OA520: Kraken Lawyers Hit with Sanctions! YASSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors — the audio is the record.

0:01:16 Thomas: Hello, and welcome to Opening Arguments. This is episode 520. I'm Thomas. That's Andrew. How you doing, law-talking guy? I'm doing well. I think we have an episode for you folks today.

0:01:23 Andrew: Well, hey, I'm doing fantastic, Thomas. How are you? Good.

0:01:34 Thomas: I've just been understating. Undersell over deliver. That s, you know, always.

0:01:37 Andrew: Yep, there you go. Always be closing.

0:01:42 Thomas: Yeah. So, consequences. I know we've covered this story a lot, Andrew, and uh, I never get tired of it. And I think we have an extra special. Um, is it fair to say this is the culmination or is there even, even more to come after this? I wonder.

0:01:57 Andrew: There's even more to come after this, but this is the culmination. This is this is the awarding of sanctions in Michigan against the Kraken lawyers.

0:02:07 Thomas: Ah, so good.

0:02:09 Andrew: It's it's gonna be great. I cannot wait to walk you through it.

0:02:09 Thomas: So good. So what you're telling me, let me, lemme sum this up. What you're tellin' me is we're gettin', not only we're getting consequences and a nice big celebration, there's also maybe more consequences later. So this is like, we've killed the Death Star in Star Wars, the first one, and A New Hope, but we're also going to get the yub yubs in Return of the Jedi eventually. Is that what you're saying? Okay.

0:02:22 Andrew: Yes. Yes, exactly. Exactly.

0:02:33 Thomas: I'm to have to play the yab yab music.

0:02:34 Andrew: All Right. And I mean, this is, everything has been breaking this week. About a half an hour before our record, the who were injured and the families of those who were killed in the one six insurrection have filed an omnibus lawsuit against Donald Trump, Trump against Stop the Steal, against the Proud Boys, against the Oath Keepers. We will break down that lawsuit for you, but it's got to be next week. You can't file lawsuits on a Thursday. How do people not know this, right?

0:03:06 Thomas: Yeah. There's so much. Everyone listening, within the sound of our voice, if you're going to file a big major lawsuit, don't file it on Thursday. That's our advice.

0:03:16 Andrew: File it on a Tuesday. Give me some time to read it, digest it.

0:03:18 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah, Those documents all Over you, oh.

0:03:22 Andrew: Addition, we have not just consequences Consequences for Kraken lawyers, but consequences for Jacob Wall.

0:03:28 Thomas: Oh. Oh. I just feel like that meme, that's probably the wrestling guy, what's that guy's nick, McMahon something. I don't Watch wrestling.

0:03:37 Andrew: Yeah. Vince McMahon.

0:03:39 Thomas: Yeah, that one where it's just like he gets more and more, you've seen that meme format? Right, yeah, no, that's that's literally the face I was making. That's how I feel. It just keeps getting better, Andrew. This is, this is amazing. I found out consequences for bad people is my new kink. I shouldn't be revealing This on the air. Never mind, I'll cut that. And by the way, it is the end of the month. So we have a live Q&A coming, the Patreon Q&E monthly. It's so fun. It's on YouTube. We'll share it out on all the thingies. That is going to be this Tuesday at 5 Pacific, 8 Eastern. So that's on YouTube. Again, check it out on the Patreon, on the social media. We will tweet it out. We will share it. Or you can go to our YouTube channel.

Just search Opening Arguments. I think you'll find it. And you can subscribe. But that's a lot of fun. The questions are on Patreon, of course, only patrons get to ask the questions, but everybody can come join and have a good time, so can't wait. That's Tuesday the 31st at 5 p.m. Pacific, 8 Eastern.

0:03:42 Andrew: Yep. All right. There you go.

0:04:44 Clip: Down the law, down the law.

0:04:48 Thomas: But first, I think we perhaps need to start with our only bit of not great news. So let's get on over to that. Guess all good things must come to an end. The Texas Democrats basically had to end their holdout. How did this go? Um, why were they forced to do that, and did they win anything, did, what, what do you think, I...

0:04:52 Andrew: OK.

0:05:08 Andrew: So a couple of things. Right, end of the week last week, as of about six days ago, enough Democrats, Texas Democrats in the state legislature went home because, remember, they were camping in Washington, D.C., such that the Texas House will now have a sufficient quorum, will be able to conduct legislative business. Um, was never right, it was never a tenable position of, we're going to abandon the state house and just not come back, right? The idea was to galvanize public attention as to what's going on in Texas, that did work. The idea was to hopefully mobilize Democrats in in congress Congress, particularly the U.S.

0:05:59 Andrew: Senate, to pass federal election protections. So far, that has not worked. But, you know, we do not know what went on behind the scenes. We do not know, you know.

0:06:09 Thomas: Really Friggin' Needed that to work, that would have been The best, like a real Mr. Smith Goes to Washington story, almost Like a Mr. Texans

0:06:12 Andrew: Yeah. Yeah, it would it would make a laud great movie. It would be uplifting. Democratic state representative.

0:06:18 Thomas: Yeah I Would Just Kill to

0:06:24 Andrew: Yeah go ahead.

0:06:25 Thomas: Know What the conversations were like with Joe Mansion, with with these folks, you know, like, come on.

0:06:31 Andrew: Yeah, read you the Thomas of the group. This I'm going to link the story from The Guardian, but it's been covered everywhere, and at long length in a lot of outfits. Jasmine Crockett said it was disappointing on so many different levels. She felt betrayed and heartbroken that some of the Democrats had returned to the Capitol. Our resolve is strong and this fight is not over. And, you know, and her feeling was that, you they were going to stay in Washington until they got some kind of federal elections bill. Else we could possibly say is would be speculation. Manipulation, um, we wanted you to know, we applauded the tactic. Uh, it certainly drew attention. Um, we told you, right, there were additional sessions planned. Um.

0:07:16 Andrew: We told you that, you know, this could be kind of locked in an endless cycle. Um this was coming and, and it ended, Texas is going to pass a whole lot of terrible bills. And, if you were part of the effort of turning Texas blue, hopefully this will be strong motivation. No way to spin. This is good news. But, you Know, we got to follow up on our own story.

0:07:36 Thomas: Is this basically they're free to pass all this garbage now, or so, we can't just repeat this process, is What you're saying, yeah.

