. Doing so may lead to you being immediately and permanently banned
THE ROOF GUYS
Mickey's Diner 1950 7th Street West, St Paul, MN
(651) 698-8387
AX-MAN SURPLUS
1639 University Ave.
St. Paul, MN 55104
Tel:(651)646-8653
LANDLORD.COM LINK HERE
SHHHH! While we listen to words of wisdom from a wise man.
Conscience is the light of the Soul that burns within the chambers of our psychological heart. It is as real as life is. It raises the voice in protest whenever anything is thought of or done contrary to the righteousness. Conscience is a form of truth that has been transferred through our genetic stock in the form of the knowledge of our own acts and feelings as right or wrong. A virtuous and courageous person can alone use the instrument of conscience. He or she can alone hear the inner voice of the soul clearly. In a wicked person this faculty is absent. The sensitive nature of his / her conscience has been destroyed by sin or corruption. Hence he or she is unable to discriminate right from wrong. Those who are leading organizations, business enterprises, institutions and governments should develop this virtue of the ability to use their own conscience. This wisdom of using the clean conscience will enable them to enjoy the freedom.
Dr APJ Kalam, President of India given during the inauguration of the seminar on “THE EFFECTS OF CORRUPTION ON GOOD GOVERNANCE AND HUMAN RIGHTS
31 Comments:
I will be posting this motion in sections.
There maybe copy errors.
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
DISTRICT OF MINNESOTA
Frank J. Steinhauser, III, et al., Civil No. 04-2632
JNE/SRN
Plaintiffs,
v. PLAINTIFFS’ JOINT
OBJECTIONS TO
MAGISTRATE’S ORDER OF
APRIL 23, 2008, AND
AMENDED ORDER OF
MAY 8, 2008
City of St. Paul, et al.,
Defendants.
Sandra Harrilal, et al., Civil No. 05-461
JNE/SRN
Plaintiffs,
v.
Steve Magner, et al.,
Defendants.
Thomas J. Gallagher, et al., Civil No. 05-1348
JNE/SRN
Plaintiffs,
v.
Steve Magner, et al.,
Defendants.
Case 0:04-cv-02632-JNE-SRN Document 229 Filed 05/12/2008 Page 1 of 15
2
TO THE HONORABLE JUDGE ERICKSEN:
NOW COMES Plaintiffs in order to file their Joint Objections to Magistrate Nelson’s
April 23, 2008, Order (04-2632, ECF 220; 05-461, ECF 195; and 05-1348, ECF 188), and
Amended Order of May 8, 2008 (04-2632, ECF 225, 05-461, ECF 199, 05-1348, ECF 192)
pertaining to Plaintiffs’ Renewed Motion for Sanctions (04-2632, ECF 161; 05-461, ECF 138;
05-1348, ECF 132), and to respectfully show the Court:
INTRODUCTION
In Plaintiffs’ Joint Renewed Motion for Sanctions, Plaintiffs’ provided evidence that
during the course of this litigation Defendants destroyed documents relevant to the claims of
Plaintiffs including intentional discrimination, and defenses raised by Defendants, including
immunity defenses, made egregious misrepresentations concerning the destruction and
therefore unavailability of other relevant evidence, and delayed production of evidence and
failed to produce large volumes of other “City documents” relevant to Plaintiffs’ claims.
The Court refused to find that Defendants had acted in “bad faith” (Order at 7-10, 13,
14), determined that Plaintiffs had failed to establish that they had been prejudiced by
Defendants’ destruction of documents, misrepresentations and failures to produce other
documents (Order at 8-11, 13, 14), denied Plaintiffs’ requests for sanctions, including costs
and attorney’s fees related to bringing its motion (Order at 14, 15) and failed to grant
Plaintiffs’ request for an evidentiary hearing (Shoemaker Aff., 3-5-08 ECF 183 – Steinhauser,
para. 90).
Case 0:04-cv-02632-JNE-SRN Document 229 Filed 05/12/2008 Page 2 of 15
3
FACTUAL BACKGROUND TO MOTION FOR SANCTIONS
The Steinhauser, the Harrilal, and the Gallagher cases were filed in May 2004, March
2005 and July 2005, respectively. Defendants failed to place a “litigation hold” on potentially
relevant documents. Order at 2, 3.
