Decisions split on sanctions by magistrates

Trial Notebook

By Steven P. Garmisa

Hoey & Farina

Posted March 8, 2021 11:51 AM

Christy Mallory’s slip-and-fall claim against Rush University Medical Center “has not gone smoothly (to put it mildly),” U.S. District Judge Sara L. Ellis recounted when Mallory asked Ellis to vacate $16,741 in sanctions imposed by a magistrate judge. Mallory, relying on three decisions from the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, “contends that the magistrate judge did not have the authority to independently order her or her counsel to pay sanctions; rather, he could only recommend sanctions, which this court would then …

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