0:07:41 Andrew: We can repeat the process, but at some point, the standoff comes to an end. You return to your home jurisdiction, and while the marshal did not execute any of the arrest warrants that were issued, he's technically empowered to do so. It's

0:07:50 Thomas: Yeah I Hope these people just camped out in front of Joe Mansion's office. I hope that's where they were. I hope they went to the bathroom in the hallway next to Joe Manchin's office. OK, I don't take lobbying advice from a Thomas, but I really hope they gave Guy hell and Sinema and whoever else was against this, because if we're not going to abandon this racist legacy of a filibuster for this, at least this one thing, this voting rights, that I just don't know what, what our future is as the Democratic Party. I don't know how we're going to go forward. I mean, this next election, the gerrymandering alone could give Republicans back the House. So I guess the answer is, true. Yep.

0:09:06 Andrew: And I don't understand. I truly don't understand Kyrsten Sinema on any level. I just don't get it.

0:09:12 Thomas: God. I know. I know. It's so hard because Manchin's frustrating. At least he's in a Trump state, like a massively Trump state. So there's some justification or some sense to be made of what he's doing. Cinema, I just do not understand. It is baffling to me. And as you say, I mean, it is the gerrymandering. It is the obviously the Senate map still, you knows, looks OK, but we'll see. But also it's the dissatisfaction. But but You don't have to be a part of that, is, is I guess what I want to say to our audience. Like I'm, I'm pissed as hell, you know, but you don't have to be part of the crowd that tries to bring down all Democrats because of the actions of like two of them.

You don't have to participate in that. You know, like you don't have to go out there. Oh, why did we elect Democrats? You can, you You can be smart. You can realize what the actual problem is and why these things are happening. And we can work to primary cinema next time. And also, by the way, we can work to win a couple more states in terms of the Senate. We could have, you know, Maine. You know, there's a couple more seats that would have made this as our patron, as our fine Hall of Fame patron says. It is on us, not necessarily Joe Manchin. So that would be my

0:09:40 Andrew: Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah.

0:10:26 Thomas: Tidbit.

0:10:26 Andrew: That he's the 50th Democrat. That's absolutely right. Couldn't couldn't agree more. All right. I'm dying to get to the happy stuff.

0:10:28 Thomas: Exactly. Alright. The end of I was going to say, end of bad news. News. It's all good news from here on out. Here we go. So sanctions.

0:10:48 Andrew: It is not just good news from here on out. It is great news with respect to sanctions. So I want to explain it to you like this. Everything that we said, well, this is a really, really great argument that David Fink was making, was something picked up on by Linda Parker in sanctions hearing in Detroit. Right, everything we said, you know, hey, uh, this would be great if she accepts it. She wound up accepting the only argument, and um, let's, let's add, uh, the last piece, which is the only agreement that we said across every single member of the Kraken lawyers' briefs, uh, that had any merit whatsoever, whatsoever, was the argument that said procedurally the court could not impose Rule 11 sanctions sua sponte on its own motion because it had not issued a prior show cause order, and you are required

0:10:56 Thomas: Wow.

0:11:54 Thomas: This was that kind of nonsense technical thing. Well, not nonsense, but that technical thing that like, all right, I guess maybe I'm

0:11:55 Andrew: Yeah but yeah and to get this out of the way, this is is page H21, footnote 10, in which the court even kind of agreed on that and said, "Although the court mentioned the availability of imposing Rule 11 sanctions on its own initiative during the July 12th hearing, it recognizes such sanctions must be preceded by a show cause order, which was not issued here. See Rule 11, C3. For the reasons discussed in front of the court, the court need, need not rely on that authority to sanction plaintiff's counsel." So we told you about the case, turned out to be the case. What happened? Well, just like with a complaint, let's read this sanctions award, this 110-page. And let me tell you, if you're going to read a 110-page legal document, I recommend this one. It is wonderful. Wonderful.

0:12:50 Thomas: Not going to, but almost. You're tempting me, But no, I'm... page... legal document.

0:12:55 Andrew: It is wonderful, delightful. It is a quick read, and it will warm your Heart. But if you're counting on us to break it down for you, let's do that. Okay, so first, an interesting wrinkle at the end with respect to the request for sanctions by Robert Davis. And if you are saying, who the hell is Robert Davis, that's exactly why. We... we haven't talked about him for a good reason. He is a Detroit voter who was permitted to intervene in the case. But Judge Parker said, we think this is kind of a close call because we think that the presence of the state of Michigan is likely to protect all of the voters. But, OK, the court said we think it's a close calls. All. But, quote, "Your intervention would not unduly delay or prejudice the adjudication of the original defendant's rights," end of quote.

0:12:59 Thomas: Huh?

0:13:52 Andrew: So we're going to let you be a part of this litigation. I have not talked about Robert Davis because he really played no role in the case. He piggybacked on, right, the great work was done, by the outside lawyers for the city of Detroit. Um, good work was done uh by Gretchen Whitmer's attorneys and uh uh the Democratic Party's attorneys. Uh, no work was... does the thing that I have never ever seen them do before, right, and I told you sanctions practice is a... is a kind of its... its own beast. Um, the court says we think that sanctions are merited, respect to Davis, right? It's the same nonsense conduct, but we're not going to award them because he did not substantially contribute to the resolution of the issues In this case.

And then it says, yeah, Davis's involvement did more to interfere with than assist the advancement of this litigation. Davis's briefs added little to... to the discussion, and he often clogged the court's docket with inconsequential requests and wasted the court's limited time with the same. And then there's a footnote, and it lists like a half dozen pleadings, an emergency motion to expedite briefing, scheduling, and adjudication of his emergency motions to strike, you know, that was then subsequently withdrawn, an emergency emotion to strike for or for extension of time that was withdrawn because... because plaintiff's counsel mistakenly selected and identified Davis as the filer, right? And basically the court says, yeah, you didn't help fix this case.

0:14:45 Thomas: So?

0:15:34 Andrew: Pleadings weren't good. And then, and I like this one, moreover, despite speaking only twice during the almost six-hour-long sanctions hearing, Davis's counsel, unlike counsel to every other party to this case, opted not to file any supplemental briefing, thing, presumably because, again, Davis had nothing to contribute. Ultimately, the court refuses to reward Davis for taking the court's time and giving nothing back. Okay.

0:16:01 Thomas: Not... Sorry, so we haven't talked about this person, this is... which side are they on? I'm actually having trouble understanding.

