Law Commons^™

In Re: Estate Of Sarge 134 Nev. Adv. Op. 105 (Dec. 27, 2018), Kaila Patrick

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Court overruled the consolidation rule established in Malin v. Farmers Insurance Exchange and held that a final order resolving a consolidated case is immediately appealable as a final judgment, even if the other constituent cases or other cases are still pending. Accordingly, the Court held that the appeal at issue may proceed because the challenged order finally resolved one of multiple consolidated cases.

Gonor V. Dale, 134 Nev. Adv. Op. 109 (Dec. 27, 2018) (En Banc), Esteban Hernandez

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Court found that the 90-day period in which a deceased party’s successor or representative must seek to substitute for the deceased plaintiff begins when a party files a suggestion of death on the record, not on the actual date of death. But, because appellants failed to identify the proper party to maintain the survival action within 90 days, the Court affirmed the district court’s dismissal of the suit with prejudice.

Class Actions, Statutes Of Limitations And Repose, And Federal Common Law, Stephen B. Burbank, Tobias Barrington Wolff

All Faculty Scholarship

After more than three decades during which it gave the issue scant attention, the Supreme Court has again made the American Pipe doctrine an active part of its docket. American Pipe addresses the tolling of statutes of limitations in federal class action litigation. When plaintiffs file a putative class action in federal court and class certification is denied, absent members of the putative class may wish to pursue their claims in some kind of further proceeding. If the statute of limitations would otherwise have expired while the class certification issue was being resolved, these claimants may need the benefit of …

E-Notice, Christine P. Bartholomew

Journal Articles

Social media platforms and smartphone manufacturers face class action lawsuits, but how open are federal courts to using these very technologies to notify members of a class action? This Article details the results from an empirical analysis of over 2700 federal class notice decisions. It finds class notice changing, but very slowly. Supreme Court precedent demands a dynamic standard for class action notice. However, fears of change, technology, and imprecision keep courts tethered to twentieth-century modes of communication. This judicial fear encumbers E-Notice—at a cost to the utility of class action procedures.

$314m And Sovereign Immunity Are At Stake In Upcoming High Court Case, Peter B. Rutledge, Amanda W. Newton

Popular Media

The Nov. 7 Supreme Court arguments in Republic of Sudan v. Harrison will implicate issues of civil procedure, sovereign immunity, and statutory interpretation. At stake for the Republic of Sudan is $314 million in Sudanese assets. More broadly, however, the court’s decision could have ramifications for any nation, including the United States, that enjoys sovereign immunity.

Law School News The First Circuit At Rwu Law 10/03/2018, Michael M. Bowden, Julia Rubin

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

Law School News: Appeals Court Hears Labor Arguments At Roger Williams University School Of Law 10-2-2018, Katie Mulvaney, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

#Sowhitemale: Federal Civil Rulemaking, Brooke D. Coleman

NULR Online

116 out of 136. That is the number of white men who have served on the eighty-two-year-old committee responsible for creating and maintaining the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. The tiny number of non-white, non-male committee members is disproportionate, even in the context of the white-male-dominated legal profession. If the rules were simply a technical set of instructions made by a neutral set of experts, then perhaps these numbers might not be as disturbing. But that is not the case. The Civil Rules embody normative judgments about the values that have primacy in our civil justice system, and the rule-makers—while …

Rights And Retrenchment In The Trump Era, Stephen B. Burbank, Sean Farhang

All Faculty Scholarship

Our aim in this essay is to leverage archival research, data and theoretical perspectives presented in our book, Rights and Retrenchment: The Counterrevolution against Federal Litigation, as a means to illuminate the prospects for retrenchment in the current political landscape. We follow the scheme of the book by separately considering the prospects for federal litigation retrenchment in three lawmaking sites: Congress, federal court rulemaking under the Rules Enabling Act, and the Supreme Court. Although pertinent data on current retrenchment initiatives are limited, our historical data and comparative institutional perspectives should afford a basis for informed prediction. Of course, little in …

Valley Health Sys. V. Estate Of Jane Doe, 134 Nev. Adv. Op. 76 (Sept. 27, 2018) (En Banc), Amanda Stafford

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Court held that the district court acted within its discretion in sanctioning the party for discovery violations. Further, it determined that the district court’s citation to the Nevada Rules of Professional Conduct causes reputational harm that amounts to a sanction and that the district court correctly found that the attorneys did in fact violate Nevada Rule of Professional Conduct 3.3(a)(1).

