Attorneys for the city of Inglewood are asking a judge to throw out a sexual harassment lawsuit filed by Mayor James T. Butts Jr.’s former assistant and ex-girlfriend on the grounds that she has stalled and obstructed the case for more than a year.
A legal motion filed Wednesday, May 15, requests the court dismiss 3-year-old case and impose $217,404 in sanctions against the former assistant, Melanie McDade-Dickens, for refusing to “produce evidence supporting her allegations” and “engaging in a staggering pattern of discovery abuses.”
“From the beginning, the City has made clear that Melanie McDade’s case lacks merit,” said Mira Hashmall, a partner at Miller Barondess LLP and outside counsel for Inglewood, in a statement. “After violating multiple court orders and refusing to produce evidence to support her claims, her latest tactic has been to submit false documents in an effort to cover up her forgery, bank fraud, and other serious misconduct. This is a blatant abuse of the courts and warrants significant sanctions.”
The city’s attorneys argued in the filing that McDade-Dickens and her counsel have now violated three separate court orders to produce records and have inundated the defense team with thousands of pages of irrelevant material. Some documents may have been edited by McDade-Dickens, including psychiatric records requested by the defense, the motion alleges.
The attorney handling the motion asked for $217,404 in sanctions as she contends she spent 439 hours at a rate of $495 per hour “performing work as a direct result of Plaintiff’s continued discovery abuse.”
If the court declines to terminate the case, it should “issue evidentiary sanctions barring McDade from offering evidence in support of any of her claims or damages.”
In a statement, McDade-Dickens’ attorney, Ernest Martin Jr., called the motion a “ridiculous and non-meritorious” attempt to delay the case’s October trial date and to “avoid accountability for…
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