0:16:06 Andrew: He's on the defendant's side. He moved to intervene as a defendant. He is a city of Detroit voter, presumably a Biden voter, who, you know, we've talked about intervention before, who said, okay, Krakens, you have sued against

0:16:10 Thomas: Uh-huh. Yeah.

0:16:21 Thomas: When... You say defendant... So in defendant, against the bullshit cracking lawsuit, okay. Sorry.

0:16:26 Andrew: The, yeah, against the bullshit Kraken clips.

0:16:28 Thomas: I... Might as... I and others might have thought, oh, defendant in sanctions means a part of the, like, bad guys... Team.

0:16:34 Andrew: Yep. No, that's, I'm glad we asked. We have not talked about him at all because he said, hey, I want there to be a real voter as a part of this lawsuit. The court was like, yeah, all right, fine. If you keep your head down and don't do anything dumb.

0:16:45 Thomas: Yeah. So?

0:16:49 Andrew: Dumb, uh, and then he kind of kept his head down but did a couple of dumb things, uh, and so then when sanctions came around, uh, Davis and his lawyer, right, we're like, yeah, yeah, we'd like in on that whole uh Sanctions thing.

0:17:00 Thomas: They're Asking For like essentially money, like for the... is That what, okay. I was wondering what You, when you get in on sanctions, like, what, what that means, exactly, possibly Having Your legal expenses paid for.

0:17:02 Andrew: Yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Well, And And when you say possibly, uh... that's a great segue to let's move on to page... and again, we're reading this backwards, so, uh, page 107, it does not get more plain than this. This is Judge Parker, this lawsuit should have never been filed. The state defendants and the intervener defendants should never have had to defend it. If plaintiff's attorneys are not ordered to reimburse the state defendents and the city for the reasonable fees and costs incurred to defend this action, counsel will not be deterred, this means Sidney Powell, from continuing to abuse the judicial system to publicize their narrative. That's as stark as you get.

0:17:50 Thomas: Yep.

0:17:50 Andrew: So are three in which this court has awarded sanctions against all of the defendants, we're going to talk about that, With respect to with the relief going to the city and the state. And the first one is the big one for as far as they're concerned, and that is that the lawyers must jointly and severally pay the costs of the state defendants and the city of Detroit, of their litigation costs associated with the entire case. Case, right?

0:18:24 Andrew: You heard this. Yeah. This lawsuit should have never been filed. They should have never had to answer it. You've got to put them in a position as if they never had to answer. Now, jointly and severally, that means Emily Newman could be called upon to satisfy the entire judgment. Now how does Emily Newman recoup her contribution from From Sidney Powell.

0:18:24 Thomas: That's Gonna Add up, sue

0:18:45 Andrew: She'd have to sue the rest of them. Yeah.

0:18:44 Thomas: The Hell out Of the Krakens. Yeah. Oh. I want to see This should be the... With the Return of the Jedi Act. Or well you're probably going to tell me there's something better. But if they're all just fighting themselves. Oh that'll be fun.

0:18:51 Andrew: Yeah, they could be. In 14 days. Those parties have to file their requests for fees and costs. It's a public document. Certain line items will be redacted. But I estimate that this will be six figures. It will not be seven. I know. We will know in two weeks how much money they're seeking. So that's item number one. You've got to pay all the litigation costs of the state and the city of Detroit. Item number two, within six months, all of the lawyers have to take 12 hours of continuing legal credits, education credits.

0:19:15 Thomas: Oh.

0:19:39 Thomas: To learn how to be a lawyer again.

0:19:41 Andrew: Six must be on the standards of pleading, and six must be on election law. It must be nonpartisan, which led somebody on Twitter to say there was no amount of money I would not give for the court to require that class to be taught by me, which if there's a way I can apply to teach that class, I will do it.

0:19:44 Thomas: Ethics. Yeah.

0:20:04 Thomas: Well. But Already I'm disappointed. Because I want these people to never be lawyers again. So what do you mean they get to take a class. You know, this is like driver's school. This is like traffic school when you get a ticket except you did a vehicular homicide

0:20:13 Andrew: I think that's a great transition. So let's talk about number three. Number three. Lastly, the conduct of plaintiff's counsel, and here I'm, I'm quoting directly from the opinion, which also constituted violations of the Michigan Rules of Professional Conduct, calls into question their fitness to practice law. This warrants referral for investigation and possible suspension or disbarment to the appropriate disciplinary authority for every state bar and federal court in which each attorney is admitted. There

0:20:47 Thomas: I just moved up another frame on that meme format I love

0:20:52 Andrew: Uh, so the clerk of this court shall send a copy of this decision to the Michigan Attorney Grievance Commission and two, one, Sidney Powell, Texas, two, Lin Wood, Georgia, three, Emily Newman, Virginia, four, Julia Z Haller, the District of Columbia, Maryland, New York and New Jersey, five, Brandon Johnson, the District of Columbia, Georgia, Nevada, six, Scott Hagerstrom, Michigan, seven, Howard Kleinhandler, New York and New Jersey, eight, Gregory Roll, Michigan, and nine, Stephanie Lynn Gentilla, Michigan, so each and every one.

0:21:25 Thomas: It so is there a chance they go through this rigmarole of the like, hey, here's how do you learn to not be a dirtbag attorney again, and then they still get disbarred, because that would be the best of all worlds

0:21:34 Andrew: Oh, yeah, that would absolutely be plausible, and there is one more. Um, this is footnote 85 and I am both, both, I, I love the fact that, that, uh, Judge Parker wrote this footnote. I am saddened by the factthat she had to write this foot note. So what does it say? This court is troubled that Sidney Powell is profiting from the filing of this and other frivolous election challenge lawsuits. See http defending the republic.org parenthesis website of company run by Powell on which donations are solicit to support the quote additional cases being prepared every day, end quote. Other attorneys for plaintiffs may be as well. And sidebar, we have documented each and every one of these attorneys, even, you know, Emily Newman and her It's My First Day

0:21:35 Thomas: Oh yes oh geez footnote 85, five.

0:21:55 Thomas: Yeah. Right.

0:22:31 Andrew: Have been involved in multiple garbage.

0:22:34 Thomas: It's my first day. Go fund my first day, everybody.