Guidelines And Best Practices For Implementing The 2015 Discovery Amendments Concerning Proportionality (Second Edition), Bolch Judicial Institute

Bolch Judicial Institute Publications

In November 2014, the Duke Law Judicial Studies Center, which became the Bolch Judicial Institute in 2018, held a conference on the discovery proportionality amendments with more than 70 practitioners and 15 federal judges. Drafting teams were subsequently formed, consisting of 32 practitioners, who worked for nine months on an initial draft set of GUIDELINES AND PRACTICES prepared by Judge Lee Rosenthal and Prof. Steven Gensler. The team’s work product, the GUIDELINES AND PRACTICES FOR IMPLEMENTING THE 2015 DISCOVERY AMENDMENTS TO ACHIEVE PROPORTIONALITY, was published in 99 Judicature, no. 3, Winter 2015, along with several related articles.

Most of …

Guidelines And Best Practices For Large And Mass-Tort Mdls (Second Edition), Bolch Judicial Institute

Bolch Judicial Institute Publications

Mass-tort MDLs dominate the federal civil docket, yet they present enormous challenges to transferee judges assigned to manage them. There is little official guidance and no rules specific to the management of mass-tort MDLs, often requiring the transferee judge to develop procedures out of whole cloth.

Beginning in 2013, the Bolch Judicial Institute (then the Center for Judicial Studies) sought to address this issue through a series of annual bench-bar conferences. From these conferences came the Guidelines and Best Practices for Large and Mass-Tort MDLs document — now in its Second Edition — which is designed to help judges and …

N. Nev. Homes V. Gl Constr., 134 Nev. Adv. Op. 60 (Aug. 2, 2018), Jeff Chronister

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Court found that the district court’s awarding of attorneys fees and costs was appropriate following bifurcated trials in which the parties settled as to damages on Northern Nevada Homes’ claims in an amount that exceeds GL Construction’s damages on its counterclaim because: 1) no statute or court rule requires the trial court to offset a damages judgment on one party’s counterclaim by the amount recovered by another party in settling its claim to determine which side is the prevailing party, and 2) the most reasonable interpretation of NRS 18.010(2)(a) and 18.020(3) precludes the use of settlement recovery for this …

20th Annual Open Government Summit: Access To Public Records Act And Open Meetings Act, 2018, Department Of Attorney General, State Of Rhode Island

School of Law Conferences, Lectures & Events

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Labarbera V. Wynn Las Vegas, Llc, 134 Nev. Adv. Op. 51 (Jul. 19, 2018), Casey Lee

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Court determined that the district court erred when it precluded the appellant from testifying by video conference from Italy and when it cited the incorrect legal standard to exclude evidence of appellant’s intoxication.

When Can The Patent Office Intervene In Its Own Cases?, Saurabh Vishnubhakat

Faculty Scholarship

The rise of administrative patent validity review since the America Invents Act has rested on an enormous expansion of Patent Office authority. A relatively little-known aspect of that authority is the agency's statutory ability to intervene in Federal Circuit appeals from adversarial proceedings in its own Patent Trial and Appeal Board. The Patent Office has exercised this intervenor authority frequently and with specific apparent policy objectives, including where one of the adverse parties did not participate in the appeal. Moreover, until recently, there has been no constitutional inquiry into the Article III standing that the Patent Office must establish in …

A Review Of Civil Protection Orders In Six Jurisdictions, Wing Cheong Chan

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Traditional criminal and civil remedies are inadequate responses against the problem of domestic violence. The criminal justice system requires allegations to be proven beyond reasonable doubt, the focus is on punishment for past acts instead of prevention of vio-lence from recurring, and the existing criminal offences do not fully cover the range of undesirable conduct. As for the civil justice system, the court processes take too long and are often incomprehensible to litigants-in-person, and there are no clear penalties imposed by the law even if an injunction is awarded by the court. In order to provide vic-tims of domestic violence …

Stays, Portia Pedro

Faculty Scholarship

After judges issue orders or judgments, they often face the difficult task of making a determination even more complex than that of the underlying order, but in less time, with less guidance, and with high stakes. These judges are deciding whether to grant a stay pending appeal — whether to prevent the enforcement of a court order or judgment until a court has decided the appeal. Although stays may seem to be a mere procedural technicality, stays are, instead, the new battleground for injunctive litigation. While review was pending, stay determinations have decided if abortion providers could operate in Texas, …

The Pro Bono Collaborative Project Spotlight: Pro Bono Collaborative Aci Civil Legal Clinics Project Expands To Women's Facility (05-03-2018), Roger Williams University School Of Law

Pro Bono Collaborative Staff Publications

No abstract provided.

Fitzgerald V. Mobile Billboards, L.L.C., 134 Nev. Adv. Op. 30 (May 3, 2018), Shaneka J. Malloyd

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

No abstract provided.

We’Ve Come A Long Way (Baby)! Or Have We? Evolving Intellectual Freedom Issues In The Us And Florida, L. Bryan Cooper, A.D. Beman-Cavallaro

Works of the FIU Libraries

This paper analyzes a shifting landscape of intellectual freedom (IF) in and outside Florida for children, adolescents, teens and adults. National ideals stand in tension with local and state developments, as new threats are visible in historical, legal, and technological context. Examples include doctrinal shifts, legislative bills, electronic surveillance and recent attempts to censor books, classroom texts, and reading lists.

