ARGUMENT
I. Clear and Convincing Proof Plaintiff Violated the Protective Order and Submitted a Perjured Affidavit Denying Knowledge of Real MCSO
(Nos. 1-9)
On February 2, 2012, Defendants filed their supplemental motion pursuant to Rule 37(b) and the Court’s inherent authority, which set forth 19 acts of contumacious conduct of Plaintiff and/or his counsel warranting dismissal and monetary sanctions. (Dkt. 384.) The first 9 concern Plaintiff’s intentional violation of a protective order and his perjured June 21 affidavit. In support, Defendants introduced undisputed evidence that:
(1) Defendants disclosed roughly 3000 disciplinary file documents to Horwitz, and only to Horwitz, in 2010, that were subject to a separately negotiated amendment to the Agreed Protective Order (Ex. 3; Ex. 4; Tr. 45-50, 173, 176-77); [FN2 ]
(2) those documents were redacted, Bates-stamped, and marked confidential (Ex. 4; Tr.45-50, 173);
(3) Horwitz provided those documents to Plaintiff (Tr. 275, 280);
(4) confidentiality and Bates- stamps were removed from 51 of those documents and “Lundsman” was substituted for redactions on 4 pages (compare Exs. 9 & 10; see also Tr. 174, 181-83);
(5) those 51 documents were posted to Real MCSO, a blog created from Plaintiff’s home computer on May 27, 2011 and administered from the same computer (Ex. 26; Ex. 33 at ¶¶ 20-23; Tr. 176-78, 180-83; compare Exs. 9 & 10); and
(6) Plaintiff submitted a sworn affidavit to this Court declaring, under penalty of perjury, that he did not know who owned the site,[FN3} did not disseminate the documents that appeared on Real MCSO, and did not know how its owner obtained the documents. (Ex. 12.) [FN4]
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FN2 The entire transcript of the evidentiary hearing (1-1849) is cited herein as “Tr.”
FN3 Allegation 8 addresses the affidavit’s mis-cites to the blog, which Horwitz and Plaintiff described as typos because they were intending to address Real MCSO. (Tr. 37-38, 451-52, 354, 693.)
FN4 Plaintiff and Horwitz admit they did not even review the Exhibits attached to Defendants’ motion before responding on June 21 with supporting affidavits. (Tr. 501-02, 620, 664-69, 690-91, 716.)
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Subject to Plaintiff’s affirmative defense (addressed below) that his wife perpetrated all of these acts (except submitting the affidavit) without his knowledge, that evidence conclusively establishes that Plaintiff violated the protective order, as set forth in ¶¶ 1-7 of Defendants’ supplemental motion (Dkt. 384), and perjuriously denied the violation, as set forth in ¶ 9.
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Part 4 tomorrow.