Saturday Clean-Up: Looks Like We Should See The Name Spat Pre-Trial Order Around Mid-May(?) -- FINALLY!

It is interesting that the German Merck is apparently the one trying to delay disclosure of the expert witnesses, and the disputes about them -- not the US Merck.

We will see them, and delay (unless a confidential settlement is reached) really doesn't change anything. Here's the latest lay of the land, in four pages -- but we will quote the US Merck analysis, since it more correctly reflects standing federal civil procedure law and rules:

. . .It is common practice in this Court, and others, for the pretrial order to be filed before motions in limine are decided. Those motions may not be decided until close to trial. Parties then adjust their trial presentations as needed, not the pretrial order. The form of the Court’s pretrial order here reflects this practice. It required the parties to list in limine motions that were “contemplated,” but not yet briefed, as of the September 25, 2023 date the pretrial order was filed. (ECF No. 227 at p.6). The Court then ordered briefing to begin on May 3, and be completed by June 24, 2024. (ECF No. 247).

The May 10 update will remove issues that were resolved at the February 29 final pretrial conference (e.g., choice-of-law, elimination of German law experts, replacement fact witness process). It also gives the parties an opportunity to eliminate some other potential motions by stipulation, and identify which three motions in limine each selected for service on May 3. The parties can identify designations and exhibits implicated by each motion they served in the May 10 update for the Court’s convenience. In addition, Your Honor directed the parties to consider whether they can pare down certain objections they preserved to (i) fact deposition designations, and (ii) trial exhibits in the May 10 update. The parties know which motions they plan to file, and which objections they lodged against the evidence each motion implicates. They can take that into account now as they consider their objections.

KGaA’s suggestion to delay the filing of the final pretrial order until some date after motions in limine are decided will have significant disruptive effects on multiple fronts. Entry of the May 10 final pretrial order triggers the deadline for disclosure of replacement witnesses that Your Honor set at the February 29 pretrial conference. . . .

The pretrial order was originally due in June 2023 (ECF No. 218) and significantly delayed by KGaA to September 2023 to accommodate [German Merck's counsel's] availability as it is. . . . There is no sound reason to deviate from the routine and orderly progress towards trial by further delaying the May 10, 2024 final pretrial order. . . .

We shall see -- but it seems I won't have to intervene in Jersey, now.

Onward grinning. . . no matter what happens this weekend, I've beaten Mr. Obama in both the men's and women's brackets.

But if UConn can hold serve, and win it all, then I'll win every pool I am in (though I would like to see a Purdue loss tonight, since I had Marquette to get by them, and sadly they bowed out early... to NC State)! Heh!

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