Norfolk Southern Judge’s Frank Demeanor Demands Lawyers’ Focus

The federal judge presiding over dozens of lawsuits from the Norfolk Southern Corp. train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, wanted to get down to business.

During a Feb. 27 hearing before US District Judge Benita Y. Pearson, a plaintiffs’ attorney said lawyers for the Atlanta railroad giant had “sandbagged” and “ghosted” them the prior weekend. When an attorney for the company tried to respond, Pearson—whose Northern District courtroom is in Youngstown, about 20 miles north of the small village where the derailment happened—cut him off.

“I don’t want to hear argument in the sort that might say ghosted or not. Don’t care about that,” the judge said, according to a transcript. “What you all should know about me, hyperbole is lost on me. It’s a waste of my time. It’s a distraction from why we’re here.”

Attorneys who know and practice before her weren’t surprised by the comments. She rarely lets up when it comes to how she expects lawyers to act in her courtroom, they said.

On April 5, Pearson consolidated a group of proposed class-action lawsuits that were filed in the wake of the Feb. 3 train derailment in East Palestine on Ohio’s border with Pennsylvania. The derailment had caused the release of the carcinogen vinyl chloride, polluted surrounding waters and forced residents near the site to evacuate.

“We know the circumstances are very difficult,” she told attorneys on a virtual hearing held March 1, according to a transcript. “But I think we all continue to agree, while litigation is difficult for this side, the circumstances faced by the residents are even more difficult.”

J. Gerald Ingram, a longtime criminal defense attorney in Youngstown, described a busy day that included an appearance before her that was also around the same time he was supposed to be in another courtroom.

“She scolded me for looking at the clock,” Ingram said.

“She’s a very focused judge and doesn’t get distracted with semantics like that,” Laura E. Kogan, a partner at Benesch Friedlander Coplan & Aronoff LLP in Cleveland who clerked for Pearson before and after the US Senate confirmed her in 2010, said in an interview.

Journey to Federal Judge

Pearson, a 1995 graduate of Cleveland State University’s law school, was elevated to the district bench after spending more than two years as a federal magistrate judge in Akron. She is the first Black woman in Ohio to become a federal district judge.

Before that, she was a federal prosecutor for eight years with the US Attorney’s Office in Cleveland. She also did stints at Jones Day and McDonald Hopkins LLC and served as a clerk to a federal judge in Cleveland, according to paperwork she submitted to the Senate Judiciary Committee following her 2009 nomination by President Barack Obama.

Kogan, in an email, recalled reviewing and revising draft orders at the judge’s standing desk, with Pearson editing by hand and explaining why she made certain changes.

“The Judge would often tell me that ‘the best writing is rewriting,’” Kogan said.

The Norfolk Southern litigation has put Pearson in the spotlight, perhaps more than at any other time than in her 13 years on the federal bench. However, she has presided over other high-profile cases in northeast Ohio.

In 2017, Pearson granted a temporary restraining order that allowed a football player, who was convicted in a sexual assault as a juvenile in Steubenville, to play for Youngstown State University. School officials had prevented Ma’lik Richmond from playing, following outcry from members of the student body. However, Pearson ruled that he had made a strong argument that he wasn’t afforded due process by the university.

She also found in 2017 that a buffet run by televangelist Ernest Angley’s church in suburban Akron violated federal law by using unpaid parishioners as workers. The US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit overturned that decision the following year, ruling that the workers didn’t expect to get paid, which is a requirement under the Fair Labor Standards Act.

Strict and Professional

Lawyers said she does her homework and expects those in front of her to do the same.

“Judge Pearson is an attentive jurist who closely controls her courtroom to make sure that everyone involved appreciates the seriousness of the proceedings,” Andrew Geronimo, director of the First Amendment Clinic at Case Western Reserve University School of Law, wrote in an email.

“In my experience, while she is strict about filing requirements and courtroom decorum, her demands for professionalism ensure that all parties having business before the Court are treated with respect regardless of their status,” he continued.

Geronimo said he and a colleague supervised a team of law students during a four-day bench trial in front of Pearson. “I believe her trial demeanor helped prepare our students for the realities of trying complex cases in the Federal Courts,” he said.

Avidan Cover, associate dean for academic affairs at Case’s law school, also worked on the same case with the law students prior to trial and said Pearson was proactive about trying to resolve the matter.

“She was very engaged,” Cover recalled. “More engaged than any judge I’ve had in settlement discussions.”

During a case involving an alleged multimillion-dollar fraud scheme, Ingram recalled that the lawyers had submitted more than 1,000 exhibits at trial. But Pearson could focus the issue.

“She referred the [assistant] US attorney to a particular paragraph in the motion to dismiss. It just so happened to be the best paragraph in the motion,” Ingram said of his work.

Pearson proceeded to read the paragraph aloud to the lawyer, he said.

“I’m telling you that paragraph has legs. What is your response?” Ingram recalled Pearson saying.

Her direct style will certainly be on display during the derailment litigation, attorneys said.

“She will slice through noise,” Kogan wrote, “and ask the right questions to ensure that she understands the arguments.”