Plaintiffs initially moved in June 2007 for sanctions based upon spoliation of relevant
evidence and non-production of relevant evidence. Order at 2. The Court determined that
Plaintiffs had not demonstrated prejudice from Defendants’ conduct and denied the motion.
Order at 3.
Plaintiffs original and renewed motion for sanctions were based on Defendants’
destruction of 15,000-18,000 Truth-In-Sale-of-Housing (“TISH”) housing inspection reports
for 2001-2003 after litigation was commenced, destruction of most of the e-data/e-mails for
the time periods prior to December 2005 (most relevant time period for Plaintiffs’ claims and
Defendants’ claimed immunity defenses was 1999 through 2005), failure to produce City
documents related to the Saint Paul Public Housing Agency (PHA), and failure to produce
certain other City documents including documents related to the City’s Problem Properties
2000 code enforcement initiative. Order at 2.
Case 0:04-cv-02632-JNE-SRN Document 229 Filed 05/12/2008 Page 3 of 15
4
ISSUES
1. The Court made a decision contrary to the law by holding that where a party during the
course of litigation destroys or fails to retain relevant evidence, a finding of intentional -
bad faith destruction is required in order for any sanction to be imposed. Order at 7, 8, 9,
10, 13, 14.
2. The Court made a decision contrary to the law that Plaintiffs’ had a high burden to show
that they were “prejudiced” by Defendants’ destruction or non-retention of relevant
evidence during the course of litigation. Order at 6.
3. The Court made a decision contrary to the law that Plaintiffs had failed to demonstrate
prejudice from Defendants’ overall conduct including destruction and non-retention of
relevant evidence and other abusive litigation tactics. Order at 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14.
4. The Court made a decision contrary to the law in failing to award Plaintiffs’ their costs and
attorney’s fees incurred as a result of Defendants conduct when the Court acknowledged
Plaintiffs may have been harmed. Order at 8, 14.
5. The Court made clearly erroneous determinations of fact concerning Defendants’ failure to
produce City-PHA documents, Defendants’ destruction of TISH housing inspection
reports, and Defendants’ destruction of e-data/e-mails from the time periods relevant to
Plaintiffs’ claims and Defendants claims of immunity.
STANDARD OF REVIEW
The Court must modify or set aside any portion of the Magistrate’s Order found to be
clearly erroneous or contrary to law. Fed.R.Civ.P. 72(a); and Local Rule 72.2(a). At the same
time, however, where, as here, the decision under review does not offer a reasoned
explanation for its decision, and merely adopts one party's arguments in their entirety (as the
Court did here in adopting Defendants’ arguments in their entirety), “it is incumbent on the
Court to check the adopted findings against the record ‘with particular, even painstaking,
care.’ ” Holland v. Island Creek Corp., 885 F. Supp. 4, 6 (D.D.C. 1995), citing Berger v. Iron
Workers Reinforced Rodmen Local 201, 843 F.2d 1395, 1408 (D.C.Cir.1988).
yup,,,,it looks like a crooked court to me!
3:02 PM
yup,,,,it looks like a crooked court to me!
Did you think our court were right all these year.
What is Chuck's outlook on this one?
From what I've seen and heard in the past, I've always thought the judge was going against the weight of the evidence and that's usually the "norm" when the small guy sues the big guy. It should be intresting to see if the appeals court has the same ideas as this judge does.
Cooperative Power Association vs. Danny O. Lundell, et al., unpublished opinion :
" Appellants argue that the District Court Erred in adopting verbatim respondents proposed findings and conclusions.
But a trial courts adoption of proposed findings is not by itself improper so long as those findings are not clearly erroneous " .
Sigurdson vs. Isanti County 408 N.W.2d 654 at 657 review denied.
Jeff Matiatos
Federal cases (courts) uniformly disapprove of a District Courts verbatim reliance of a litigants memorandum of law, or proposed findings of fact as a derilection of the trial courts functions ( Federal Rules of procedure 52.(a) and identical to Minnesota Rules of Civil practice 52.01.
