Over the years, Minnesota Litigator has had touchstones, you might call them, or recurring post themes and one of them has been sanctions. As a blog that focuses on news and developments in Minnesota civil litigation, sanctions are of interest because, in a sense, they illustrate the pinch points, one might say, between respective Minnesota litigators (the movants and respondents) and/or between particular Minnesota litigators and particular judges.
Presumably, some readers have absorbed some of the messages we’ve hoped to disseminate in some of our recurrent themes. We like to think so. For those of you who have not, we post about another case standing for the proposition that Minnesota courts are not particularly amenable to motions for sanctions.
They do not like them.
The critical practice pointers are (1) think more than twice about bringing a motion for sanctions; and (2) if you bring one, follow the procedural provisions of Minn. R. Civ. P. 11 strictly.
Minnesota litigator, Mark A. Olson, did not. Specifically, he failed to served the motion papers on his adversary three weeks before filing the papers with the court. As a result, in the linked case, Mr. Olson expended the resources of a motion, which was denied, and an appeal, which was denied. One hopes that clients were not billed for the motion and appeal which were dead on arrival since they were procedurally improper.