0:22:38 Andrew: Yeah, right. None of these are innocent. All of them are playing the right-wing grift game. So the court says, "Yeah, other attorneys for plaintiffs may be as well, given their address, according to the filings here, is the same Turtle Creek address listed on this website. What is concerning is that the sanctions imposed here will not deter counsel from pursuing future baseless lawsuits because those sanctions will be paid for with donor funds rather than counsel's." Completely correct.

0:23:05 Thomas: Yep.

0:23:06 Andrew: In this court's view, this should be considered by any disciplinary authority reviewing counsel's behavior, end of quote. That is as strong a shot across the bow as I can imagine, right? That's the judge saying, hey, I cannot, it's up to the attorney grievance committee, uh, in each jurisdiction and each court, um, to decide to say you can't practice law anymore. Um, but I strongly encourage those people to consider that any lesser sanction than total disbarment will probably just be something they used to fundraise. It's absolutely,

0:23:37 Thomas: Yeah, exactly. They'll probably profit off of it. I'm so glad this judge sounds like she handled it perfectly. Like, doesn't this seem like about as good as you could possibly do? So, because she's saying, yeah, and you, okay, find them for whatever amount doesn't matter. They'll raise more than that profit off of it. And guess what? Do it again. So like, yeah, I hope these people get disbarred. It's the only answer.

0:23:50 Andrew: Absolutely. Absolutely.

0:24:03 Thomas: Even that's not enough by the way, but I

0:24:03 Andrew: Yeah, I well, I agree with that, too, but let's take our victories. I would settle for disbarment and one tar and feathering, right? I'm to pick one. Howard Kleinhandler. The court thoroughly dismantled how bad the arguments being advanced by Donald Campbell. That was the lawyer hired by everybody except Lin Wood and Emily Newman. And we told you that these were terrible arguments. Here's what the court said, for example, to the, we didn't sign this argument, you heard, right? If you listen to those hearings or to our Lawed Awful movies, over and over again, you heard the only person who signed these was Sidney Powell and, you know, and the court said, plaintiff's lawyers argue that no attorney can be sanctioned whose name appeared only in typewritten form,

0:24:11 Thomas: Know, I know. I know I, I would settle for disbarment.

0:25:04 Andrew: "That no attorney beside plaintiff's local counsel has appeared or signed a document filed in this matter, and that the court lacks jurisdiction to sanction any attorney who did not personally appear or sign a document." Yet, okay? The local attorneys assert that, although they signed the filings, they did not prepare them and thus should not be responsible for them. As such, no attorney wants to take responsibility now that sanctions are sought for filing this lawsuit. "In this age of electronic filing, it is frivolous to argue that an electronic signature on a pleading or motion is insufficient to subject the attorney to the court's jurisdiction if the attorney violates the jurisdiction's rules of professional conduct or a federal ruler's statute establishing the standards of practice. As set forth earlier, Sidney Powell, Scott Hagerstrom, and Gregory Roll electronically signed" - Hagerstrom and Roll being the local counsel, by the way - "the complaint, amended complaint, and motion for injunctive relief."

0:25:57 Andrew: The remaining attorneys, except for Stephanie Lynn Gentilla, were listed as of counsel on one or more of the pleadings. The cases plaintiffs cite to support their argument that non-signing attorneys cannot be sanctioned were all decided before 1993, and in particular, before the 1993 amendments to Rule 11. For purposes of Rule 11, those amendments say an attorney who is knowingly listed as counsel on a pleading written motion or other paper, quote, expressly authorized the signing, filing, submitting, or later advocating of the offending paper and shares responsibility with the signer, filer, submitter, or advocate. Yeah.

0:26:37 Thomas: Chef's kiss.

0:26:38 Andrew: And then there's a footnote on Gentilla who did sign and docket, subsequently filed motions, briefs, or other papers in which she and plaintiffs' remaining attorneys advocated the claims asserted in their pleadings. And she was never getting out of it. You remember Stephanie Gentile was the one who raised the—and

0:26:38 Thomas: So good.

0:26:54 Thomas: Was she the one who didn't talk the whole time and then talk to the end

0:26:57 Andrew: Then had the First Amendment argument, and the court was like, yeah, don't you discuss the relevant case law? And she gave that four-minute rambling answer and was like does that answer the court's question? And the judge was like no.

0:26:57 Thomas: Oh, God. Yeah. Can we sentence her to go to law school, and then also you don't get to be a lawyer at the end, but you do have to go, just yeah.

0:27:15 Andrew: Yeah. That would be great. That's a good punishment.

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0:31:13 Andrew: So that argument went nowhere. The "it's my first day" argument went nowhere, as you know, because Emily Newman has been sanctioned. And there the court said, "does not suggest that her name was included without her permission. And she does not cite case law suggesting that an attorney may not be sanctioned under Rule 11 if the time spent on the relevant lawsuit does not surpass an unidentified threshold." Threshold. "Newman's responsibility for any Rule 11 violation is not diminished based on where those working hours were spent, particularly during a global pandemic when many people were working from home."

0:31:46 Andrew: And then it says, yeah, look at the Rule 11 advisory notes. It says that are sanctioned you violated the rule or if you are responsible for the violation, and that the court should consider whether other attorneys in a firm, co-counsel, other law firms, or the party itself should be held accountable for their part in causing a violation, even if they were not the person actually making the presentation to the court. So long as the attorney bears some responsibility, the attorney may be sanctioned. And amen, right? Like, you, I don't care, you know, I only worked five

0:31:45 Thomas: I know,

0:32:22 Andrew: Hours on this.

0:32:23 Thomas: You get five free hours of evil, like, you get to yeah,

0:32:23 Andrew: Yeah. You put your, you put your name on a nonsense lawsuit that indirectly, at minimum, contributed to a violent insurrection aimed to overthrow the legitimately elected government of the country, yeah, I'm sorry, you don't get it "it's my first day" on that.

0:32:41 Thomas: Yeah, You're not free to go if you did your work real fast, yeah.

0:32:43 Andrew: Right. That is exactly right. Also, the, the court dismantled, uh, the, you didn't give us the brief alongside the Rule 11 motion, so therefore, you know, we get a, get out of jail, free, card, yeah, and the, and the court was like, that's not how any of this works, you idiots, um, it's so good.

0:32:56 Thomas: We're free to go. Oh, oh, oh. This is so great.