Jeff Matiatos
In these cases, for as long as I have been reading.....which has been years now, I haven't seen anything that supports any findings that benfiet the city of St Paul. What is has looked like is that the city keeps trying to drag it out to run these guys out of money or motivation, and every time they do it, the people suing wind up finding more evidence to use against them. I think the city has dug itself into a hole they're never going to get out of. I would suspect that very soon all the other landlords the city has screwed are going to look up these Attorneys and bring actions against the city for their illegal actions.
Seems like the Ricomen have filed objections to the Magistrates ruling against sanctions educating the magistrate that she was held to a strict standard in reviewing the evidence of the motion for sanctions.
I see that the plaintiffs
(OBJECTIONS) are very well stated, but shouldn't this plaintiffs objections really be a motion for reconsideration ?
Bob is the title of this posting correct ?
If it was a motion for consideration it would contain a proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law .
The law cited by plaintiffs only appears to show that the Magistrate was to take a serious look at the facts.
Please correct me if I am wrong, I like to pick your brains.
Learning is fun.
Jeff Matiatos
It looks like they are not trying to educate the judge but appealing the ruling to a higher judge. I believe they are appealing the magistrats order to judge Erickson. The Magistrat judge is named Nelson. Looks like they want Erickson to over turn the Nelson ruling.
I've had ex[erience with St Paul in court. They constantly lie to the court about the facts of the case, the law they cite for their position and any other damn thing they can do to win. They should all be in jail.
There maybe copy errors.
ARGUMENT AND AUTHORITIES
1. Where a party during the course of litigation destroys or fails to retain relevant evidence, a
finding of intentional - bad faith destruction indicating a desire to suppress the truth is not
required in order for certain sanctions to be imposed.
At the April 14, 2008, hearing on Plaintiffs renewed motion for sanctions the Court
acknowledged that no showing of “bad faith” was required because the subject documents had
been destroyed by Defendants after litigation was commenced. Nevertheless, the Court
applied the “bad faith” standard in its Order. Order at 7-10, 13, 14.
The Eighth Circuit’s decision in Stevenson v. Union Pacific, 354 F.3d 739, 745 (8th
Cir. 2004) is directly on point. The Court in Stevenson determined that the district court’s
order for an adverse inference instruction sanction based upon the ongoing destruction of
records during litigation was supported by the court's inherent power even absent an explicit
bad faith finding. 354 F.3d at 750. See E*Trade Sec. LLC v. Deutsche Bank AG, 230 F.R.D.
582, 589 (D.Minn 2005) (no “bad faith” needed to sanction defendants where computer hard
drives wiped clean after defendants aware of potential for litigation).
Any possible destruction of evidence is to be treated as a serious transgression of
discovery procedures in that it goes to the core of the Court’s truth-finding mission. See
Dillon v. Nissan Motor Co., 986 F.2d 263, 269 (8th Cir. 1993).
Here, after being sued by Plaintiffs, Defendants and other public officials and
employees destroyed written communications related to their policies and actions and multiple
years of housing inspection records. The Court made an egregious mistake in treating these
shocking violations of the law and Court rules in such a light manner.
Case 0:04-cv-02632-JNE-SRN Document 229 Filed 05/12/2008 Page 5 of 15
6
Plaintiffs submit that at the very least public defendants should be held to the same
standard of preserving evidence applicable to private corporations before this Court. When
considering the sophisticated and litigious nature of the Defendant City and the important
policies of honesty and openness by government officials and employees in public matters, the
Court seriously erred in not sanctioning Defendants for destruction of relevant evidence while
these cases were before this Court.
Defendants had a duty at the commencement of the Steinhauser lawsuit in May 2004,
to place a litigation hold on all relevant evidence that might be useful to Plaintiffs.
Defendants failed to do so then or thereafter when they were sued in Harrilal and Gallagher in
2005. Discovery requests in Steinhauser were served on Defendants in November of 2004
requesting all inspection reports, records and “emails” of all officials and City agencies.
