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Dylan's Attorney Sanctioned by Court 1 Million Dollars
The sanctions order is against Gibson Dunn, but the judge specifically pointed to the behavior of two partners: Orin Snyder and Robert Blume.
Facebook and Gibson Dunn were ordered to pay $925,078.51 in fees and costs to the plaintiffs in the Cambridge Analytica scandal.
Plaintiffs lawyers, who settled the lawsuits last year, had asked for more than $2 million in their sanctions request.

A federal judge sanctioned Facebook owner Meta Platforms and its law firm, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, for what he ruled as “ridiculous,” “frivolous” and “laughable” arguments that purposely stonewalled plaintiffs suing over privacy violations.

In a Thursday order, U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria of the Northern District of California found that Facebook and its lawyers repeatedly gaslighted the plaintiffs attorneys and purposely misinterpreted discovery orders in the multidistrict litigation over the Cambridge Analytica scandal. Chhabria ordered them to pay over $925,000 to the plaintiffs attorneys in fees and costs.

Judge Vince Chhabria of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.Judge Vince Chhabria of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.

“This case is an example of a wealthy client (Facebook) and its high-powered law firm (Gibson Dunn) using delay, misdirection, and frivolous arguments to make litigation unfairly difficult and expensive for their opponents,” Chhabria ruled. “Unfortunately, this sort of conduct is not uncommon in our court system. But it was unusually egregious and persistent here.”

Their conduct was not a matter of incompetence or ignorance, he added.

“Instead,” he ruled, “the court finds by clear and convincing evidence that Facebook and Gibson Dunn’s conduct reflected a sustained, concerted, bad-faith effort to throw obstacle after obstacle in front of the plaintiffs—all in an attempt to push the plaintiffs into settling the case for less than they would have gotten otherwise.”

His order against Gibson Dunn is against the firm, but he specifically pointed to the behavior of two partners: Orin Snyder in New York, and Robert Blume in Denver.

“Orin Snyder, who served as lead counsel when Gibson Dunn’s conduct was at its worst, should consider himself lucky that he has not been sanctioned personally,” the judge asserted in a footnote. “Presumably, this ruling will help ensure that he will not be so lucky if he acts this way again.”