When most lawyers get rapped by a federal judge, they take their lumps and move on. But Peter Nickles, attorney general for the District of Columbia, isn’t like most lawyers. On April 7, he went toe-to-toe with U.S. District Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle, trading jabs in court in Evans v. Fenty, a three-decades-old class action involving court oversight of city services for the mentally disabled. Huvelle dressed down Nickles for a recent filing in which the District proposed ending oversight in nine months. She had asked the city to work out a settlement with the plaintiffs, she said, not draw up a plan on its own. “The problem is, you’ve lost the case,” she said. Nickles later retorted that “this castigating of our efforts is unseemly.” The verbal pugilism continued through the afternoon, with Huvelle often fighting to get a word in edgewise. “You are not listening to what I’m saying,” she said at one point, obviously irritated. But Nickles did eventually agree to go back to the negotiating table. — Jordan Weissmann
AT HISTORY
This content has been archived. It is available through our partners, LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law.
To view this content, please continue to their sites.
Not a Lexis Subscriber?
Subscribe Now
Not a Bloomberg Law Subscriber?
Subscribe Now
LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law are third party online distributors of the broad collection of current and archived versions of ALM's legal news publications. LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law customers are able to access and use ALM's content, including content from the National Law Journal, The American Lawyer, Legaltech News, The New York Law Journal, and Corporate Counsel, as well as other sources of legal information.
For questions call 1-877-256-2472 or contact us at [email protected]