Privacy rights for minors in Florida are increasingly unstable. New assertions of parental rights are part of a larger conservative animus. Proponents of IF can identify a lessening of ideals and standards that began after doctrinal fruition in the 1960s …

Litigation Academy Helps Lawyers Hone Skills 4-30-2018, Katie Mulvaney, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

Clark Cty. Office Of The Coroner/Med. Exam'r V. Las Vegas Review-Journal, 134 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 24. (April 12, 2018) (En Banc), Tamara Cannella

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Under NRCP 62(d) and NRCP 62(e), state and local government appellants are generally entitled to a stay of a money judgment pending appeal, without needing to post a supersedeas bond or other security as a matter of right.

Rethinking Judicial Review Of High Volume Agency Adjudication, Jonah B. Gelbach, David Marcus

All Faculty Scholarship

Article III courts annually review thousands of decisions rendered by Social Security Administrative Law Judges, Immigration Judges, and other agency adjudicators who decide large numbers of cases in short periods of time. Federal judges can provide a claim for disability benefits or for immigration relief the sort of consideration that an agency buckling under the strain of enormous caseloads cannot. Judicial review thus seems to help legitimize systems of high volume agency adjudication. Even so, influential studies rooted in the gritty realities of this decision-making have concluded that the costs of judicial review outweigh whatever benefits the process creates.

We …

Procedural Retrenchment And The States, Zachary D. Clopton

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Although not always headline grabbing, the Roberts Court has been highly interested in civil procedure. According to critics, the Court has undercut access to justice and private enforcement through its decisions on pleading, class actions, summary judgment, arbitration, standing, personal jurisdiction, and international law.

While I have much sympathy for the Court's critics, the current discourse too often ignores the states. Rather than bemoaning the Roberts Court's decisions to limit court access-and despairing further developments in the age of Trump-we instead might productively focus on the options open to state courts and public enforcement. Many of the aforementioned decisions are …

“Encroachments And Oppressions”: The Corporatization Of Procedure And The Decline Of Rule Of Law, J. Maria Glover

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This Article begins by providing a brief account of the corporatization of procedure through judicial decision-making and noting some of the detrimental effects it has had on the preservation of rule of law and access to justice. Part II goes on to explore how the judiciary does not retain full control over procedure and how corporate entities have little care for whether a procedural reform simply cuts back at litigation or goes further and cuts back at judicial power and the judicial role itself. To illustrate these points, Part II examines the most recent attempt at "procedural reform" by corporate …

Southworth V. Eighth Judicial Dist. Court, 134 Nev. Adv. Op. 20 (Mar. 29, 2018), Lucy Crow

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The court determined that Justice Court Rule of Civil Procedure 98 requiring appeals in small claims court to be filed within five days was jurisdictional and mandatory. The district court cannot use its discretion to expand the time to appeal.

To Understand Us V. Microsoft, Consider 'Acme V. Shamrock', Peter B. Rutledge, Amanda W. Newton

Popular Media

The February 27, 2018, Supreme Court argument in United States v. Microsoft Corp. raises profound questions about issues of executive power, corporate governance, technology, judicial power and international affairs. At stake for the government is the scope of its investigative authority to obtain information located in a foreign country, irrespective of that country’s laws. At stake for Microsoft is its ability to organize its international corporate affairs and the predictability of the laws that will govern those affairs. This article analyzes the potential effects of this critical Supreme Court case.

Quinn V. Eighth Judicial Dist. Ct., 135 Nev. Adv. Op. 5 (Feb. 8, 2018) (En Banc), Shaneka J. Malloyd

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Court determined that (1) a writ of mandamus/prohibition is appropriate when a party does not have an adequate relief in the ordinary course of the law and it is necessary to prevent improper disclosure of privileged and confidential information; (2) a Nevada district court has no authority to compel an out-of-state non-party to appear in Nevada for a deposition; and (3) specifically, a Nevada district court does not have subpoena power over a non-resident attorney that has practiced law in Nevada.

Castillo V. United Fed. Credit Union, 134 Nev. Adv. Op. 3 (Feb. 1, 2018), Jocelyn Murphy

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Court determined that (1) in a class action suit parties may not aggregate putative class member claims to reach the statutorily required jurisdictional amount for subject matter jurisdiction; (2) NRS § 104.9625(3)(b) permits an individual to combine the amount of sought statutory damages with the proposed deficiency amount in consumer transactions to obtain the jurisdictional amount for subject matter jurisdiction; and (3) district courts possess original jurisdiction over all claims for injunctive relief, even those that fail to meet the jurisdictional amount.