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May 14, 2009: Case Schedule Set: We Have a Trial Date!

The Court has ruled on the schedule for the rest of the case.

The next phase is "discovery", which involves lots of request for documents, answers to questions ("interrogatories"), and admissions, followed by depositions of various people. Most of the information that's learned in discovery has to remain confidential, so we won't be saying much for the next few months.

After that, both sides are expected to file "Motions for Summary Judgment". Basically, in civil cases like this one, judges decide matters of law, while juries rule on facts. If all the facts can be established through the discovery process, then some or all of the case can be decided by the judge without need for a jury trial. Motions for Summary Judgment ask the judge to first decide whether there's any questions left about the facts, and if not, to decide the case. Sometimes this is possible for part of the case, but not all, in which case it's called "Partial Summary Judgment".

Our Motions for Summary Judgment are due October 30th, followed by opposition briefs, replies, etc. We'll post them here as they become available.

That will be followed by a hearing on December 4th, 2009 on the summary judgment motions. The decision may come that day, or may follow later.

If anything remains undecided after the summary judgment decision, either because summary judgment wasn't requested on all parts of the case, or because the Judge decided that some questions of fact remain, there will be a trial. The trial is currently scheduled to start on March 22, 2010. There will probably be a few motions, etc, before that.

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