Litigation partners Kim Branscome and Jonathan Tam and associate Matthew Steinberg co-wrote an article in Bloomberg Law discussing recent reform efforts to deal with a judicial phenomenon in multidistrict litigation (MDL) known as the “Field of Dreams Problem,” in which plaintiffs’ lawyers flood an MDL proceeding with new claims that never would have been filed individually. In “Litigation, Professional Perspective - Field of Dreams Issues in Multidistrict Litigation,” published on May 28, the authors discuss how this persistent problem has led to a proposed new Federal Rule of Civil Procedure that will provide practitioners, parties and judges with new tools to navigate the issue.
The proposed rule “contemplates a process where litigants submit their views about ‘how and when the parties will exchange information about the factual bases for their claims and defenses’ (among other topics) in advance of an initial case management conference,” the authors write. They add that the rule “does not provide any details or suggestions as to when and how a case-specific exchange of information should occur—or establish a presumption in favor of early claim vetting,” and that its “ambiguity is intentional.”
The authors also outline steps that companies can take in current and future MDLs to prepare for the potential new rule to take effect, including providing MDL judges with data demonstrating the pervasiveness of meritless claims in MDLs and providing judges with potential processes to vet claims on an ongoing basis, among others.
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