The Reporter covers Miller, Morgan and Camden County in Central Missouri's Lake of the Ozarks and is published once per week on Wednesdays.
Published July 11, 2018
Lawyer: Both sides need to pay reporter’s legal fees
CAMDEN COUNTY - The attorney for Lake Sun reporter Joyce Miller has filed a
request with the court asking the judge to make both sides pay her fees.
Attorney Jean Maneke filed a document with the court last week pointing the
finger at the county commissioners for “bad acts” they made in court regarding
Miller and that she supports the commissioners’ request that Rowland Todd
(Plaintiff) pay their fees (and at least some of hers).
The filing mainly addresses the commissioners (Defendants) and their actions in
regards to Miller (Movant).
“The Movant supports Defendants’ Motion for Attorneys’ Fees against Plaintiff
but also believes it has a right to relief from a prior court order, and its
attorneys’ fees awarded, due to the underlying frivolous and unreasonable bad
acts of the Defendants in claims made before this Court in the subpoenaing of
the Third Party Joyce Miller and taking her deposition. Defendants deposed the
Plaintiff on February 12, 2018, prior to taking the deposition of this Movant.
As a result of that deposition, Defendants had in their possession the knowledge
that the Plaintiff said he ‘would have shared this letter through a Sunshine
request,’ and that the letter was published in the Lake Sun Leader on its online
website subsequently in its coverage of this litigation. There was no evidence
in the deposition testimony of the Plaintiff that Movant or her employer were in
any way involved in the underlying facts or actions upon which Plaintiff’s cause
of action was based. Although there is mention in the Statement of Facts
provided by Defendants in connection with their Motion for Summary Judgment of
certain articles published in the Lake Sun Leader, none of those cited articles,
or acts by this Journalist, are relied upon by the Defendants in their argument
that they are entitled to summary judgment in this matter. The motion is based
solely on the acts of the Plaintiff, a letter he wrote to the Defendants and his
performance of his duties, which included being custodian of open records for
that county office.
“It was clear from Plaintiff’s deposition that Movant’s only involvement with
Plaintiff was that he was her contact point in her work as a journalist covering
county government when a records request was involved. The Defendants had no
evidence in their possession suggesting Third-Party journalist Joyce Miller or
her employer were colluding or acting in concert with the Plaintiff. Instead,
these Defendants, claiming they might find some evidence of interactions,
clearly intended to use this ‘fishing expedition’ as a means of intimidating the
Movant in her coverage of this ongoing story of high interest to the newspaper’s
readers, and to hinder her ability to rightfully seek access to public records
from the custodian of records for the county during the course of this trial.
“These actions resulted in this Court issuing an improper order which
necessitated this Third-Party to appear and hire counsel to defend a deposition,
as well as file a number of pleadings before this Court, unnecessarily.”
She then cites multiple cases in support of her request and also continued with
her accusation that the commission was on a “fishing expedition.”
“Just as the court in the Wacker case, (Wacker v. Gehl Co., 157 F.R.D. 58, 58 [W.D.Mo.,1994])
held that there was no factual information that the requested discovery would
lead to discoverable evidence, so it is now clearly evident that the Defendants
had no factual information at all that this deposition of journalist Miller
would lead to discoverable evidence. They never offered this Court a set of the
direct and cross-questions they sought to ask the journalist. Instead, they
simply badgered her for more than five hours in an effort to trap her into
saying something they could use to attempt to tie her and her newspaper to the
claim of the Plaintiff, which they knew even at that time was without a
foundation. Such an abuse of this judicial system should not go unpunished.”
Since the judges ruling in the case, Maneke claims that Miller has been forced
into an awkward position.
“Now, due to the Court’s granting of summary judgment and Defendant’s motion for
attorney’s fees, the Third-Party finds herself in the absurd position of being
subject to sanctions for asserting a privilege she believes she was entitled to
assert in a deposition being taken in a lawsuit the party seeking sanctions
claims was frivolous enough to justify an award of attorney’s fees. Without
relief from the Court, the Third-party is left without the ability to challenge
the Court’s Order requiring her deposition, is still potentially subject to
sanctions in future cases for asserting a privilege she believes is entitled to
assert and has spent substantial legal fees defending her journalistic rights,
while the party that is substantially the cause of her predicament claims it is
entitled to attorney’s fees for being subjected to frivolous litigation. Such an
outcome hardly seems just.”
Though the filings by Maneke mainly point to the commissioners, if Todd did file
a “Frivolous, Unreasonable and Groundless” suit, a claim that has not been
decided in court yet, then he is also partly responsible for Maneke’s attorney
fees.
“Further, Movant respectfully asks this Court to enter judgment assessing
attorneys fees of this party in bringing and arguing its Motion to Quash
Subpoena, and in defending Movant’s deposition, against Plaintiff and Defendant
as the Court deems just and proper, or such other and further relief as this
Court believes will allow this appeal by the Third Party to proceed under
federal rules of procedure.”
The judge has not ruled on this or the request by the commissioners at press
time.
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