Defendants continued to destroy e-data/e-mails and TISH reports thereafter until sometime in
January 2007. How could that have happened without being intentional? During the filings
of these three lawsuits, Defendant Dawkins was a lawyer who headed the main code
department of the City. Defendants had a large full service law firm at their disposal.
Defendants were familiar with Court rules due to the City’s vast experience with state and
federal court actions. Yet the Court has held that such a failure to preserve the written
communications of City officials and employees and housing inspection reports for the
relevant time period prior to December 2005 was not in “bad faith”.
Even though Plaintiffs were not required to demonstrate Defendants’ “bad faith,”
Plaintiffs submit that Defendants conduct rose to the level of “bad faith” or at least “gross
Case 0:04-cv-02632-JNE-SRN Document 229 Filed 05/12/2008 Page 6 of 15
7
negligence” thereby justifying a finding of “prejudice” because the evidence was relevant,
would have been helpful to Plaintiffs and could have led to discovery of other evidence.
Defendants having “destroyed a significant quantity of documents, the exact extent of which
is now indeterminable,” should not now be allowed to “claim that the information contained is
irrelevant or unimportant.” Capellupo v. FMC Corp., 126 F.R.D. 545, 551 (D.Minn. 1989).
Here, as in Capellupo, Plaintiffs were “deprived of significant amounts of potentially helpful
information” especially evidence going to the issues of Defendants’ claimed immunity
defenses and Plaintiffs’ claims requiring a showing of “intentional discrimination.” Id. at 552.
2. The Magistrate Judge made a decision contrary to the law in requiring a high standard for
a showing of “prejudice” from Defendants’ destruction or non-retention of relevant
evidence during the course of litigation. Order at 6.
Magistrate Nelson determined that “sanctions for improper document destruction may
not be imposed until ‘the moving party can demonstrate that they have suffered prejudice as a
result of the spoliation’” (citing E*Trade, 230 F.R.D. at 592; and Stevenson, 354 F.3d at 745;
and Keefer v. Provident Life & Accident Ins. Co., 238 F.3d 937, 940 (8th Cir. 2000).
Plaintiffs submit that the Court improperly applied a heavy burden on Plaintiffs to
demonstrate prejudice when the Court should have found prejudice from the nature and
volume of the documents destroyed and from the time period the destruction took place.
Equally as important, the Court failed to account for the necessity of Plaintiffs showing
intentional discrimination in support of many of their claims, which would best be shown by
the written, electronic communications of City officials and employees – e-data/e-mails that
were destroyed for all relevant time periods prior to December 2005.
Case 0:04-cv-02632-JNE-SRN Document 229 Filed 05/12/2008 Page 7 of 15
8
The Court also failed to consider that the written, electronic communications of
Defendants and City officials and employees would have been the best source of evidence
directly bearing on their claimed immunity defenses. The e-data/e-mails destroyed for the
time periods prior to December 2005 relate directly to the knowledge, motive and conduct of
Defendants on the issues of immunity. Plaintiffs have been prejudiced by the almost complete
destruction of key evidence on the immunity issues. The nature and volume of destruction
justifies a prohibition against Defendants’ motion for summary judgment.
The substantial and complete nature of the destruction of three years of TISH housing
inspection reports and the e-data/e-mails of Defendants, City Council members and other key
players for all periods prior to December 2005, the time periods relevant to Defendants’
claims of immunity and Plaintiffs constitutional and statutory claims, justifies a finding of
“prejudice” to Plaintiffs from said destruction. See E*Trade, 230 F.R.D. at 592. The written
communications of Defendants and City officials/employees on the issues of immunity
defenses and intentional discrimination is similar to the only recording of conversations
contemporaneous to an accident. Stevenson, 354 F.3d at 748. There is no substitute evidence
available.
