Blown deadlines sink appeal for ex-Quinn Emanuel associate

(Reuters) - A federal appeals court on Wednesday dismissed a former Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan associate's appeal of a ruling that threw out her discrimination lawsuit against the firm, finding she had once again missed too many case deadlines.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit faulted plaintiff Crystal Nwaneri for not filing an opening brief and appendix and then failing to explain "her late filings and continued failure to submit her brief or to provide a timeline for doing so."

Nwaneri, a Black, female attorney who worked in the firm's Washington, D.C., office from 2012 to 2016, described Quinn Emanuel in her September 2020 amended lawsuit as a "boys' club" stocked almost exclusively with white men.

But her pro se pursuit of the racial and gender bias case has been marred almost from the start by missed deadlines.

In December, U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden dismissed Nwaneri's lawsuit, citing her failure "to meet most, if not all, of the original and extended filing deadlines has resulted in multiple delays, which have caused the defendants to expend additional resources."

In appellate filings asking the court to excuse the missed deadlines, Nwaneri said she is the mother of three small children, one of whom contracted a "serious, potentially life-threatening illness" and required extensive medical treatment. She also homeschools the children as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, and she indicated she has her own medical condition.

The appellate court was not persuaded. In its two-page order Wednesday, it held that her appeal warranted dismissal after she failed "to provide an adequate explanation for her repeated failure to comply with the rules and orders of this court."

Although Quinn Emanuel has not formally replied to Nwaneri's lawsuit at the district court, in a July motion to dismiss her appeal, the law firm called her case "a series of unfounded, scurrilous allegations."

Nwaneri did not respond to a request for comment. A spokesperson for Quinn Emanuel declined to comment.

In addition to the firm, Nwaneri's lawsuit named as defendants William Burck, the co-managing partner of Quinn Emanuel's D.C. office, Jon Corey, a former co-managing partner of the same office, and Derek Shaffer, co-chair of the firm's government and regulatory litigation practice.

Corey recently left Quinn Emanuel to join McKool Smith as a partner in Los Angeles, according to an announcement this week from McKool Smith.

The case is Nwaneri v. Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, No. 21-7005.

For Crystal B. Nwaneri: Pro se

For Quinn Emanuel, William Burck, Derek Shaffer and Jon Corey: Jan-Philip Kernisan of Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan; and Benjamin Kurland and Richard Smith of Linklaters

Read more:

Quinn beats bias case, for now, after ex-associate blows deadlines