Estate of John Marvin Blas, Through Mildred Chargualaf, Personal Representative, and Mark E. Griffin, Guam Legal Services Corp. v. Paul Winkler, M.D.

Plaintiff’s counsel, Mark Griffin, appeals from the district court’s imposition of sanctions on him personally for filing a motion to reconsider. Plaintiff asked the district court to reconsider its denial of plaintiff’s request for attorney’s fees for successfully obtaining a discovery order compelling the defendant to answer requests for admissions. The district court concluded that the motion to reconsider was an unreasonable and vexatious multiplication of proceedings and, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1927 , awarded attorney’s fees and costs to the defendant. We reverse.

I.

On June 7, 1984, plaintiff served defendant with forty-five requests for admissions. Defendant objected to seventeen requests, and on August 21, 1984, plaintiff filed a motion to determine the sufficiency of six of these objections. Although Griffin signed the last page of the combined motion and supporting memorandum, he failed to sign immediately following the motion itself. After a hearing on the motion, the district court concluded that the failure to sign the motion violated Fed.R.Civ.P. ll’s certification requirement and granted defendant’s motion to strike the plaintiff’s motion.

Plaintiff then filed a…