The Court here, contrary to the Court in Stevenson, placed too high of a burden on
Plaintiffs to demonstrate prejudice. “Courts must take care not to ‘hold the prejudiced party to
too strict a standard of proof regarding the likely contents of the destroyed [or unavailable]
evidence,’ because doing so ‘would subvert the…purposes of the adverse inference and would
allow parties who have…destroyed evidence to profit from that destruction.” Residential
Case 0:04-cv-02632-JNE-SRN Document 229 Filed 05/12/2008 Page 8 of 15
9
Funding Corp. v. DeGeorge Fin. Corp., 306 F.3d 99, 109 (2d Cir. 2002).
3. The Magistrate Judge made a decision contrary to the law in determining that Plaintiffs
had failed to demonstrate that they had suffered prejudice from Defendants’ overall
conduct including destruction and non-retention of relevant evidence and other abusive
litigation tactics. Order at 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, and 14.
The Court erred in its determination that, “Utterly absent from Plaintiffs’ affidavits and
exhibits is a showing that they were prejudiced by the non-disclosure of PHA-related
documents.” Order at 8. Plaintiffs detailed the substantial prejudice suffered by Plaintiffs due
to Defendants non-disclosure of City documents related to PHA. See Shoemaker Affs.,
3/5/08, ECF 183 - Steinhauser, pp. 9-25, 43-44, and 3-31-08, ECF 211 – Steinhauser -
moreover, Defendants have not yet produced the large volumes of City’s documents related to
PHA as set forth in Counsel’ affidavits. See Shoemaker Aff. ECF 211.
Defendants during the litigation destroyed three years of TISH housing inspection
records that Defendants’ own liability expert opined were relevant to Plaintiffs’ claims. The
Court recognized the relevancy of these TISH reports. Order, 11-13-07, ECF 134 -
Steinhauser, at 5, fn 3). See Shoemaker Aff. 3-5-08 ECF 183, pp. 25-33.
Due to Defendants’ destruction of the TISH reports that were centrally located at
Defendant Dawkins’ office, Plaintiffs were forced to attempt to obtain TISH reports from 45
inspectors with no assurance that those inspectors maintained their copies of reports past the
three-year retention period applicable to both the City and TISH inspectors.
The Court erred in determining that, “Plaintiffs never subpoenaed the TISH evaluators.
Such a failure to pursue discovery is incongruent with Defendants’ claim of prejudice.” Order
at 10. The Court suggested that Plaintiffs could seek the TISH reports from inspectors
Case 0:04-cv-02632-JNE-SRN Document 229 Filed 05/12/2008 Page 9 of 15
10
through subpoenas and Defendants would be required to bear the subpoena costs. Order at 10.
Arguably, the Court’s Order included service fees, but there was no provision for $15,000 in
copy costs of the replacement records (15,000 reports, four pages each, at $.25/page), for
$13,500 from 45 deposition transcripts ($300 each), or for the Plaintiffs’ attorney fees. But
for Defendants destruction of centrally stored TISH housing inspection reports, Plaintiffs
would not have been faced with these prohibitively burdensome additional costs and fees.
The Eighth Circuit in Stevenson held that even though the destroyed track maintenance
records were of limited use, where those documents had been destroyed after litigation was
commenced, Plaintiffs had suffered sufficient prejudice to warrant an adverse inference
instruction sanction. Id. at 749-50. Here, the Court determined that Plaintiffs had not shown
what the missing e-data/e-mails would have contained - but Plaintiffs had demonstrated that
the missing e-data consisted of written communications of Defendants, City officials and
employees and influential third-parties. Under Stevenson, even if this e-data was of limited
use, its destruction during litigation should have resulted in a prejudice finding and an adverse
inference instruction and/or other sanctions.
4. The Magistrate Judge made a decision contrary to the law in failing to award Plaintiffs’
their costs and attorney’s fees incurred as a result of Defendants conduct when the
Magistrate Judge acknowledged that Plaintiffs may have been harmed. Order at 8 and 14.
The Magistrate erred by failing to award Plaintiffs’ their costs and attorney’s fees
incurred as a result of Defendants conduct. Here, as in Capellupo, the actions of Defendants
“have imposed an enormous burden on counsel for plaintiffs.” Capellupo, 126 F.R.D. at 553.
