Opinion ID: 3159024
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Factual Propriety of Sanctions

Text: The voters’ inability to show legal error reduces them to arguing that even without legal errors “the record in this case manifestly does not support the imposition of sanctions.” 1st Cx-App. Br. at 29. They emphasize that the only 15 At no point in contesting sanctions did they directly assert Latinos were unable to elect their candidates of choice, which was the key Gingles issue highlighted by Mr. Sanderoff’s report. Nor did they make any one-person-onevote argument not premised on the misunderstanding of Larios we discussed above. -27- substantive motion they filed was their opposed motion to dismiss on July 5. In large part, this misses the point. Much of this question turns on whether the court abused its discretion in finding that multiplying proceedings after June 25 was sanctionable because the case became meritless at that time. We have already explained why the court did not err in finding the Gingles and one-person-onevote arguments lacked merit, as well as why the voters cannot blame the court’s stay for extending proceedings. Ample evidence supported the court’s decision. When the court looked back in August 2014, it was apparent that the case was substantively weak from the start. Mr. Sanderoff’s report hammered home the intractability of those flaws by showing the Gingles claim could not succeed and that district deviations made it unlikely that the one-person-one-vote claim would. It was not an abuse of discretion to find it became objectively unreasonable to pursue the case further on June 25, 2013. With June 25 established as the critical day, the remaining question is whether the court abused its discretion in finding the voters in fact acted in a way that unreasonably and vexatiously multiplied proceedings. The voters’ main argument here boils down to a comparison of this case to some of our other § 1927 cases they claim exemplify more egregious conduct. Even if that were true, however, none of those cases suggested they were establishing a floor below which a court could not permissibly impose sanctions. In a vacuum, it matters little to our review for abuse of discretion that some lawyers may have acted -28- worse than the voters did. If they acted in a way the court could have justifiably found to be objectively unreasonable, § 1927 requires no more. That, however, brings us to the reason we cannot affirm the award in its current form. In short, we cannot affirm what appears to be the court’s finding—implicit in the imposition of fees beginning on June 25—regarding what the sanctionable conduct actually was. Section 1927 sanctions are for “conduct that, viewed objectively, manifests either intentional or reckless disregard of the attorney’s duties to the court.” Hamilton, 519 F.3d at 1202 (internal quotation marks omitted) (emphasis added). As explained earlier, this means excess costs and fees for which a sanctioned attorney must pay must have been caused by that attorney’s sanctionable action. Here, the court found the voters’ sanctionable conduct was “continu[ing] to pursue th[e] case” after the receipt of Mr. Sanderoff’s report on June 25 would have made “clear to a reasonable attorney that th[e] case no longer had merit.” App. 407. To be clear, the court did not abuse its discretion by finding June 25 was the date after which it became sanctionable for the voters to multiply proceedings in an objectively unreasonable way. But, by imposing sanctions beginning on June 25, it necessarily found they did something at that point that multiplied proceedings within the meaning of the statute. Because the voters took no affirmative action on that day, the only potentially sanctionable June 25 “conduct” we can see is their failure to immediately cut the case short—i.e., -29- dismiss the case with prejudice—after receiving Mr. Sanderoff’s damaging report. 16 We do not discount the possibility that in some cases, failing to act can be sanctionable conduct under § 1927. See, e.g., Roadway Express, Inc. v. Piper, 447 U.S. 752, 755–57, 760 (1980) (observing a party’s “uncooperative behavior” and “deliberate inaction in handling” a case leading to sanctions (internal quotation marks omitted)). After all, the statute “authoriz[es] the assessment of costs against dilatory attorneys.” Id. at 760. Surely an attorney’s failure to act could be objectively unreasonable and vexatious and multiply the proceedings in a case by causing the opposing party to file motions to compel action. More pertinent here, in a meritless case, protracted failure to do anything but dismiss the case (or, perhaps, insisting on conditions of dismissal that themselves create further litigation) might be sanctionable. But the court’s decision below does not appear to rest on this type of reasoning. Rather, the award in effect found the voters’ unreasonable failure to dismiss the case began the very day they received the report. That cannot be reconciled with the need to construe § 1927 to avoid “dampen[ing] the legitimate zeal of an attorney in representing his client,” Braley, 832 F.3d at 1512. When new information appears to make it objectively unreasonable to pursue a case, an 16 A dismissal with prejudice, of course, was the only type of dismissal to which the Mayor was willing to acquiesce. -30- attorney must have at least some time—surely a day or two—to study that information and make a decision regarding its impact before failing to drop the case becomes sanctionable unreasonable pursuit. See Riddle & Assocs., P.C. v. Kelly, 414 F.3d 832, 835 (7th Cir. 2005) (“If a lawyer pursues a path that a reasonably careful attorney would have known, after appropriate inquiry, to be unsound, the conduct is objectively unreasonable and vexatious.” (emphasis added)). Consequently, we vacate the award of fees and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. The court is free to revisit the fees question on remand and certainly may reimpose fees if it finds a more appropriate triggering action. It is possible that an affirmative action creating further litigation taken by the voters after June 25 might suffice, or that a lengthier delay after June 25 will do on its own. We express no opinion on those possibilities here. 17 We only note that lawyers and litigants generally should have some reasonable leeway to review ostensibly damaging materials, even if the materials are, ultimately, the last straw proving their case’s weakness. 17 Doing so would be largely pointless. With respect to “a matter committed to the district court’s discretion,” like the propriety of § 1927 sanctions, “we cannot invoke an alternative basis to affirm unless we can say as a matter of law that it would have been an abuse of discretion for the trial court to rule otherwise.” Ashby v. McKenna, 331 F.3d 1148, 1151 (10th Cir. 2003) (internal quotation marks omitted). Even if a more appropriate triggering date exists, we cannot say on this record that it would have been an abuse of discretion for the district court to decline to impose sanctions. -31- But they should keep in mind that this time is not unlimited. The necessary time will of course be case-specific and largely within the discretion of the district court. Some relevant, although non-exclusive factors would include the strength of the underlying case and the nature of the new developments affecting the objective reasonableness of further pursuing the case. We leave any further investigation into those questions for the district court on remand and note also that such investigation may be unnecessary if it finds an affirmative action by the voters that multiplied proceedings in an objectively unreasonable way. 18