Legal Ethics
Ex-Houston DA Fined $19K for ‘Venomous’ Deletion of E-Mails
Posted Mar 31, 2008, 07:04 am CST
By Debra Cassens Weiss
A federal judge has ordered Houston’s former district attorney Charles Rosenthal to pay almost $19,000 for his “venomous” deletion of thousands of e-mails.
U.S. District Judge Kenneth Hoyt imposed the sanction after finding Rosenthal in contempt of court for violating a subpoena for the e-mail in a civil rights lawsuit, the Houston Chronicle reports.
Hoyt said Rosenthal knowingly deleted the e-mail, the Associated Press reports. "The court finds several areas of contradictions and misrepresentations that render [Rosenthal's] testimony unreliable and incredible. Moreover, the court views his conduct as venomous and hostile to the judicial process," Hoyt wrote.
The civil rights case involved a wrongful arrest and settled for $1.7 million earlier this month. Rosenthal resigned in February after disclosures that the e-mails contained off-color jokes, racial slurs and amorous notes to a former secretary.