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Ninth Circuit Dumps Appeal Based on Lawyer’s Duplicity
Opinion Says Attorney Angela R. Swan Misrepresented Holdings, Apparently Cited Two Nonexistent Cases
By a MetNews Staff Writer
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ANGELA R. SWAN attorney |
The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday struck an appellants’ brief, because it was stuffed with false representations of law, and dismissed the appeal.
Circuit Judge Roopali H. Desai authored the opinion.
The appeal is from a summary judgment granted by District Court Senior Judge James V. Selna in favor of the City of Long Beach and police officer Gabriela Rodriguez-Lopez in an action brought by Larry Grant and his daughter, Pherin Cephus, a minor. Various state and federal claims were put forth based on Rodriguez having come, on Sept. 19, 2020, to an apartment shared by Grant and his fiancée to pick up Pherin and bring her to her mother who had come from Atlanta, where she resides, to retrieve the child.
Grant, as an individual and as guardian ad litem for Pherin, was represented in the District Court by Torrance attorney Angela R. Swan.
Desai’s Opinion
In Friday’s opinion, Desai said:
“To fairly consider cases on appeal, we require parties to present reliable and understandable support for their claims….We have discretion to dismiss appeals because of deficiencies in the briefs….
“Here, Appellants filed an opening brief replete with misrepresentations and fabricated case law.”
He continued:
“Unfortunately, Appellants not only materially misrepresent the facts and holdings of the cases they cite in the brief, but they also cite two cases that do not appear to exist.”
Asked about those two cases at oral argument in Pasadena on March 7, Swan said that one of the cases “was cited incorrectly” and as to the other case, it “just did not apply, so I would have to just not rely on that case.”
Cases Not Explained
Desai also noted:
“Appellants’ brief includes only a handful of accurate citations, almost all of which were of little use to this Court because they were not accompanied by coherent explanations of how they supported Appellants’ claims. No reply brief was filed.”
Swan commented yesterday:
“[W]e will be filing a petition to the CA Supreme Court. This is Jim Crow 2.0. Unbelievable.”
The case is Grant v. City of Long Beach, 22-56121.
Swan’s Background
Swan, whose law degree is from Whittier College, was admitted to the State Bar of California in 2001. She has no disciplinary history.
However, on March 14, 2022, Div. Two of the Fourth District Court of Appeal, in an unpublished opinion in Gossett v. Jackson, dismissed an appeal because the appellant was not aggrieved by the judgment. It ordered that sanctions be paid by the appellant and his lawyer, Swan, with the amount to be set on remand by the Riverside Superior Court.
In Timmins v. Zheng, Div. Two of the Fourth District Court of Appeal on April 1, 2021, in an opinion not certified for publication, dismissed an appeal Swan brought on behalf of a client from a nonappealable order. The respondent’s brief in that case recites:
“The trial court was entitled to find—and did find—that Defendants’ counsel was not credible and the record amply supports that finding as there was reliable evidence showing multiple instances where attorney Swan lied to the trial court under penalty of perjury.”
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