Deflategate’s day in court has run out of steam.
The legal, if not emotional, drama is over. A federal judge in Boston dismissed a Rumford lawyer’s lawsuit demanding the NFL return draft picks taken from the team as punishment following the controversial 2015 AFC championship game between the New England Patriots and the Indianapolis Colts.
Federal District Court Judge Dennis Saylor last week dismissed a lawsuit brought by seven East Coast New England Patriots fans on behalf of “all Patriots fans” against Roger Goodell, Robert Kraft and the NFL.
In an eight-page ruling on June 10, U.S. District Court Judge Dennis Saylor wrote that the plaintiffs lacked grounds to sue and the content of the allegations were insubstantial, failing to state a “plausible claim for violation” of the law.
In April, more than a year after the game, Rumford lawyer Seth Carey filed the lawsuit in an attempt to reinstate the team’s 2016 draft pick three weeks before the league draft. That temporary restraining order against the ruling was dismissed by the court two days later. On April 25, two plaintiffs pulled out of the suit.
The suit, which made national news, claimed Patriots fans had suffered emotional harm, embarrassment and ridicule. While each plaintiff asserted that they faced “embarrassment, ridicule and depression,” one said his 7-year-old daughter believed the outcomes were rigged and would no longer attend games with him, leaving him “devastated.”
The lawsuit relied heavily upon the findings of Sports Illustrated legal analyst Michael McCann, who examined “Deflategate” after Goodell fined the Patriots $1 million and took away the team’s first-round draft pick in 2016 and its fourth-round draft pick in 2017.
The league also suspended Patriots quarterback Tom Brady for four games, which was appealed, denied and then overturned before finally being reinstated in late April. Brady has since petitioned a panel to overturn the suspension.
Referencing McCann verbatim and at length, the narrative starts with a Colts linebacker’s initial suspicion after he intercepted a pass in the second quarter of the game, to a Colts intern measuring the football’s weight.
The intercepted ball had less than 12.5 pounds per square inch of pressure; according to the lawsuit, league rules require balls to be between 12.5 and 13.5 PSI.
The lawsuit continues with a point argued by Brady supporters and Patriots fans who deny that the quarterback knowingly deflated the balls. They contend that underinflated footballs aren’t surprising, given the game was played in cold conditions. All 11 of the Patriots’ footballs, and three of the four Colts’ footballs measured under 12.5 PSI, according to the lawsuit.
In a news release Monday evening, Carey, who is appealing a two-year suspension for failing to properly discharge his professional duties, said he intends to appeal.
“I believe this case represents a microcosm of the emblematic monopolistic corporate greed and thirst for money and power growing exponentially in most big corporations today, as regulations are eased and they buy politicians and real people have less and less say or understanding what is happening.”
ccrosby@sunjournal.com
Send questions/comments to the editors.