Case 0:04-cv-02632-JNE-SRN Document 229 Filed 05/12/2008 Page 10 of 15
11
5. The Magistrate Judge made clearly erroneous determinations of fact concerning
Defendants’ destruction of TISH inspection records, non-production of Problem Property
reports, and Defendants’ destruction of emails and e-data from the key time period of the
illegal code enforcement.
a. TISH inspection records.
The Court made a clearly erroneous factual determination that, “Defendants also
reminded Plaintiffs that they had not even asked for the [TISH] reports until 2007,
approximately two years after they first learned of the reports, and that the City had produced
all of the reports in its possession to Plaintiffs at that time.” Order at 10. Defendants
deliberately misrepresented the facts to the Court. In November 2004, the Steinhauser
Plaintiffs requested Defendants produce all inspection reports; Defendants responded that
those reports included TISH reports. Shoemaker Aff., 8-6-07, ECF 114 – Steinhauser, para.
16.
Finally, the Court made a clearly erroneous factual determination, “The Court finds no
malfeasance by Defendants or prejudice to Plaintiffs with respect to the Sandberg [TISH]
report[s] and related documents.” Order at 10 (emphasis added). The Sandberg Reports fell
within the scope of the Steinhauser discovery requests and yet were not produced until years
later.
b. E-data/E-mails.
In November of 2004, the Steinhauser Plaintiffs requested Defendants produce all edata/
e-mails. Shoemaker Aff., 8-6-07, ECF 114 – Steinhauser, paras. 18, 21. Because
Defendants’ failed to place a litigation hold on e-data/e-mails, Defendants produced miniscule
e-data/e-mails for the relevant periods prior to December 2005. See Engel Aff. ECF 152 -
Case 0:04-cv-02632-JNE-SRN Document 229 Filed 05/12/2008 Page 11 of 15
12
Gallagher, Ex. 12-39.
The Court made the following clearly erroneous factual determination concerning the
destruction of e-data prior to December 2005: “Other than the reasons already discussed,
Defendants offer an additional reason: because Plaintiffs’ counsel had explicitly limited the
discovery request to emails from December 2005 onward, in a letter dated June 6, 2007.”
Order at 13.
Plaintiffs never limited their document request to email communications from
December of 2005 forward, or at any other time waived their right to email communications
for the relevant periods prior to December 2005. As Mr. Shoemaker stated to Ms. Seeba in a
letter dated May 15, 2007:
We understand from you that the electronic communications such as emails between
City departments and third parties have not been retained for the period prior to
December 2005. In light of that surprising and disturbing development, we request
production of the following: emails, inter-departmental emails, correspondence,
memos, and other written communications from December 2005 through April 30,
2007, between City departments, and to and from City departments and non-city
entities and individuals, … We want to know what date each e-document … was
discarded after your receipt of the Steinhauser Notice of Claim in July 2003 and who
authorized the employees of the City’s Information Services staff to destroy the edocuments
that were relevant to Plaintiffs’ claims.
See Exhibit 10 to Seeba affidavit in opposition to sanctions, page 3 (emphasis added).
In Plaintiffs June 6, 2007 letter, Plaintiffs again sought emails from 1994 to present:
Emails, inter-departmental emails, correspondence, memos, and other written
communications during 1994 through 2004, and thereafter to present, between City
Agencies, and to and from same and non-city entities and individuals, …
Emails both within the City and to and from third parties have been relevant to the
claims herein since 2002. …inspectors also testified to use of the e-mail system in their
work for the City. It certainly appears to us that Defendants and City officials and
Case 0:04-cv-02632-JNE-SRN Document 229 Filed 05/12/2008 Page 12 of 15
13
I don't know what's more shocking.....the fact that this happened or that there are people like Eric and Chuck who seem to go right along with this type of behavior by the city. How does one condone destroying evidence and then going to court and wanting immmnuity because the other side has not facts or evidence?
http://www.krollontrack.com/newsletters/clu.aspx
Check Federal Case Law
Citeis do this shit because they can. They get away with it time after time, and the only thing that ever stops them is judgemnet awards so big it knocks their sock off!
