THE ROBING ROOM

Judge Brown is the most biased and mean-spirited judge in federal court that I have dealt with since I tried a case before Julius Hoffman in 1973 (that I won). She failed to recognize, or recognized and chose to reward the defense counsel's obstructionist tactics in all discovery matters. Despite that we voluntarily gave up any discoverable materials and they withheld, redacted and/or declared confidential almost every document they produced, she repeatedly granted them more relief than the rules allowed and almost never gave us any relief - going so far as to strip the attorney-client privilege of one plaintiff because he was to offer expert opinions. On the other hand, she extended their attorney-client privilege to cover a meeting among all of the defendants that a first-year associate listened in on, based on his attendance and a joint defense agreement that the defendants did not enter into until months later. When we established that they had withheld hundreds of documents, including some core documents that were in a category she ordered them to produce, she refused to issue any sanction at all. She denied another important motion made and briefed at the same time, but did not issue rulings until the eve of trial, thus preventing us from getting a meaningful review by the district court. If defendants could not come up with a rationale for her to deny a motion, she would raise an issue sua sponte to do so. I don't know anything about her mediation skills - I refused the district court's suggestion that the case be referred back to her for mediation.