Lawyer tampers with trial exhibit, dodges sanctions by pleading age

At first lawyer J. Kendall Few, trying a case against Kia Motors alleging seat belt failure, denied tampering with the seat belt in an exhibit car so as to produce an effect prejudicial to the automaker’s case. “Later he admitted he had moved the seat belt, but said he thought he had returned it to its original position. ‘I’m 70 years old, and I’d been through a fairly hard day. I went down there, and I don’t remember everything as good as I did when I was 25 or 30,’ Few said.” A federal judge said it was a “close call” but declined to levy sanctions, finding “there was no conclusive evidence that Few had acted in bad faith or committed intentional misconduct”. [ABA Journal]

5 Comments

  • In the absence of bad faith or intentinal misconduct, I wonder if Few would counsel clients not to sue ederly surgeons accused of malpractice?

  • The judge should have let him off the hook in return for his license to practice law. If the attorney is that forgetful, then he oughtn’t be practicing.

  • And if the judge is that gullible maybe he should be practicing either.

  • should = shouldn’t

  • “The judge should have let him off the hook in return for his license to practice law. If the attorney is that forgetful, then he oughtn’t be practicing.”

    The lawyer gets a pass on age because the judge is only 3 years his junior.
    http://www.pawd.uscourts.gov/Documents/Public/Reference/mcverry.pdf