Update on yesterday’s how-not-to-write post: The lawyer’s response to the show-cause order
24 February 2015
Fair is fair. Yesterday I criticized a petition for certiorari, filed in the U.S. Supreme Court, as being incomprehensible. It’s only fair to present the filing lawyer’s side of the story. So here is his response to the Court’s show-cause order, with some redactions (presumably to protect intellectual property). Hat tip to Lyle Denniston at the SCOTUS Blog for this.
Long story short: the client “insisted on articulating his basic argument ... in his own words ... right down to the client’s favored locutions and acronyms.” The resulting work product is “written in an unorthodox style and can be difficult to follow at times ....” Yep.
What do you think? Is this sanctionable conduct? Or is having the petition denied by the Court or rejected by the clerk punishment enough?
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Update (23 Mar. 2015): A happy ending for the lawyer who filed this petition: the Supreme Court has discharged its show-cause order against him, with a reminder that lawyers “are responsible—as Officers of the Court—for compliance with the requirement of Supreme Court Rule 14.3 that petitions for certiorari be stated ‘in plain terms,’ and may not delegate that responsibility to the client.”
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