Jonathan Rardin, a lawyer the city retained to represent Bilal, wrote in a motion filed Friday afternoon that the embattled sheriff shouldn\u2019t have to testify before Common Pleas Judge Paula Patrick at Wednesday\u2019s hearing on sheriff sales because it would involve \u201cmatters outside her unique personal knowledge.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Tuesday morning, Judge Patrick rejected Bilal\u2019s request for a protective order to shield her from testifying, writing that \u201cBilal and any other relevant parties shall appear\u201d on Wednesday morning and \u201cbe expected to testify if necessary.\u201d <\/p>\n
Judge Patrick, supervisor of the court\u2019s commerce division, scheduled the hearing in May, as winning bidders at sheriff sales continued to flood the courts with petitions seeking their deeds. As The Inquirer first reported in July 2024<\/a>, Bilal\u2019s office had not been issuing the deeds for a year or more after the auctions, leaving neglected homes unable to be renovated, rented or resold.<\/p>\n \u00bb READ MORE: After six years of chaos in Philly Sheriff’s Office, Rochelle Bilal must answer to judges<\/a><\/p>\n An attorney who represents real estate investors recently filed a lawsuit arguing that Bilal had breached the terms of a 2003 consent order requiring the office to issue deeds within 40 days of settlement. Patrick responded by ordering Bilal\u2019s office to demonstrate at a public hearing that they were not in violation of the decree.<\/p>\n Wednesday\u2019s hearing will help decide whether Patrick will appoint a \u201cspecial master,\u201d title agent, or some other third party expert in real estate to administer sheriff sales in Philadelphia \u2014 arguably the most important function of Bilal\u2019s office.<\/p>\n Bilal\u2019s lawyer had already successfully pushed back the hearing, which was originally set for July 27, by arguing the sheriff had an unavoidable scheduling conflict due to \u201ca previously scheduled vacation.\u201d That request to delay the hearing did not mention that Bilal hoped to completely avoid testifying, and at the time, Rardin wrote that her \u201cpresence in this matter is necessary.\u201d<\/p>\n Yet last week\u2019s motion instead argued that the sheriff\u2019s knowledge is \u201climited to the information provided to her by her staff\u201d and she should not have to personally testify at all.<\/p>\n \u201cRequiring Sheriff Bilal to appear and testify regarding events and administrative practices that are not within her unique personal knowledge would impose an unreasonable burden and oppression\u201d under the state\u2019s rules of civil procedure \u201cand would divert a high public official from the discharge of her official duties \u2026 \u201d Rardin wrote.<\/p>\n Daniel Bernheim, the lawyer for a property group whose March lawsuit<\/a> triggered Judge Patrick\u2019s court order, said on Monday evening that Bilal\u2019s attempt to avoid testimony was a \u201cdisappointing response by an elected official.\u201d On Tuesday, Bernheim \u2014 himself an elected commissioner in Lower Merion<\/a> Township \u2014 filed a response to her motion that sought to force Bilal to testify in court.<\/p>\n \u201c[T]he sheriff seeks to avoid answering questions based upon a series of cases which have no relevance whatsoever with the present proceedings and a claim of immunity from testifying which does not exist,\u201d Bernheim wrote.<\/p>\n In April, Bilal claimed at a City Council<\/a> budget hearing that most post-auction delays had been resolved. She blamed any ongoing delays in issuing deeds on buyers who didn\u2019t submit required forms or fees.<\/p>\n But after Patrick filed her court order in May, Bilal\u2019s office within 48 hours processed 277 deeds, some attached to auctions that took place more than a year ago. The office filed more paperwork in two days than it had in the prior three months.<\/p>\n Acknowledgment<\/p>\n The Inquirer\u2019s journalism is supported, in part, by the Lenfest Institute for Journalism and readers like you. News and editorial content are created independently of The Inquirer\u2019s donors. Gifts to support The Inquirer\u2019s high-impact journalism can be made at inquirer.com\/donate<\/a>. A list of Lenfest Institute donors can be found at lenfestinstitute.org\/supporters<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Listen to article \u2022\u00a00:00 min Philadelphia Sheriff Rochelle Bilal made an unsuccessful, last-ditch attempt to avoid facing a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":145616,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[69,71,70,114565],"class_list":["post-272099","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news","tag-rochelle-bilal-testify-immunity-sheriff-sales"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272099","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=272099"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272099\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/145616"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=272099"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=272099"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=272099"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/circle_outline_footer_light_theme.png\"\/)
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