A federal judge in the Southern District of New York was apparently misled by defense counsel when he issued an order leveling more than $700,000 in sanctions against a Bronx landlord who claimed a T-Mobile rooftop antenna damaged his building, a federal appeals court ruled.

A unanimous panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit also said Southern District Judge Alvin Hellerstein's April 2016 order—in which the court said plaintiff Robert Spring committed an “elaborate and persuasive fraud on the court” and had to pay litigation costs for T-Mobile and co-defendant Skyline Steel Fabricators and Erectors—was in “serious tension” with a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling limiting sanctions for bad-faith conduct.

Western District Judge Lawrence Vilardo, sitting on the panel by designation, said in the court's opinion that Hellerstein had been apparently misled by the declaration of T-Mobile's trial counsel, Marc Rapaport of the Rapaport Law Firm, which had accused Spring of embellishing details for a report on work to be done on his building.