Headnotes Feb. 13, 2025: Attorneys behaving badly

Tim Kowal February 14, 2025

Here are a few cases I did not have time to write up but seemed either important or irritating enough to mention:

ChatGPT Fail: Remember last year when ChatGPT “hallucinated” leading a solo attorney to cite a couple nonexistent cases? Well, a couple of Big Law attorneys from Morgan and Morgan, “America’s largest injury law firm,” filed a brief citing 9 cases, of which 8 were AI hallucinations. David Lat reports they are facing an OSC for sanctions.

Disbarred in Federal Court, But Welcome in State Court? Remember the attorney, Reshma Kamath, who accused the trial judge, the appellate justices, and the whole judicial system of racism and generally “vent[ing] h[er] spleen.” The California courts charged her a surprisingly low price of a $10,000 sanction. But the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California disbarred Kamath from practicing before it. Judge Lin issued an OSC in Lee v. Byrnes Special Works, LLC, 24-cv-03629-RFL (N.D. Cal. Nov. 14, 2024), noting that Kamath “was disbarred from practicing as an attorney in this District.” Kamath had failed to advise the court, as required, of her disbarment. The California Bar, on the other hand, still cashes her checks.

Frivolous anti-SLAPP motion gets $81k sanctions. The court concluded that the attorneys cited just one distinguishable case, and probably "did not want to spend the time and money to bolster a motion that was already being brought on questionable grounds". Helix Media LLC v. Clark. (2D4d. Jan. 23, 2025 No. B332861) (nonpub. opn.).

(Artwork by Randall Holbrook, RNDL.DESIGN.)

Tim Kowal is an appellate specialist certified by the California State Bar Board of Legal Specialization. Tim helps trial attorneys and clients win their cases and avoid error on appeal. He co-hosts the Cal. Appellate Law Podcast at CALpodcast.com, and publishes summaries of cases and appellate tips for trial attorneys. Contact Tim at [email protected] or (949) 676-9989.

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"It may be that the court is thought to be excessively legalistic. I should be sorry to think that it is anything else."

— Hon. Sir Owen Dixon, Chief Justice of Australia

"A judge is a law student who grades his own papers."

— H.L. Mencken

"So far as the beginnings of law had theories, the first theory of liability was in terms of a duty to buy off the vengeance of him to whom an injury had been done whether by oneself or by something in one's power. The idea is put strikingly in the Anglo-Saxon legal proverb, 'Buy spear from side or bear it,' that is, buy off the feud or fight it out."

— Roscoe Pound, An Introduction to the Philosophy of Law

"Upon putting laws into writing, they became even harder to change than before, and a hundred legal fictions rose to reconcile them with reality."

— Will Durant

"Counsel on the firing line in an actual trial must be prepared for surprises, including requests for amendments of pleading. They cannot ask that a judgment afterwards obtained be set aside merely because their equilibrium was slightly disturbed by an unexpected motion."

— Posz v. Burchell (1962) 209 Cal.App.2d 324, 334

"At common law, barratry was 'the offense of frequently exciting and stirring up suits and quarrels' (4 Blackstone, Commentaries 134) and was punished as a misdemeanor."

— Rubin v. Green (1993) 4 Cal.4th 1187

"Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws."

— Plato (427-347 B.C.)

"Moot points have to be settled somehow, once they get thrust upon us. If an assertion cannot be proved, then it must be settled some other way, and nearly all of these ways are unfair to somebody."

—T.H. White, The Once and Future King

“It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood; if they be repealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man, who knows what the law is today, can guess what it will be tomorrow. Law is defined to be a rule of action; but how can that be a rule, which is little known, and less fixed?”

— James Madison, Federalist 62

"God made the angels to show Him splendor, … Man He made to serve Him wittily, in the tangle of his mind."

— Sir Thomas More in Robert Bolt's A Man for All Seasons

Headnotes Feb. 13, 2025: Attorneys behaving badly

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"It may be that the court is thought to be excessively legalistic. I should be sorry to think that it is anything else." — Hon. Sir Owen Dixon, Chief Justice of Australia

"A judge is a law student who grades his own papers." — H.L. Mencken

"Upon putting laws into writing, they became even harder to change than before, and a hundred legal fictions rose to reconcile them with reality." — Will Durant

"At common law, barratry was 'the offense of frequently exciting and stirring up suits and quarrels' (4 Blackstone, Commentaries 134) and was punished as a misdemeanor." — Rubin v. Green (1993) 4 Cal.4th 1187

"Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws." — Plato (427-347 B.C.)

"Moot points have to be settled somehow, once they get thrust upon us. If an assertion cannot be proved, then it must be settled some other way, and nearly all of these ways are unfair to somebody." —T.H. White, The Once and Future King

"God made the angels to show Him splendor, … Man He made to serve Him wittily, in the tangle of his mind." — Sir Thomas More in Robert Bolt's A Man for All Seasons

Show neither partiality to the weak nor deference to the mighty, but judge your fellow men justly. — Leviticus