If what's printed here is true, it doesn't look good for the city of St. Paul. Sooner or later their luck is going to run out.
OK - finally got the chance to read the entire thing. Basicly the plaintiff's are saying, we know you ruled against us but you are wrong because we say so.
The judge's order said I am not agreeing with the plaintiffs because they didn't show where anything that was missing hurt their case. Rather than some combersome high level of proof the judge said show me anything that you have found that would lead me to believe in what ever is missing might have a chance of being evidence. What the plaintiffs are now saying the judge was asking them to meet to high of proof.
They are saying if the City can't find an email between the janitor and his sister we should get a million bucks.
Ain't going to happen.
The judge has ruled that they have to have some evidence of a RICO case in the emails before any missing emails can be taken as the city destroying evidence.
Other wise this was nothing but a scam to bilk money from the City.
JMONTOMEPPOF
Chuck Repke
I agree with Chuck.
Why does it seem the plaintiffs put so at stake on this e-mail issue ?
Their fighting this issue like its the only thing they have going.
That or they can't face losing.
Lets get this dam summary judgment over with and move on !!!!!!!!
I don't think they're saying the court was wrong because they said so Chuck. I think they're saying the court was wrong becasue the law says so. Are you really this stupid Chuck? Why don't you ask your girlfriend Attorney about a defendants responsibility to preserve evidence?
IS going to happen Chuck and they're gonna get tens of millions, not just one million.
I'd be very interested in what you aould think if you were suing someone and the other side says they have the evidence and it is relevant to the case and then they destroy it all after you ask for it. Everyone knows why they destroyed it Chuck......cause it would've hurt them.
"Basicly the plaintiff's are saying, we know you ruled against us but you are wrong because we say so."
LOL----Your a real hoot Reppke!
Chuck,
Why do you even participate here on this forum? Has Dave Thune sent you to lobby for the city? You are the Mitch Berg or Tom Swift from the old SPIF forum, but only just the opposite, you are a liberal, progressive DFLer instead of being conservative. Swiftee and Berg are tops in my book.
George
Chcuk
How the hell can you read through the above court papers and not think anything even might be wrong with what is going on in this lawsuit?
OK try this again,
1. The plaintiffs first motion was that because the City continued to delete emails they should get money.
2. The judge said, the law says that you have to at least give me one email or letter or scrap of paper that would be EVIDENCE of this conspiracy you believe exists for me to give you money for the City deleting emails or throwing away their grabage. You do that and I will consider giving you money.
3. Now the plaintiffs are saying your wrong judge you should just give us money because they haven't been able to produce everything we have asked for even if we haven't any evidence that a federal crime was committed.
I'm guessing the judge will go back to what was said before... yes there is a pot of gold waiting for you if the City destroyed evidence and I can rule that occured if you produce some kind of evidence that their is this conspiracy... something, anything other than your imagination!!!
And for the guy who brought up Thune again... can we give it a rest? I stopped being employed by Dave Thune on 12/31/1997 last century for god's sake. It is:
Just My Opinion Not Those Of My Employer Past (thune) Present Or Future (JMONTOMEPPOF)
Chuck Repke
That's not what the judge said Chuck and you know it. If you analogy was correct, everyone that gets sued would just have a "scorched earth" policy toward documents and destroy everything to get rid if the proof. Secondly, I believe they did produce some incriminating emails....the ones the city forgot to get rid of.
Go back to the judges ruling...
“must establish a reasonable possibility, based on concrete evidence rather than a fertile imagination, that access to the [destroyed material] would have produced evidence favorable to his cause.” Gates Rubber Co. v. Bando Chem. Indus., 167 F.R.D. 90, 104 (D. Colo. 1996)
As I have been saying the entire time the landlords case rests on the notion that in their imagination there is a conspiracy and that failing to find any evidence means that the conspiracy must be larger than we thought and contained in any sliver of paper we don't have.
They have no evidence and the judge has the case law that says a paranoid imagination is not enough evidence to award a sanction.
If they gave the judge anything that would lead any reasonable person that there was something in the missing documents they would have won a judgement. But they don't have any evidence of a conspiracy and that is what the suit is about.
