Government

Sidney Powell's Latest Lawsuit Has Been A Journey... Where The Car Flips Five Times And Explodes

I don't think she can count on winning this one, you guys.

By  
on

Krakens aren’t particularly successful.

As mythological creatures go, the Kraken is one of the big losers of the genre. The Midgard Serpent gets to live until the end times. Krampus is always there to punish naughty boys and girls. Even the very Kraken-like Cthulhu just gets to chill out in the lost city of R’lyeh. But the Kraken is always the loser. Tennyson said “In roaring he shall rise and on the surface die.” In Clash of the Titans, Harry Hamlin bested the Kraken with the help of a tragic haircut. The point is, Krakens aren’t actually indomitable forces of nature, but blustery spectacles that amount to minor speedbumps.

Sidney Powell has embraced the “Release the Kraken” catchphrase from that Hamlin film and is faring about as well as her cinematic counterpart at this point.

Yesterday, Powell filed a new lawsuit challenging the election results in Wisconsin on behalf of proposed Trump Elector Bill Feehan and local candidate Derrick Van Orden. This is the first point where things went off the rails:

That’s not a great start!

It wouldn’t get much better as one waded through the meandering conspiracy theory-laden complaint and tried to discern the requested relief:

Sponsored

Immediate production of 48 hours of security camera recording of all rooms used in the voting process at the TCF Center for November 3, 2020 and November 4, 2020.

The TCF Center is in Michigan. Maybe Wisconsin can ask them nicely for a copy.

Powell filed a simultaneous motion for injunctive relief. Today, Chief Judge Pamela Pepper issued an order on that motion and takes us on a wild ride.

The motion indicated that the specific relief the plaintiffs were requesting was laid out in an attached order. Dkt. No. 2 at 1. This language was highlighted and in a larger font than the rest of the motion. There was no order attached. At the end of the motion, under the words “Certificate of Service,” the following statement appeared (also highlighted): “This is to certify that I have on this day e-filed the foregoing Plaintiffs’ Motion to File Affidavits Under Seal and For In Camera Review with the Clerk of Court using the CM/ECF system, and that I have delivered the filing to the Defendants by email and FedEx at the following addresses:”. Id. at 2. No addresses were listed below this statement and no documents were filed under seal. There was no request for in camera review.

Surely there’s an explanation?

Sponsored

At 3:15 that afternoon, the plaintiffs filed another document. It appears on the docket as a motion to amend or correct, but the document itself is captioned, “Plaintiffs’ Corrected Motion for Declaratory, Emergency, and Permanent Injunctive Relief.” Dkt. No. 6. This motion indicates that the earlier motion was an inadvertently filed draft and acknowledges that the referenced proposed order had not been attached.

There we go. So now everything makes sense and we can move on to a hearing, right?

There is a proposed order attached to the afternoon’s amended motion. Dkt. No. 6-1. The proposed order asks various injunctions, declarations and orders. It does not ask for a hearing.

Uh oh. Can we at least entertain the motion?

Because the afternoon motion indicates that the plaintiffs “will” provide electronic notice to the adverse parties, the court does not know whether the plaintiffs have yet provided notice to the adverse parties or when they will do so. Until the plaintiffs notify the court that they have provided notice to the adverse parties, the court will not take any action because the motion does not comply with the requirements of Rule 65(b).

Emails are close to instantaneous, so that can be cured quickly and then we can move forward with this forthwith…

If the plaintiffs have provided notice to the adverse parties, under Civil Local Rule 7(b) (E.D. Wis.) those parties have twenty-one days to respond to the motion and under Civil L.R. 7(c) the plaintiffs have fourteen days to reply. While the caption of the motion includes the word “emergency” and the attached proposed order seeks an “expedited” injunction, neither the motion nor the proposed order indicate whether the plaintiffs are asking the court to act more quickly or why. As indicated, the motion does not request a hearing. It does not propose a briefing schedule.

Honestly, check out the whole order on the next page. At this point, Team Kraken should just provide boilerplate to plaintiffs acting pro se. At least then the courts would theoretically bend over backward to overlook the most glaring screw-ups.

HeadshotJoe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.

1 2Next »

Topics

, , , ,