0:33:09 Andrew: It it it, as a result, right, it said, look, the purpose of the safe harbor period, period, is to give you notice of what you've done wrong. And you had that. It listed all the things you did wrong. Uh, and to give you due process, right? To give you 21 days to say, oh, okay, um, that's bad, I'm going to withdraw, uh, because, you, I have been persuaded. That's all the procedure that Rule 11 is meant to do. Um, and you had that. Uh, don't you know, come on. Um, and the idea that they were ever going to get out, you know, with respect to that kind of a technicality, um, is, uh, you know, is, I, as we described it, you know, worse than

0:33:09 Thomas: It's so great, yeah.

0:33:59 Thomas: Well, who

0:34:00 Andrew: Wishful thinking.

0:34:00 Thomas: Knows anymore, Andrew? Who knows anymore? We all needed this. This was a judge telling us, like, yes, reality exists and things matter, and we all could use that.

0:34:02 Andrew: Yeah, so I am not reading any of, right? I told you, this is a 110-page decision. I am walking you through the legal aspects of the decision. And the last legal aspect has to do with our friend Lin Wood, who is, again, sanctioned as a result. This begins on page 28. And as we pointed out, Linwood never at any point provided any kind of an answer to why he bragged about having represented the plaintiffs when he filed his own pleading in Delaware. And you betcha that shows up in this court section, right? It begins, however, with Judge Parker's own question.

0:35:01 Andrew: "When the court asked Wood if he gave permission to have his name included on the pleadings or brief, what he answered, 'I do not specifically recall being asked about the Michigan complaint, but I had generally indicated to Sydney Powell that if she needed a, quote unquote, trial lawyer, I, it, I, I just love that, like, you don't put scare quotes around your own profession, dude, that I would certainly be willing and available to help her in this case. Obviously, my name was included. My experience or my skills were never involvement with it."

0:35:14 Thomas: Trial lawyer. Yeah, I remember that.

0:35:29 Andrew: Would I have objected?

0:35:29 Thomas: Yeah. Is that why he put, put the quotes under, like, he's quoting himself and making sure, because we didn't go to trial, is that what he's saying, like, because it never went to trial, he was never used? Nice try.

0:35:40 Andrew: Yeah. And then it says the court asked Wood if he gave Powell permission to include his name in the filings, to which he responded, I didn't object to it, but I didn' t know. I actually did not know that my name was going to be included, but I certainly told Ms. Powell in discussions I would help her if she needed me, but I was never needed, so I didn''t have anything to do with it."

0:35:48 Thomas: Oh, he's trying so hard, oh, he

0:35:58 Andrew: Wood

0:35:58 Thomas: He's having, trying to have it every single which way.

0:35:59 Andrew: Yeah. And the court sees through this. Wood then denied being served with the motion for sanctions and stated that he was present only at the hearing because the court required him to be there, right, the Marshawn Lynch defense. According to Wood, he only discovered that he had been included in counsel for plaintiffs in this matter when he saw a newspaper article about the sanctions motion. "I didn't receive any notice about this until I saw something in the paper about being sanctioned," quoting him. Then the court springs the trap. When the court turned to Powell and asked whether she told Wood his name was being placed in the pleading, Powell first answered, "My view, Your Honor, is that I did specifically ask Mr. Wood for his permission. I can't imagine that I would have put his name on any pleading without understanding that he had given me permission to do that." Powell then suggested there was a misunderstanding between her and Wood, and Kleinhandler did not recall whether he spoke to Wood before his name was included on the pleating.

0:36:48 Andrew: Then, court does not believe that Wood was unaware of his inclusion as counsel in this case until a newspaper article alerted him to the sanctions motion filed against him, and this is why. First, the city's motion for sanctions was filed on January 5th. At no time between that date and the hearing did Wood ever notify the court that he had been impermissibly included as counsel for plaintiffs in this action. Almost a month before the hearing, the court entered an order requiring them to show up. Wood still did not submit anything to the court claiming his name was placed on those filings without his permission. No reasonable attorney would sit back back silently if his or her name were listed as counsel in a case if permission to do so had not been given. Oh, you're giggling, but paragraph two, first full paragraph on page 31, the very next sentence. Second, Wood is not credible. He claims that he was never served with the city's motion for sanctions. However, counsel for the city represents that the motion was sent to Wood via email and regular mail.

Kimberly Hunt, the office manager for the the city's attorneys, affirms in an affidavit that she mailed a first-class U.S. mail copy of the safe harbor letter and the safe harbor motion letter to Wood on December 15th, and that no copies were returned as undeliverable. And despite being told that he had the opportunity to attach an affitavit to his supplemental brief in order to put an oath behind a factual assertion, we specifically called that one out, he declined to do so.

0:37:22 Thomas: Not

0:38:13 Andrew: And then in the footnote, it says, because notably, while Wood stated at the July 12th hearing that he only learned about the motion seeking sanctions against him when he read about it in a newspaper article, Wood suggests in his supplemental brief that he in fact learned of his involvement when he received a call from one of the attorneys in this matter in mid to late June of 2021, alerting him to the court's order requiring him to appear at the sanctions motions. Motions.

0:38:36 Thomas: Good idea to totally lie your ass off in a situation like this Right, you

0:38:37 Andrew: It is rare for a court to say of an attorney, we don't believe this guy. This guy is not credible, is an astonishing, correct in this case, but an astonishing thing for a court to stay like, yeah, this guy's a liar.

0:38:54 Thomas: Oh That's, that's so good, Andrew.

0:39:02 Andrew: This all, like I said, 110 pages of this, um, you will stop every couple of pages, uh, to just smile at, uh, You know? Yeah, at at statements like, you know, going through the Melissa Carone, you know, drunkie McDrunkerson affidavit, uh, which ends with "and speculation, coincidence, and innuendo could never amount to evidence of an illegal vote dump, much less anything else." It is a chef's

0:39:14 Thomas: Pour yourself a nice glass of wine while you read this you know do you think someone got us this for our fifth anniversary? I'm starting to think that's whoever did that, if you're out there, you know, well done. Thank you.

0:39:38 Andrew: Case. I think they did. I'm going to end with, and the court, and again, the opinion goes on for another 29 pages.

0:39:49 Thomas: Bet it was Teresa Risa.

0:39:51 Andrew: It could be, it very well could Be Teresa, have gotten us this gift, after going through the inquiry done by plaintiff's counsel from the affidavit that's copied and pasted from other cases where they've lost, right? It says, "Plaintiff attorneys argued you've got to be able to trust that when something has been submitted by counsel because the oath that we take, knowing that everybody else within the profession therefore believes the attorney's submission should have tremendous value." The court then says, "Clearly plaintiff counsel relied on the assessment of counsel for the plaintiffs in other cases as to the affidavits from those cases that plaintiff's counsel recycled here." And then we get, to me, this is the line of the opinion: "This is not okay."

