The Circuit Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, as it is prone to do, issued another warning to attorneys filing briefs in its court. In Abner v. Scott Memorial Hospital, 634 F. 3d 962 (7th Cir. 2011) the Court issued an order to show cause why the appellants should not be sanctioned for filing an over-sized brief without permission. The appeal involved was a grant of summary judgment to the defendant in a suit under the False Claims Act. The attorney for the appellant certified that the brief complied with the word count limitation requirements of the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure. However the brief exceeded the 14,000 word limit in that it contained 18,000 words. The Court rejected the contention by appellant’s attorney that he inadvertently considered only the words included in the argument section. The Court pointed out that it was clear what words should be included in the count.
The appellants brief was stricken and the Court commented that it could go further and said:
“The flagrancy of the violation in this case might well justify the dismissal of the appeal; let this be a warning. But in addition it is plain from the briefs that the appeal has no merit. To allow time for the appellants to file a compliant brief and the appellees to file a revised brief in response, and to reschedule oral argument, would merely delay the inevitable.” (p. 965)