A lawyer who filed an appellate brief that included four cases the Fifth Court of Appeals could not locate has explained that the culprit is “relying on third-party research without independent verification.”
“This has been a humbling and embarrassing lesson in the importance of verifying every citation at its source,” Heidi Rochon Hafer wrote in a response filed April 20. “Appellants’ counsel does not regularly practice law that requires use of case law research tools and does not have access to Westlaw or Lexis and used the internet in general and a temporary free trial access to a program known as FastCase for case law verification purposes.”
Hafer is representing herself and her sister, Lauren Rochon-Eidsvig, in an appeal in a fraudulent transfer case. The sisters, according to court documents, were transferred jewelry valued at more than $1 million by their parents, former Mary Kay Cosmetics Chairman John Rochon Sr. and Donna Rochon.
The parents owe JGB Collateral the balance of a $6.7 million judgment, according to court documents, and JGB filed suit to recover the valuables, alleging the transfer violated the Texas Uniform Fraudulent Transfer Act. The sisters have argued they’re entitled to keep the jewelry, which was a gift.
Hafer filed a brief that cited four cases purportedly supporting her position on gift law in Texas on May 16.
JGB Collateral is represented by Jeffrey S. Lowenstein, Gwen I. Walraven and David G. Webster of Bell Nunnally & Martin. Those attorneys told the court in an Aug. 14 brief it should reject the sisters’ arguments because “they rely on cases that do not exist.”
In a reply brief filed in September, Hafer did not cite those four cases and did not address the contention that the cases “do not exist.”
Justice Nancy Kennedy issued an order April 10 giving Hafer 10 days to file with the court copies of the four cases in question.
In her four-page response filed April 20, Hafer said that “despite exhaustive research in every reporter, online database and regional archive available to appellants’ counsel, appellants’ counsel has been unable to locate the four authorities.”
She did not “keep a record of all the internet searches done” for the May brief, she explained, “and an attempt to recreate the general internet searches and FastCase searching now is not producing the source of these four cases.”
“Appellants’ counsel accepts full responsibility for the error and has implemented enhanced protocols — including mandatory double-check of all non-primary research — so that no comparable mistake will recur,” she wrote, explaining she was trying to provide the court with case law on what constitutes a valid gift in Texas and “was not attempting to sway the Court with fake cites for unsupported propositions.”
“Appellants are prepared to take whatever further action the Court deems necessary to correct the errors made in the May 16, 2024 appellants’ brief,” Hafer wrote.
The state bar website lists Hafer as a 1998 graduate of Loyola Law School Los Angeles who is working as in-house corporate counsel in Plano.
A trial court granted JGB summary judgment on its TUFTA claim and signed judgment in its favor in January 2024.
The case number is 05-24-00123-CV.