0:39:52 Thomas: She probably did this.

0:40:34 Thomas: Wow.

0:40:35 Andrew: The court remains baffled after trying to ascertain what convinced plaintiff'S counsel otherwise.

0:40:41 Thomas: Baffled.

0:40:41 Andrew: Substituting another lawyer's judgment for one's own does not constitute reasonable inquiry. There you go. No. So is this going to persuade Uncle Frank? This is not going to persuade Uncle Frank, but it will not hurt.

0:40:50 Thomas: I don't know. It's not going to hurt, you know, because now when you were, okay, so we should kind of bottom line this. I know, you know, we've all been through a lot of these, but we don't know how often everybody listens to every episode. To sum up here, if anyone is saying that like, well, these claims were never judged on the merits and they fit technicalities to throw out the election fraud claims and da-da-da da-dah. Andrew, what should you say? Because I feel like this will be a good capper to the argument. We've kind of given people the argument as we've gone along, and I feel like this has got to be even better, right?

0:41:28 Andrew: What you want to say is the, quote, evidence that was submitted in those cases, including in Michigan, was so bad that not only was it never presented to a jury, the mere presentment to the court itself, under a far more liberal standard, right, led to the imposition of the most severe sanctions possible, right, led to a six-hour finger-pointing session in which no lawyer wanted to take responsibility for the fact that they had introduced those affidavits, and the court took note. I mean, again, I have read none of this to you. Because, you know, quite frankly, we've been through all of the problems with, you know, the spiders and terpsichores and Gina Carone and Melissa Carone and Russell Ramsland.

0:42:23 Andrew: These affidavits are nonsense on their face. And the court has said, you lawyers looked at this and you knew or should have known that they were ridiculous. And you either didn't care or you did it anyway. Way. And you know what? That does not fly in my court.

0:42:46 Thomas: So, so no.

0:42:48 Andrew: So, you know, that,

0:42:48 Thomas: On the argument that, like, there's, these have never been looked at in the claim, blah-blah-bluh, uh, no. You're just wrong. That will help a few uncles, Frank, I think. Or people, people yeah they're

0:42:55 Andrew: I sure hope so. Right. That, that that the claims are right. Consider the Melissa Carone affidavit. Right? What did you see?

0:43:03 Thomas: So bad they get sanctioned for them

0:43:05 Andrew: I saw a truck. That's, that's literally what her affidavia amounts to.

0:43:05 Thomas: Oh that's incredible cool yeah must be the illuminati

0:43:10 Andrew: I saw it truck. I'm pretty sure they were changing ballots for Biden and carrying new ballots in to be processed out of that truck. And the court says, look, this is not OK. You can't you can't put them off.

0:43:11 Thomas: Yeah I bet it's so bad you don't even get to use it like it's not like oh we don't quite believe it it's like no you this is such bad evidence you don'T even get TO THE POINT WHERE YOU GET TO TRY TO HAVE YOUR DAY IN COURT THAT'S HOW BAD THIS EVIDENCE IS oh so good andrew we're not even done with the good news.

0:43:26 Andrew: Right. Exactly. Exactly, exactly. We're not.

0:43:40 Thomas: Oh, what?

0:43:40 Andrew: We are not.

0:43:41 Thomas: What? They should have sent a poet.

0:43:46 Andrew: All right. So last section and we're getting to it on time and everything else. This is a an asset forfeiture and sanctions of $5,134,500 against John M. Burkman and Jacob Wohl and their made-up company for making 1,141 unlawful robocalls without subscribers' prior express consent in violation of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, TCPA, as codified at 47 U.S.C. Section 227B and the TRACED Act of 2019. So Jacob Wohl went through, made a whole bunch of stupid, ridiculous robocalls. You don't know who Jacob Wohl is. You haven't been listening

0:43:50 Thomas: Oh, what a day.

0:44:03 Thomas: Oh,

0:44:34 Andrew: To our show.

0:44:35 Thomas: You're lucky. If you're going to look at a picture of a make sure there's nothing punchable in the vicinity that's going to break, you know, like a, you know fine vase or like a mirror, you know if you get in a soft room if you're gonna look at the picture of this guy. Most punchable face in the history of punchable faces.

0:44:52 Andrew: And these were deliberately fraudulent robocall aimed at Democratic voters that said, you know, you're going to have to pay all of your outstanding debts in order to cast your vote, that, you could be deported, that some of them saying that the election was on a different day. I mean, just the kind of low-grade nonsense that Jacob Wall would come up with you know, to try and swing the election. So a couple of things to know here. This is not a Federal Elections Commission sanction. This a Federal Communications Commission, the FCC. OK. And the reason for that is the FEC, the Federal Elections Commission, is broken right now.

0:45:42 Andrew: The FEC has six members, of which no more than three can be from the same party. Four are required for a quorum, and there's no vote for a tiebreaker, right? And so what Trump What did was, time period, from August of 2019 to December of 2020, that is through the 2020 elections, didn't nominate anyone to the FEC, didn't bother, had retiring Republicans and just said, oh, look, if I can keep this commission of three or fewer people, then they can't do any business. They could not vote on complaints. They could not issue guidance during an election that was subject to, and to the best of our intelligence estimates, was affirmatively interfered with. Now, in two subsequent elections by Russia, by a hostile foreign power, our executive branch overseeing an election lacked a quorum at the direct instigation of the former president.

0:45:33 Thomas: Huh. Uh, yeah. Yeah.

0:46:46 Thomas: Seems legit, right? That seems like totally normal above board thing to be doing. Just disable like a, you know, the, the agency that's supposed to be looking over things like this.

0:46:55 Andrew: And if you're thinking, oh, well, maybe it was not deliberate, then I think it would be a challenge to explain why on December 9th, 2020, three new members were appointed by Trump and confirmed by the Senate in the lame duck session.

0:47:09 Thomas: Very interesting.

