SEATTLE – A federal judge said he will fine lawyers for the state Attorney General’s Office for withholding documents in a lawsuit brought against the agency by a former employee.
U.S. District Judge Thomas Zilly said Attorney General Christine Gregoire’s office failed to provide the documents by the deadline he set last month.
The lawsuit was filed by Janet Capps, a former deputy attorney general who contends Gregoire’s office unfairly blamed her for not appealing an $18 million verdict against the state in 2000. Capps later was forced to resign.
Zilly said the state would have to compensate Capps’ attorney, Suzanne Thomas, for her time, copying expenses and court reporter and videographer fees wasted due to its failure to comply with the deadline.
Thomas said she expects those fees to run well into the thousands of dollars, since she had lost hundreds of hours at $250 an hour.
Last month, Zilly imposed an “absolute” deadline for the state to give Capps documents relevant to the lawsuit. He told state lawyers to report to the court any documents they were withholding on the grounds they were privileged.
Despite that deadline, senior assistant attorney general Mike Tardif – who is also a defendant in the case – testified in a May 12 deposition that he’d never been asked if he had any documents relevant to the lawsuit. Tardif revealed he had a stack of 1,100 pages on his desk that had never been turned over.
Following the revelation, Gregoire’s office sent messages to nearly 300 people asking if they had any documents related to the case. Seven people said they had 39 relevant documents that had not been given to Capps, and Thomas. Zilly gave the state until Friday to produce them.
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