IN THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE FIRST JUDICIAL CIRCUITIN AND FOR WALTON COUNTY, FLORIDA

CIVIL DIVISION

JOHN P. CARROLL,

Plaintiff, Case No.: 09CA002021v.

WATERSOUND BEACH COMMUNITY ASSOCIATION, INC., Florida CorporationDAVID LILIENTHAL, individuallyand as Director,MARY JOULE, SANDRA MATTESON,RONALD VOELKER,WATERCOLOR COMMUNITY ASSOCIATION, INC.JOHN DOE and JANE DOE

Defendants.

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PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR CONTEMPT OR SANCTIONS

COMES NOW Plaintiff John Carroll (“Carroll”), pursuant to Florida Rules

of Civil Procedure, and moves for an Order of Contempt or Sanctions and other

relief against Defendants Joule, Lilienthal, WaterSound, Matteson, Watercolor and

Voelker for violating the Order of this Court to meet and prepare a list of Exhibits

for use at trial, along with a list of documents that have been objected to.

Plaintiff, states:

1. On June 2, 2011 this Court held its pre-trial conference wherein

the Court instructed the parties to meet and exchange each and every Exhibit

appearing on their Exhibit lists to determine in advance which documents the

parties would agree to enter as Exhibits at trial. The transcript is attached herein

for clarity:

THE COURT: You would need to meet with

5 John Humphrey as soon as possible to take care

6 of any of that now. It sounds to me like we

7 have some fairly voluminous exhibits. And

8 Mr. Carroll, I understand you're not an

9 attorney, but the way that it's done in these

10 cases where we have a lot of documents is

11 normally we'll have a notebook that will be

12 presented. And the parties will agree on the

13 documents that aren't disputed and will

14 introduce them as a group and won't go through

15 each document showing it to the jury because

16 it will take needless time, and they won't have

17 time to consider them as they're shown on the

18 screen anyway. So I would expect the parties

19 to meet and agree on all exhibits possible. Do

20 we think there are any -- do we know of any

21 exhibits that will be in dispute at this point

22 as far as the admissibility on either side?

23 MR. CARROLL: I don't know of any other

24 than what these gentlemen might bring up.

25 THE COURT: It's pretty much mostly

KATHRYN B. PEACOCK, COURT REPORTER (850) 897-2864

46

1 y'all's records, isn't it?

2 MR. SHIPMAN: I believe so. I think it

3 would be best if we all sat down and went

4 through one set. And I also have a concern

5 when we're doing all of this, it's a separate

6 claim against WaterColor. I don't want any

7 misunderstanding of for example when we're

8 talking about this tower, it has nothing to do

9 with WaterColor. That we separate out.

10 MR. CARROLL: Are we talking about two

11 different notebooks then?

12 MR. SHIPMAN: Well, I assume you're going

13 to present evidence as to each of your cases

14 because they are distinct.

15 THE COURT: We can do it with two

16 notebooks if there is a danger of prejudice if

17 we combine the two.

18 MR. GEORGE: The only other thing I would

19 add about exhibits is I know on his exhibit

20 list, he has identified a lot of materials that

21 have to do with underground debris on Lot 24.

22 That was a subject of a separate dispute that

23 he had with St. Joe that was settled. So there

24 is going to be some dispute about whether those

25 are relevant or admissible for this litigation.

KATHRYN B. PEACOCK, COURT REPORTER (850) 897-2864

47

1 So there may be a significant group of

2 documents or exhibits he's identified that are

3 problematic. But, I mean, we're certainly

4 willing to sit down and go over them with him

5 and try to resolve what we can.

6 THE COURT: Okay. Within two weeks from

7 today y'all will arrange a time to meet, have

8 all your documents with you that you plan to

9 introduce at trial and prepare an agreed list

10 of exhibits and a list of any exhibits to which

11 there are objections so that we can schedule

12 that for a hearing if we need to.

13 MR. CARROLL: Can we set one now just to

14 save time if we'll meet at the south Walton

15 annex or at someone's office?

16 MR. SHIPMAN: Why don't we meet at my

17 office since, Chris, you're over in Mobile.

18 And, Mark, do you have any problem coming to my

19 office? You're down there near my office. You

20 want to try and agree on a date now?

21 MR. GEORGE: We can. I need to get my

22 calendar up.

2. On June 17, 2011 this Court held an additional hearing on a separate

matter, and Carroll introduced (2) binders complete with Exhibits which appeared on his exhibit

list as a sample of what he intended to offer as the final jury’s exhibit notebook.

3. The parties then confirmed that they would meet at Mr. Shipman’s office

per the Court’s Order to consider all of the parties Exhibits.

4. When Carroll appeared, Mr. George handed Mr. Carroll his Exhibits in

(2) binders and Mr. Carroll handed (2) binders to the other Counsel of Record.

5. Mr. Carroll then began turning over additional Exhibits numbered per his

Exhibit List at a rate of (3) Exhibits per minute.

6. Before any of the opposing Counsel offered a single Objection to any of

the (200) Exhibits they were presented with, Mr. George and Mr. Davis left the room to confer.

7. Mr. Carroll continued to present the Jr. Attorneys with separate and

numbered exhibits at a rate of (3) per minute.

