Opinion ID: 4447778
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Refusal to Reschedule the Trial

Text: Taylor’s first argument is a challenge to the denial of his several continuance motions. We review continuance rulings under the deferential abuse-of-discretion standard. Research Sys. Corp. v. IPSOS Publicité, 276 F.3d 914, 919 (7th Cir. 2002). “The decision concerning whether to grant a continuance is left to the broad discretion of the district court,” id. (quotation marks omitted), and “[t]he occasions for intervention are rare,” United States v. Winbush, 580 F.3d 503, 508 (7th Cir. 2009) (quotation marks omitted). The judge was well within his discretion to refuse to grant a continuance. Taylor’s claim that he had a dental emergency on Sunday was not substantiated by reliable evidence and was hard to take seriously given Taylor’s evasive litigation conduct and the Snapchat photos. A goodfaith litigant would have notified his counsel immediately if a true emergency prevented his appearance at trial. Yet Williams did not learn about Taylor’s dental procedure until Monday night. And he submitted no affidavit from Taylor or a dental professional to substantiate the claimed emergency. When Taylor was still a no-show by mid-week, Williams produced airline and hotel reservations in a last-ditch effort to show that his client intended to attend the trial. But the dates did not match the trial schedule, and the lone room reservation was obviously insufficient to accommodate everyone in Taylor’s travel entourage. Nos. 16-4153 & 18-2990 9 The Snapchat posts, moreover, gave the judge good rea- son to doubt that Taylor’s dental issue was a true emergency. The screenshots showed Taylor smoking something under pink neon lights in the middle of the night just a few hours after he called a dental emergency hotline and a few hours before he was due in court in Chicago. Add to this mix Taylor’s evasion of service and other dilatory conduct during the litigation, and the judge was quite understanda- bly unconvinced. Taylor insists that the note from the dentist’s office and the judge’s phone call to the endodontist should have been enough to win a continuance. But the judge was justified in treating this information with skepticism. It remained unclear whether Taylor’s dental issue was a previously known condition or a sudden-onset emergency—a material fact in evaluating whether this was a good-faith excuse for skipping trial or just a ruse. Taylor also argues that the judge gave too much weight to the Snapchat posts. He objects that the screenshots are not clear enough to establish that he is in fact the person in the photos. And he tries to create doubt by noting that his staff can also post to his Snapchat account. But it’s not our role to reweigh the evidence. The judge carefully considered the entire record and made a reasonable judgment that Taylor was unjustifiably absent. We find no error.