Judge sticks with $268K sanction for fake news article lawyer filed with appeals court
A federal judge in California is requiring a Seattle lawyer to pay $251,000 in attorney fees and nearly $17,000 in interest for filing a fake news story with a federal appeals court in San Francisco. Image from Shutterstock.
A federal judge in California is requiring a Seattle lawyer to pay $251,000 in attorney fees and nearly $17,000 in interest for filing a fake news story with a federal appeals court in San Francisco.
U.S. District Judge Jeffrey S. White of the Northern District of California ordered lawyer Edward C. Chung to pay the sanction in a Jan. 8 judgment after rejecting Chung’s request for a hearing, Law360 reports.
Chung had sought to file the fake Saudi Sun article in July 2021 as a “supplemental exhibit” for “demonstrative purposes” to bolster his attempt to enforce an $18 billion arbitration award against the Chevron Corp. and other entities. The article was attached to a motion filed with the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals at San Francisco.
In an August 2022 letter, Chung told the 9th Circuit that the article was a “hypothetical paper” intended to summarize the court record, and he had informed the court of the purpose.
Chung’s letter accused two 9th Circuit judges of “an obvious abuse of judicial authority, corruption and collusion between you, Chevron Corporation and its counsel of record, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher.”
Chung didn’t show up for the August 2022 sanctions hearing. The 9th Circuit found in June 2023 that the article was a “fraud upon the court” and asked White to determine the sanction amount.
White awarded the full amount of attorney fees sought by the Chevron Corp. Chung then told White in an October 2023 letter that he had reason to think that White didn’t actually sign the order for sanctions.
“Please understand there has been so many profound oddities, threats and misrepresentations made in this case by Chevron and their counsels, we have good reason to believe it is necessary to assure the legitimacy of the court orders being executed,” Chung wrote.
Chung is a lawyer with Chung Malhas & Mantel. Chung told the ABA Journal in an email Tuesday morning that he had a deposition but would respond to questions by the end of the day. Later, he told the Journal that he couldn’t respond until Wednesday morning.
