U.S. District Judge David Hittner of the Southern District of Texas signed an order on Aug. 5 sanctioning the Lane Law Firm of Houston and three attorneys for Rule 11 violations for asserting causes of action barred by the statute of limitations.
Hittner found that sanctions against the firm and lawyers were necessary to “deter” them from “advocating claims or arguments in the future that have been considered and rejected by the Fifth Circuit.” He also found that because the plaintiffs’ attorneys “misled” him by failing to cite a U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit opinion in supplemental briefing in other lawsuits, sanctions were necessary to “encourage plaintiffs’ attorneys to be more truthful and candid in the future.”
