LORI RIGELMAN VS. IPASS, INC

Summary:

Attorney Teresa Maestrelli of Cooley represents the defendant. Plaintiff brought motions to compel the production of documents and responses to written questions from Maestrelli's client.

The court ordered documents to be provided and questions answered, and issued sanctions of $18,990.



From the Judge and Court File:

This is an employment case where attorney Teresa Maestrelli represents the defendant. Although several Cooley attorneys are listed as defense counsel, it appears only Ms. Maestrelli provided a declaration under penalty of perjury to the court outlining her personal involvement and knowledge of the events before the judge.

Plaintiff filed motions to compel answers to written questions and for the production of documents.

Plaintiff originally sought "monetary sanctions against Defendant iPass, Inc., and their Counsel Gregory Tenhoff and Teresa Maestrelli of Cooley LLP in the amount of $27,900.00 for Plaintiffs reasonable attorneys fees and costs."

The judge's tentative ruling states "Plaintiff's request for monetary sanctions is GRANTED in the amount of $18,090.00. Defendant is ordered to pay these sanctions no later than August 10, 2018."

Lawzilla believes the final order, reflected in a minute order from the court, provides "Plaintiff's request for monetary sanctions is GRANTED in the amount of $18,090.00. plus an additional sanction for today's hearing in the amount of $900.00 for a total in the amount of $18,990.00. Defendant is ordered to pay these sanctions within 30 days of today."

Note: Plaintiff sought sanctions against defendant and its attorney. The judge said the request is granted, but then said defendant is to pay without mentioning the attorneys.



Lawzilla Commentary:

Lawzilla has almost 1000 sanctions orders on its blog, most of which involve discovery. Of those hundreds of orders we believe these sanctions are the highest. If not the highest amount of sanctions, the almost $19,000 is among the highest.

The judge's order does not have much information explaining why such a large amount of sanctions was justified for a discovery motion.

Reviewing the court file, plaintiff's counsel outlines five different meet and confer letters sent about the discovery. But there was one issue that stood out for us:

Attorney Teresa Maestrelli declared under penalty of perjury that: "I advised Plaintiff's counsel that there is no evidence of past harassment or other disciplinary problems in [employee's] personnel file."

Plaintiff's attorney noted this in her declaration: "[Defendant's] former Director of Human Resources ... has submitted a declaration in support of this Motion stating that at least 15 [] employees complained to her about [employee's] behavior. These employees informed [her] that they could not tolerate working with [employee] because he was a bully, he yelled, insulted employees, was constantly angry, attacked and insulted others in public, was emotionally unstable, and created a horrible work environment. [She] estimates that at least 7 employees informed her they could not tolerate [employee's] abusive conduct and planned to quit because of him. [She] personally complained in writing about [employee] to Chief Commercial Officer ..."

In other words, attorney Maestrelli claims to have personal knowledge stating there is no evidence of problems in a personnel file. But defendant's own director of HR states at least 15 workers complained and she herself made a written complaint about the employee.

Who is a judge going to believe? No information exists because of what an attorney says, or the HR director of attorney's own client who says information and documents do exist?

This is an easy call in our view.

Worse, Ms. Maestrelli's declaration was made after plaintiff presented her evidence. But she made no attempt to explain this at all. For example, where is the HR director's complaint? What about the other 15 workers who complained - is there simply no documentation? Why not?

Our opinion of this is Ms. Maestrelli:

(1) should not be personally stating this type of fact as her personal knowledge,

(2) is arguably being deceptive by stating no complaints are in a "personnel file" without addressing whether the complaints are in a different file or do not exist at all, and similarly using the words "harassment" and "disciplinary problems" to limit the response when plaintiff is asking for more general information such as complaints, and

This is speculation on our part, but an attorney declaration viewed as deceptive, even if unintentional, could upset or anger a judge and lead to a large amount of sanctions being awarded. On the other hand, the judge did cut plaintiff's sanctions request by about a third.

Would you hire Teresa Maestrelli to be your attorney?

This is just one case and one ruling, but almost $19,000 in sanctions cannot be ignored.

Additionally, the Cooley attorneys undoubtedly charge a lot per hour. From what we have seen it may not be money efficiently spent. Judges don't issue $19,000 in sanctions every day and if we were retaining counsel for a case in San Mateo we would rather have the attorney who won $19,000, not the one on the losing end.

Teresa Maestrelli was admitted to the California Bar in 2015. Bar Number 304769.

Cooley LLP
101 California Street Floor 5
San Francisco, California 94111

Law School: University of Miami

Sanctions are Recoverable as a Judgment - Analysis of the little known fact that sanctions awarded in a lawsuit can be enforced as their own separate judgment. Surprise someone by putting a lien on their bank account, home, wages, etc.