Little Rock City Manager Bruce Moore has been ordered to appear in court next week to explain why the city failed to pay a penalty levied by a judge two weeks ago.
Circuit Judge Tim Fox fined the city $10,000 on April 25 for not being ready for trial in the case of a former police officer suing the city and for failing to follow the judge's scheduling order. His order required the city to pay the fine by Thursday.
The date came and went without any payment from the city.
City Attorney Tom Carpenter filed two motions May 3 asking Fox to reconsider the fine and to postpone the payment deadline until he had ruled on the motion to reconsider.
Fox responded to the two requests around noon Monday, denying them both without further explanation.
He then issued another order requiring Moore to appear in his courtroom next Monday at 10:15 a.m. "to show cause why the defendant should not be cited with contempt for failure to comply with the court's order of April 25."
Carpenter and Moore declined to comment Tuesday about the new order.
Carpenter explained in his motions last week that the city hadn't made the payment by the due date "in light of the legal issues and arguments" he raised. He argued that the $10,000 penalty against the city was excessive and improper.
Carpenter wrote in his motions that Arkansas Rules of Civil Procedure limit the instances in which a sanction can be issued against a party that is represented by counsel, and that both instances require notice and an opportunity for the party to respond within 14 days.
"The city has not had notice or an opportunity to respond to the charges levied against it," Carpenter said.
He also argued that Rule 11, which Fox cited in his order issuing the fine, requires an explanation as to how a monetary sanction is determined.
Fox didn't say in his April 25 order how he came up with the $10,000 fine.
In that order he chastised the city and attorney Latonya Austin, who was representing the city in a lawsuit filed by Tiffany Malone, a former police officer. Malone is alleging sex discrimination and retaliation in her discipline and termination from the Little Rock Police Department.
Fox said the city should have put more than one attorney on the case, which he called "complex." He also said Austin "made numerous statements on the record indicating she had not properly or professionally prepared the case for trial."
His penalty came after Austin had filed for the third time a motion seeking to delay the trial, which was set for the next week.
A day after Fox's order, the city took Austin off the case and substituted her with deputy city attorneys Amy Beckman Fields and Alexander J. Betton.
In Carpenter's motion for reconsideration, he said Austin had two "significant medical scares" that were unforeseen, and that was the reason for at least one of her requests for continuance.
He also justified assigning Austin to the case.
"At the time the case was assigned, it appeared to be a straightforward appeal from a decision of the Civil Service Commission. However, the complaint added additional allegations that attempted to expand this appeal into a cause of action for wrongful discharge and discrimination. When this case was assigned, Ms. Austin believed that she had the time and resources necessary to handle the litigation," Carpenter said.
"In this particular situation, because of the nature of the case, and the fact that for the first 11 months after the case was filed there was no action on the part of opposing counsel to pursue the matter, a great deal of work was not done on the case as other matters with pressing scheduling orders were pursued," he added.
A new trial date in the lawsuit filed by Malone has not been set.
Metro on 05/11/2016