The outcome for Team Kraken of a sanctions proceeding in Michigan was not good. On Thursday, federal District Judge Linda Parker ordered that disciplinary measures be taken against nine lawyers who participated in an effort to overturn the state's 2020 election results on behalf of Donald Trump. Those lawyers, who included Sidney Powell and Lin Wood, face possible disbarment and will also be responsible for paying the attorneys fees of their opponents in the case, the city of Detroit and the state of Michigan.
Judge Parker slammed the Kraken attorneys for committing a "historic and profound abuse of the judicial process" by filing such a fact-less lawsuit.
“This case was never about fraud,” she wrote in a withering 110-page opinion, according to the Washington Post. “It was about undermining the People’s faith in our democracy and debasing the judicial process to do so.”
The original case filed by Powell and her cadre of lawyers-lite—Wood, Stefanie Junttila, Scott Hagerstrom, Julia Haller, Brandon Johnson, Donald Campbell, Howard Kleinhendler, and Gregory Rohl—alleged massive election fraud in the state and included 960 affidavits for which they apparently did little-to-no vetting.
"They presented pleadings that were not ‘warranted by existing law or by a nonfrivolous argument for extending, modifying, or reversing existing law or establishing new law’ and contained factual contentions lacking evidentiary support or likely to have evidentiary support,” Parker wrote.
Parker ordered the lawyers to take legal education classes and referred them to the Michigan Attorney Grievance Commission. She also referred them to the disciplinary commissions in the states where they are licensed, which could ultimately result in disbarment proceedings.
"Given the deficiencies in the pleadings, which claim violations of Michigan election law without a thorough understanding of what the law requires, and the number of failed election-challenge lawsuits that Plaintiffs’ attorneys have filed, the Court concludes that the sanctions imposed should include mandatory continuing legal education in the subjects of pleading standards and election law,” reads the opinion.
David Fink, the attorney for Detroit who was seeking disbarment, bluntly told The Rachel Maddow Show, "They used the federal courts to broadcast lies."
That about covers it.
Powell and Wood aren't the only Trump-aligned attorneys to get torn apart by people who actually know something about the law.
In New York, Rudy Giuliani's law license was suspended by a panel of judges.
A federal judge in Colorado disciplined two lawyers, calling the election lawsuit they filed "one enormous conspiracy theory."
Overall, Trump's 'elite strike force' and anyone even remotely aligned or associated with it are getting absolutely shredded in court. May they all end up penniless and unable to ever practice law again.
Judge Parker slammed the Kraken attorneys for committing a "historic and profound abuse of the judicial process" by filing such a fact-less lawsuit.
“This case was never about fraud,” she wrote in a withering 110-page opinion, according to the Washington Post. “It was about undermining the People’s faith in our democracy and debasing the judicial process to do so.”
The original case filed by Powell and her cadre of lawyers-lite—Wood, Stefanie Junttila, Scott Hagerstrom, Julia Haller, Brandon Johnson, Donald Campbell, Howard Kleinhendler, and Gregory Rohl—alleged massive election fraud in the state and included 960 affidavits for which they apparently did little-to-no vetting.
"They presented pleadings that were not ‘warranted by existing law or by a nonfrivolous argument for extending, modifying, or reversing existing law or establishing new law’ and contained factual contentions lacking evidentiary support or likely to have evidentiary support,” Parker wrote.
Parker ordered the lawyers to take legal education classes and referred them to the Michigan Attorney Grievance Commission. She also referred them to the disciplinary commissions in the states where they are licensed, which could ultimately result in disbarment proceedings.
"Given the deficiencies in the pleadings, which claim violations of Michigan election law without a thorough understanding of what the law requires, and the number of failed election-challenge lawsuits that Plaintiffs’ attorneys have filed, the Court concludes that the sanctions imposed should include mandatory continuing legal education in the subjects of pleading standards and election law,” reads the opinion.
David Fink, the attorney for Detroit who was seeking disbarment, bluntly told The Rachel Maddow Show, "They used the federal courts to broadcast lies."
That about covers it.
Powell and Wood aren't the only Trump-aligned attorneys to get torn apart by people who actually know something about the law.
In New York, Rudy Giuliani's law license was suspended by a panel of judges.
A federal judge in Colorado disciplined two lawyers, calling the election lawsuit they filed "one enormous conspiracy theory."
Overall, Trump's 'elite strike force' and anyone even remotely aligned or associated with it are getting absolutely shredded in court. May they all end up penniless and unable to ever practice law again.