0:47:10 Andrew: Yeah, very, very interesting. That's right. So FEC is broken. It is politically split 3-3. And unless it's a 4-2 or better, it undertakes no action. So there's a problem. The FCC, on the other hand, a five-member component, of which three can be from one party. But weirdly, right now, it is two Democrats and two Republicans. There is an open Biden nominee for that fifth seat, which he can fill with a Democrat. He can pick whomever he wants. And it is a legitimate criticism to say should have filled that spot by now, right? You can point out, yes, McConnell's going to McConnell. He's been slowing down everything that they can do and, you know, casting pointless votes against and to and to derail Biden nominees in the Senate. But there is not a nominee for that fifth spot. And Biden should have one.

0:48:08 Andrew: And in fact, was a speech given by Tom Wheeler, who was Obama's former FCC chair, that said, you don't realize how important it is to have a new FCC. Remember, Ajit Pai was the outgoing chair of the FCC under Donald Trump, who reversed the rules on net neutrality, can't right? Get to work on those, you know, sort of most controversial issues so long as it is deadlocked 2-2, right? You have two votes that were the commissioners who were there with Pai for maintaining the differential access rules. The FCC also needs to look at entirety of consumer protection from misleading advertising, television, radio, internet.

0:48:05 Thomas: That's interesting. Yeah,

0:49:02 Andrew: They need to set telecommunications policy, right? Like SpaceX is launching like a thousand satellites a day. And, you know, there's not great oversight of this right now. So really, really important to staff up the FCC. Now, I told you the FCC was partisan split too, too. Had they come out in this case, unanimous. This is a case of first impression under that traced amendments to the Telecommunication Consumer Protection Act. These were 2019 amendments that said cannot engage in dialing without a person's consent. And And Berkman had thousands of these pre-recorded voice message calls. This is paragraph four of the complaint. The recorded messages told potential voters that if they voted by mail, their personal information will be part of a public database that will be used by police departments to track down old warrants and used by credit card companies to collect outstanding debts. Um, and so even

0:49:23 Thomas: I

0:50:09 Andrew: The Republicans on the FCC are like, yeah, that's 100% the kind of thing that this law was meant to prohibit. Uh You guys came out in public and admitted you made the call because of course they did. There's... there's a lovely paragraph, there's paragraph eight that says, "The evidence supports finding that Burkman, Wohl, and their entity made the calls. First, the voice messages identified Burkman and Wohl by name." And Burkman's personal wireless telephone number was listed as the calling party on the recipient's caller ID. You may recall that we shared the screenshot of that as the graphic for our show we did when discussing this particular fraud. What, so uh, yeah, and

0:50:26 Thomas: Do remember that

0:50:57 Andrew: Yeah.

0:50:57 Thomas: Smart.

0:50:57 Andrew: And uh, and the FCC liked it as well. "Second, Burkman and Wohl have admitted under oath their involvement in the creation and distribution of the robocalls. Third, both dialing platforms provided service agreements signed by Burkman that listed his residential address and personal cell phone number. Fourth, email exchanges between or among Wohl, Burkman, and a sales agent for one of the dialing platforms discussed customizing the robocall campaign and ad pricing. In one email, Burkman directed the dialing platform to use his personal cell phone as the number listed on the recordings as a callback number. Burkman also provided the dial platform with a list of eight zip codes that he directed the platform to target with the robocalls. Ultimately, Burkman agreed on a price and paid one of the dial platforms using a MasterCard issued in his name." You know, these are not smart criminals.

0:51:42 Thomas: These are smart criminals, sophisticated masters of crime.

0:51:47 Andrew: So, Uh, Preliminary findings. Uh, that's the recommendation. Um, this, uh, proposed action, so it's called a Notice of Apparent Liability for Forfeiture. Um, the commission, uh, now gets to hear back, right? The parties will be given an opportunity to respond, and the commission will consider the party's submission of evidence and legal arguments before acting further, uh, to resolve the matter. So, um, we get to continue to follow this. I am sure that whatever Berkman and Wall submit in connection with this is going to be delightful, and, uh, and we will enjoy reading it as much as I've enjoyed

0:51:48 Thomas: Oh God, how did it take this long?

0:52:25 Thomas: Oh,

0:52:25 Andrew: Reading this. Yeah, it's so, Yep, there you go.

0:52:26 Thomas: What a day, Andrew. This is one of the best episodes we've ever done. Just, what great, it's such a long, it has been such a Long Slog. And I don't mean our show, I mean, just waiting for consequences. You know, it'S been such such a brutal journey. And yet, if you're here with us right now, you know, I guess it's not exactly Yodel Mountain, but it's like an adjacent peak. It's like K2. What is that one?

0:52:38 Andrew: Yeah, it feels good, K2.

0:52:53 Thomas: K1? K2?

0:52:53 Andrew: K2.

0:52:54 Thomas: Yeah, it's a K2, so good.

0:52:54 Andrew: Too. There you go. I feel like I'm standing out viewing a majestic landscape. Well, there's only one thing that could make it better.

0:53:00 Thomas: Yes. What's that?

0:53:04 Andrew: That would be if you nail this Thomas takes the bar exam question.

0:53:07 Thomas: Okay. Well, we'd better get on over to T3BE. Here we go.

0:53:11 Clip: Oh, no associate of this firm has ever failed the bar exam. No kidding.

0:53:17 Andrew: So Thomas, a student at a private university, sued the university in federal court for negligence after he fell from scaffolding in a university-owned theater building. At trial, after briefing from both parties, the court permitted the jury to hear testimony that there had been several previous accidents in the same building. The jury found for the student, and the university appealed. One of the university's arguments on appeal is that the testimony about the previous accidents should have been excluded as irrelevant and highly prejudicial. What standard of review applies to this argument? A, abusive discretion. B, clearly erroneous. C, de novo. Or D, harmless error. You

0:53:38 Thomas: Oh.

0:53:51 Thomas: Come on Standard of review de, novo. Oh. For the love, this is brutal. Okay, you know, it's funny, this like almost could be about my school. There was a, unfortunately, I didn't know it was someone, um, it's a theater university on theater, but yeah, that's funny. There was, I, it was before my, it was like just before I was there, but I did theater, you know, in the, at my university. And there apparently was an accident involving like, you know, one of those, uh, what do they call them? Cherry pickers or something. One of those things that like lift you up into to the do work on the whatever. Someone like went in the theater and did that on their own, like without anybody supervising, and like didn't put the little foot things down properly on the thing, and it fell over, and I think they eventually were okay, but it was a bad accident. Anyway, I wonder, I don't know if it's related because I don't know if there was like other things, but anyway, let's get to the question. Here we go. So here's the thing.