JMONTOMEPPOF
Chuck Repke
Your dirty little city is about to take a nasty little hit Repke. Did it ever ocurr to you that maybe they already have all they need for emails and that they are just using this to back the city into a corner? Maybe they'll produce those emails in court in front of the jury after they've heard how the city tried so hard to destroy them and then cover it up with bogus legal arguments. Maybe you should talk to your city council buddies and see if they have ever written any emails that they thought they got rid of, or maybe they thought they were going to "friendlies" when the people were actually good friends with the landlords suing them now. Whatta ya think Chucky boy? Do you really think they "effectively" got rid of all of them?
Chuck if the system was ran so well under Dawkins why did they give NHPI such an extreme makeoverr and change its name? They even move the two cops out of their office.
Tim Ciani
9:12 I don't care what you think is in any email. What we have seen so far posted here as "evidence of a conspiracy" is nothing more than staff and elected official cooperating with concerned communitee members about how to clean up blite. THAT ISN'T A CONSPIRACY YOU BOOB! That is how code enforsement, elected government and the public work at improving the City.
For something to be a RICO case there has to be someone who is damaged, there has to be a conspiracy to do the damage and there has to be someone who benefits from the loss.
There has been nothing that has been shown here that would suggest that anyone gets anything out of any loss that might occur to the landlords. All that we have seen is the City doing its job to enforce the code.
JMONTOMEPPOF
Chuck Repke
CONCLUSION
Because Plaintiffs’ provided evidence to the Court that during the course of this
litigation that Defendants destroyed documents relevant to the claims of Plaintiffs and
defenses raised by Defendants, including immunity defenses, made egregious
misrepresentations concerning the destruction and therefore unavailability of other relevant
evidence, and delayed and failed to produce large volumes of other “City documents” relevant
to Plaintiffs’ claims, and this abusive conduct prejudiced Plaintiffs, Plaintiffs’ requests for
sanctions should be granted, including an award of costs and attorney’s fees.
WHEREFORE, PREMISES CONSIDERED, Plaintiffs pray this Court:
1. Overrule Magistrate Judge’s Order on the specific objections noted herein;
2. Award reasonable attorney fees and costs in bringing the motions for sanctions; and
3. Order such other and further relief, at law or in equity, to which Plaintiffs may be justly
entitled.
Respectfully submitted,
SHOEMAKER & SHOEMAKER, P.L.L.C.
Dated: May 12, 2008 By: s/ John R. Shoemaker
John R. Shoemaker (#161561)
Centennial Lakes Office Park
7701 France Avenue South, Suite 200
Edina, Minnesota 55435
(952) 841-6375
Attorneys for Plaintiffs Steinhauser, et. al.
Attorneys for Plaintiffs Harrilal, et.
You better start caring what's in the email Chuck. I know some of these guys and they already have emails coming in and out of city council offices that's a lot more than just incriminating. Your city is going down Chuck and some city council members are going to preside over their own political demise.
Bob, it doesn't change this:
“must establish a reasonable possibility, based on concrete evidence rather than a fertile imagination, that access to the [destroyed material] would have produced evidence favorable to his cause.” Gates Rubber Co. v. Bando Chem. Indus., 167 F.R.D. 90, 104 (D. Colo. 1996)
They have to show some evidence that they found something in the emails or notes of the council members, or the Mayor or the code office that suggests a conspiracy. All they have done so far is said we want more stuff and the City (who is always being sued by someone) should never throw away anything, because it might be evidence.
I think what they would need to do to win the order is say, see we have this info about a conspiracy and if we would have had access to what is missing we would have had more. Instead what they are saying is we have no case, but we are sure we would have had a case if we would have had the missing stuff. - that ain't going to fly.
...and 1:05 I am sure there is all sorts of embarasing emails and I am sure that someone may have said things that if taken the right way might be seen as wanting to hurt someone, BUT I am sure that you have nothing that would show any kind of a conspiracy to do anything because it makes no sense.
JMONTOMEPPOF
Chuck Repke
Think again Chuck,
Post a Comment
<< Home