A federal appeals court has affirmed an $18,386 sanction against a firm for an associate’s repeated interjections during the deposition of her expert witness, conduct the court called “abusive, unprofessional, and obstructionist.”

The fees were assessed against Beattie Padovano of Montvale based on Vanessa Elliott’s attempts to provide answers for the expert when opposing counsel challenged his report, and on her untimely production of a supplemental report that changed data in a previous one.