Norelus v. Denny's, Inc., No. 07-14077

Sanctions Against Plaintiff's Counsel in Sexual Harassment Matter

In Norelus v. Denny's, Inc., No. 07-14077, a sexual harassment action, the court affirmed the district court's order sanctioning plaintiff's counsel for attempting to substantially modify plaintiff's deposition testimony where it was entirely reasonable for the district court to conclude that counsel acted with objective recklessness when they created the errata document and then continued to pursue plaintiff's claims after the creation and submission of that document had made her claims untenable.

As the court wrote:  "No one's memory is perfect. People forget things or get confused, and anyone can make an innocent misstatement or two. Or maybe even three or four. But not 868 of them. In this case, the plaintiff's attorneys, William and Karen Amlong, filed a sixty-three page errata sheet containing 868 attempted changes to their client's deposition testimony, which was the sole source of evidentiary support for their client's claims."

Related Resources

• Read the Eleventh Circuit's Decision in Norelus v. Denny's, Inc., No. 07-14077