This, this strikes me as sort of the OJ Simpson thing, where it's like, shouldn't we be allowed to hear that? You know, all this previous history of like his wife calling nine one one and crying and all that. And somehow they weren't allowed to here some of those things.

But anyway, I feel like there, it's highly prejudicial, I think you've said that before, like it's, it's so I think it's a high bar to clear to hear testimony of something like this, you know, but but this feels very relevant to me.

0:54:25 Andrew: Fell off a balcony. Yeah.

0:54:46 Andrew: Yeah

0:55:38 Thomas: You know, the fact that like you're suing the university for negligence, and there have been several accidents in the same building, that that really seems relevant to your case, that the university, you know, whether it's minds, whether it's men's right, not exactly men's red, but like whether or not they knew, you know, like it's, that has to be relevant. I can't imagine that this shouldn't be allowed, but the question is about the, about the standard of review. Okay. One of the university's arguments on appeal is that the testimony about the previous accidents should have been excluded as irrelevant and highly prejudicial. I don't know about irrelevant, I guess, but highly, highly prejudicial, sure. Okay.

0:56:24 Thomas: Which standard of review applies to this argument? So, oh, oh, okay. The jury found for the student, um, after briefing both parties, the court. So this is like the court, so the judge, so we're reviewing the judge's decision. The thingy we're actually reviewing is the judging judge allowing this testimony to be heard. So I I don't know if that matters. That strikes me as slightly different than we're actually reviewing the decision. It's like we're reviewing the evidence itself. You know, I think that's not what we're doing. I think we're revealing the so in order to overturn the case because this is on appeal. OK, OK, maybe I'm maybe I'M getting a handle on this in order to overturnthe case on appeal, the standard of review for this decision.

0:57:14 Thomas: And I think, you know, abusive discretion is jumping out at me because I think that, oh, what is the example that's come up before where you've said like the standard is abusive discretion? Like it has to be the judge couldn't have allowed it. Oh man, I hope that this isn't just a bad coincidence that we've had something that had that exact thing recently. But I think this is the same as the thing I'm not remembering, because it's about the, the judge's decision to allow the testimony. Clearly erroneous, I think, is more the jury stuff, maybe. I but whatever, I don't, maybe that's wrong. Okay. C, de novo, so that would mean like you're just reviewing it like for the first time, I think. I don't think it could be that. D, harmless error, that cannot be harmless error. I, I think I'm solidly eliminating C or D, de novo or harmless error, I think that can't be right. I think it's either either A, abuse of discretion, or B, clearly erroneous.

0:58:14 Thomas: So which standard do we judge on appeal? You know, I hate it. I'm worried about this, but I feel like abuse of discretion because it is the court, it is The Judge deciding this. And I think the decision has to be so bad that it's an abuse of The Judge's discretion. Oh man, is that right though? So, yeah, I'm going to go with A. I think I think it's A. I'm between A and B. And let's see if the coin agrees. The coin agrees with me. OK, so at least this time the coin is going down with the ship here. So the coin and I pick A, abuse of discretion. The other answer being B, clearly erroneous. And I'm pretty sure C and D are just worthless. But hopefully I'm right about that. All right. Final answer.

0:58:57 Andrew: All right. And if you'd like to play along with Thomas and the coin, you know how to do that. Just share out this episode on social media, include the hashtag T3BE, include your guess, your reasons therefore. We will pick a winner and shower that winner with never-ending fame and fortune. Fame and fortune not guaranteed.

0:59:10 Clip: And thank you, Let's go!

0:59:12 Thomas: Now it's time to thank our new patrons. And reminder, new patrons, you get to, uh, join us for the live Q&A, not only join us für die Q&A, but ask the questions on that Patreon thread that Andrew has already put up. So go find it on patreon.com/law. But here are our new patrons who get to be a part of that.

0:59:30 Thomas: IreneWendyWode.com, open to ghostwriting the OA legal thriller. Oh, okay. Wow. We'll keep that in mind.

0:59:37 Andrew: We may have to be in touch with you, Irene. I

0:59:39 Thomas: Thank you to Phil Kiely, Linda Blackwelder, Jouni Mustonen, Marck Gorszwick, JJ, neyat steimer, horrorbusiness, John and Steph Kochay, and Magnus, uh, unpronounceable characters, sorry, I didn't come through the the import correctly, but verge something, sorry, uh, your turn, Andrew.

1:00:01 Andrew: Thank you you to Arturo Rosas, to tbar, to Longtime listener, Transformers-Robotech law episode made me become a patron. Well, I've got to do 12 more. Sorry. To A queer little Owlbear, Jen Emira, Donald Bell, Arthur Ruckle, Frozen Cusser, Tyler Dvorshock, and Evan. Thank you all so much for supporting the show. Yeah, you get the shout out. Give us as little as a buck an episode over at patreon.com/law. I

1:00:12 Thomas: Yeah and that's our show. Oh, what a, what a good one, Andrew. That was, oh, I feel so good. I feel so much better. Just so satisfied.

1:00:38 Andrew: Gotta I got a good one lined up for next week too. We're gonna have fun there

1:00:38 Thomas: Oh of course we got the knowledge fight guys coming on. We even should have teased that. Well, if you stayed this late, you get the teaser. That's why you always stay through the whole show. That is going to be a ton of fun. But I feel so much better, Andrew. What a great show. And we will see everybody on Tuesday's episode.

1:00:46 Andrew: You go, that's a teaser until then

1:00:56 Clip: I move for a bad court thingy. You mean a mistrial? Yeah, that's why you're the judge and I'm the law talking guy.

1:01:29 Clip: www.openargs.com. Be sure to join the Facebook group at facebook.com/groups/Yodel Mountain and follow us on Twitter at OpenArgs. This podcast is a production of Opening Arguments Media LLC, all rights reserved. It is produced with the assistance of transcriptionist Heather Leverage, production assistant Ashley Smith, and additional contributions from Morgan Stringer and Debra Smith. Special thanks to Teresa Gomez, who runs our live shows and heads up the OA Wiki, follow at OA Wiki on Twitter. Additional thanks to the moderators of the Opening Arguments Facebook community, Emily Waters, Alicia Cook, Eric Brewer, Natalie Newell, Brian Ziegenhagen, and Teresa. And finally, thanks to Thomas Smith, who edits the show and created the fabulous theme music, which was used with permission.