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Q.
We hear that you argued a case in the Supreme Court this
past January, and would like to ask you some questions
about it. Could you describe, briefly, what the case was about?
A.
We represented Goodyear in
Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. v.
Haeger
(No. 15-1406), in which certain testing documents
were not produced in discovery (before our involvement). The case
eventually settled, but the plaintiffs later learned about the tests
and sought to reopen the case to pursue sanctions. Finding that
withholding the documents was bad faith, the district court judge
hit both the defendant and counsel with large sanctions (nearly
$3 million) under its own inherent authority, which consisted
of nearly all of the plaintiff’s attorney’s fees. There was a circuit
split on how or whether causation standard restricted the amount
of inherent authority sanctions. Before the Supreme Court, we
argued that sanctions imposed under a court’s inherent authority
must be limited to damages that would not have occurred “but
for” the sanctionable conduct.
Q.
How did you prepare for oral argument? How was your
preparation different from a normal oral argument?
A.
I went through a pretty rigorous moot court regime in
order to get broad exposure to myriad questions that
might be asked. I then took both the questions that were asked in
those moots, as well as ones that I thought of, and just practiced
answering them, refining the answers, and transitioning between
topics.
Q.
Tell us about the argument itself. Which justices were the
most interested in the case?
A.
The justices were all fairly engaged (except Thomas, who
did not ask a question), which was good because I wasn’t
really prepared for a cold bench. Justice Kagan probably asked the
most questions, and they were the most probing, really trying to
get to the heart of the matter. That was good from our perspective,
because we were relying on a key opinion that she had previously
authored for the standard that we were advocating.
Ten Questions For Pierre Bergeron
About His Recent Supreme Court Argument
www.CincyBar.orgNovember 2017 CBA REPORT
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