8. Mr. George and Mr. Davis returned to the conference room whereby they

immediately proffered that they would take the (2) complete binders of Mr. Carroll’s Exhibits,

the additional separately numbered exhibits and a stack of (200) additional Exhibits which were

in order, but in process of being numbered, and take them with them to save time.

9. Carroll reminded each and every attorney present that he was separating

and numbering documents faster than they could review them, and that he was prepared to

complete the review no matter how long it took.

10. Despite this, Mr. George said it would be no problem to number the

documents himself and that he’d meet with Mr. Carroll by Wednesday June 22, 2011 to

complete the review and offer any objections. Mr. Carroll implored Mr. George to stay, but Mr.

George would not oblige the continued review. This was less than 30 minutes after the parties

commenced the review.

11. Mr. Carroll conducted the deposition of Witness Amy Norsworthy on

Monday June 20, 2011 at Mr. Shipman’s office. Mr. George, Mr. Davis and Mr. Shipman,

made no appearance. Mr. Shipman did provide alternate Counsel who made no objections

during the entire deposition.

12. On Tuesday June 21, 2011, Carroll travelled to Tallahassee to depose the

witness Drew Roberston at Mr. Shipman’s office. Again, Mr. Shipman made no appearance, but

did provide alternate Counsel who made no objections. Mr. Davis made no appearance. Mr.

George appeared telephonically.

13. At 5:53 pm, Tallahassee time, Mr. George wrote Mr. Carroll an email stating that

per

Judge Green’s Order,

“Nevertheless, you only arrived with organized, labeled copies of the last exhibit on your amended exhibit list – an exhibit which, as it turns out, consists of 111 separate exhibits.   I am working on our objections to these 111 exhibits.  As for the other 457 exhibits on your list, you failed to provide us with organized, labeled copies of these exhibits. We have been diligently trying to pull and copy each of these other 457 exhibits on your list.  However, this has become a very time-consuming and, to some degree, impossible task given the large number of exhibits involved”

14. Mr. George concluded his belated argument with,

“Al that being said, please be advised that if you fail to provide us with organized, labeled copies of the first 457 exhibits on your exhibit list prior to the hearing on Friday, we ask the court to not allow you to introduce any of these exhibits at trial.   Chris GeorgeScott, Sullivan, Streetman & Fox, P.C.”

15. By June 22, 2011 Mr. George indicated that in fact, he delegated the

review of Carroll’s Exhibits to some unnamed party,

“I also understand there is a great deal of confusion as to precisely which DRB meeting minutes or portions of DRB meeting minutes you are referring to in your exhibits 394-456.

 This is precisely the type of confusion and unnecessary waste of time the court was trying to avoid by ordering all of us to produce copies of our exhibits to one another by last Friday, as we did.”

16. All of Mr. George’s supposed confusions have been caused by the

fact that he simply wanted to get back to Mobile on the Friday the parties were ordered to

perform their review and state their objections. It was approximately 2:30 on Friday

afternoon when Mr. George asked to break up the meeting.

17. It is now 3:30 on June 22, 2011 and no Counsel of Record has

made a single objection to any of the Plaintiff’s Exhibits. That notwithstanding Mr.

Carroll put Mr. George on Notice that he expected, and demanded Mr. George to

complete the review by the end of business Wednesday.

“Your belated argument that I somehow violated Judge Green's Order is unfounded.  You all clearly wanted to avoid staying put in Mr. Shipman's conference room and completing Judge Green's Order.  You were to get back to me today with your objections to the documents you took.  You have not done so. I am ready, able and strongly desire to continue the document review today like you agreed on Friday.  If you will not recommence today, as agreed on Friday, I will make my Motion for Contempt against your clients.

There is absolutely no reason for you to not complete the Order of the Court.

I'll await your immediate reply,

John Carroll”

18. Mr. George responded in bad faith,

“You failed to appear with an organized, labeled set of your over 500 exhibits and, based on your response, aren't willing to give me one now. At this point, we will simply have to take the issue up with the court.

Chris GeorgeSent from my iPhone”

19. Mr. Carroll responded accordingly,

“Chris,

This is your last opportunity to meet with me to reconvene as we agreed last Friday.  I am ready to meet at Gary Shipman's office to complete our meeting per the Order of Judge Green.

John Carroll”

20. Mr. Davis has not turned in an Exhibit List in this case. Mr. Shipman has

not turned an Exhibit List in this case. It is only the Plaintiff, John Carroll who will suffer

because of the contemptuous acts of the Defendants. The Defendants Counsel is clearly

thumbing his nose at the Order of the Court.

Wherefore Plaintiff CARROLL moves for an Order from this Court hereby

accepting his Exhibits for the jury’s notebook, and denying the Defendants the right to introduce

any Exhibits at trial.

CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE

I HEREBY CERTIFY that a true and correct copy of the foregoing has been furnished to Christopher L. George, Esq., PO Box 1034, Mobile, AL 36633 and to Mark D. Davis, Esq., 694 Baldwin Ave. Suite 1, PO Box 705, DeFuniak Springs, FL 32435 and to Gary Shipman, Esq., 1414 Co. Hwy. 283, Suite B, Santa Rosa Beach, FL by fax and regular mail this 22nd day of June, 2011.

_____________________________John P. Carroll