With no billable hours to measure, no depositions to observe, no summary
judgment motion results to track, and no trial results to either celebrate or anguish over (and I know, the better lawyer often loses in court), pretty much all the evaluations are «soft» ones.
Not exact matches
The fact is that most chaotic
motion is not, on limited average, utterly unlike regular or nearly regular behavior, and while this qualitative
judgment is very difficult if not impossible to make into mathematically rigorous conclusions, its practical value as a perception is an important starting point for constructive
results in the theory.
Although
judgment liens that impair an exemption can usually be avoided (removed) by
motion in a bankruptcy case, Courts are split as to whether a deficiency
judgment that
results in a lien on real estate can be removed through bankruptcy.
I tried it out myself on a host of legal terms that came quickly to mind, and was able to get
results for almost all of them («
motion for summary
judgment»; «interpleader»; «chattel).»
After a series of lower court decisions
resulted in conflicting conclusions, the Appeals Court vacated a Superior Court
judgment allowing the defendant's
motion for summary
judgment, concluding that the plaintiff was entitled to the benefit of the three - year limitation period of G.L. c. 84, § 15.
Through post-verdict
motions, the Appellate Practice Group convinced the court that the releases were suspect,
resulting in reduction of the
judgment by $ 20 million instead of the $ 4 million reduction sought by the plaintiffs.
Either way, winning a
motion for summary
judgment will usually
result in saved time and legal fees.
17 As a
result of this asymmetry, the court that makes the most authoritative pronouncements on the standard for granting summary
judgment — the Court of Appeal — tends to do so in cases where the
motions court has denied the complainant her day in court.
The first surgeon then brought a
motion for summary
judgment on the basis that the plaintiff discovered her claim prior to January 1, 2004, and as a
result, the one - year limitation period established in s. 89 (1) of the Health Professions Procedural Code, S.O. 1991 applied.
* The name of the case, the identity of the party we represent, and how to bill the time; * The issue that needs to be answered; * The facts of the case I think are most pertinent to the issue; * The procedural posture of the case and how the work product will be used — for a
motion to compel, for a response to a
motion for summary
judgment, for an evaluation letter to the client, etc. * Whether I think the issue has been researched at any other time in the office, and how to find the old research; * The
result I want to reach, i.e., what I'd like the answer to be, if possible.
I tried, for example, applying the filter for «
motion for summary
judgment» and my search
results were narrowed to cases in which there had been a grant or denial of summary
judgment.
HathiTrust and related university defendants saw near - entire success in their summary
judgment motions, failing only on a standing question not consequential to the
result.
Drafted
motion for summary
judgment on behalf of component part manufacturer in a products liability case that
resulted in voluntary dismissal of the plaintiff's claims against the manufacturer.
Drafted
motion for summary
judgment on behalf of a product manufacturer involving the economic loss doctrine and statute of limitations issues that
resulted in voluntary dismissal of the plaintiff's claims against the manufacturer.
Apple wanted to ensure that summary
judgment could
result in further narrowing with respect to the number of different patents - in - suit, presumably because it expects to be more successful with its summary
judgment (SJ)
motions than Samsung (which was the case last year).
Drafted
motion for summary
judgment on behalf of grocery store that
resulted in voluntary dismissal of the plaintiff's claims against the store.
Drafted
motion for summary
judgment for manufacturer in asbestos litigation that
resulted in voluntary dismissal of the plaintiffs» claims against the manufacturer.
Much more recently, however, the Supreme Court of Canada decision in Hryniak v. Mauldin held that «a trial is not required if a summary
judgment motion can achieve fair and just adjudication... and is a proportionate, more expeditious and less expensive means to achieve a just
result than going to trial».
This
resulted in an explosion of summary
judgment motions and a wealth of Superior Court jurisprudence which, due to its conflicting nature, did little to assist in determining how the amended Rule was supposed to operate.
The
resulting decision (s)(known to most as «Combined Air») provided, arguably, clarity to
motion judges going forward and set out which types of cases are and are not suitable for summary
judgment.
The
result was that summary
judgment motions were generally only brought in very straight forward cases where, at least in the opinion of one party, there was no genuine issue for trial.
Justice Bale found that the issue was whether the proposed summary
judgment motion was likely to provide a «proportionate, more expeditious and less expensive means to achieve a just
result than going to trial», citing the Supreme Court of Canada decision in Hyrniak v. Mauldin, 2014 SCC 7.
Although the additional time that the federal judges took to make decisions is not dispositive of the
result, it adds to the possibility that state judges viewing the heavy burden on summary
judgment were and are less willing to grant these
motions as a threshold matter and instead prefer to let cases proceed to trial or settlement.112 By contrast, the federal judges who take more time in coming to decisions may put more weight on the summary
judgment motions if they are, on the balance, more willing to grant them.
To generate predicted probabilities, we held all variables at their means (or modal values if dichotomous) aside from the difference in readability score variable, which we varied from -4 to 4 based on the spectrum of our data.102 The
results for the predicted probability that a moving party prevails on a
motion for summary
judgment based on a given readability score are presented in Figure 1 below.103
For those of you who aren't familiar with the Ontario rules, a summary
judgment motion is a
motion brought by a party to obtain
judgment without a trial on the basis that the
result is so clear cut that a full trial is not necessary.
As a
result, federal court judges have a stronger personal incentive to grant summary
judgment than some of their state court counterparts.93 Finally, federal courts have more resources at their disposal than state courts and are therefore in a better position to invest the significant judicial resources often required to decide a
motion for summary
judgment.94
Our
results show that more - readable summary
judgment briefs were more likely to prevail, even after controlling for attorney experience, law firm resources, and repeat - player status before the
motion judge.
Successfully argued a Daubert
motion for a group of 12 defendants,
resulting in exclusion of the plaintiff's expert and summary
judgment for defendants.
Successful representation of major international bank in an action arising from the acquisition of an iconic major
motion picture studio,
resulting in summary
judgment in favor of the bank in excess of $ 1 billion
The plaintiffs would have not only needed to have overcome these rulings but were faced with hard - hitting summary
judgment motions that could have
resulted in dismissal of the entire case.
Could the same
result have been accomplished more simply, such as with a
motion for adverse
judgment?
As a
result, the parties to a
motion for summary
judgment must put their best foot forward by placing all relevant evidence in the record.
The increasing use of summary
judgment motions to decide straightforward wrongful dismissal actions has
resulted in it now being commonplace for a court to grant
judgment in a wrongful dismissal action before the expiration of the dismissed employee's reasonable notice period.
For personal injury lawyers we require proof of 3 cases that have gone to trial in the last 5 years
resulting in verdict for that lawyer and we also require 2
motions for summary
judgment ruled in favor of that attorney.
The benefit of the summary
judgment motion is to obtain a
result faster, and to avoid the time and expense of all of the procedural steps that are involved in a typical lawsuit.
As a
result, the
motion judge granted summary
judgment in favour of L'Image Enterprises for the amount claimed with
If this principle is not followed, there is a very real possibility of a trial
result that is inconsistent with the
result of the summary
judgment motion on essentially the same claim.
The central message of the Court of Appeal's decision is that the summary
judgment motions court can not dispense with a trial unless it is «in the interests of justice» to do so: ``... the aim of the civil justice system is to provide a just
result in disputed matters through a fair process.»
The
results of the Supreme Court's decisions on Thursday will have an impact on thousands of summary
judgment motions in Ontario and other provinces with similar regimes.
Working with Katrina Trask and Erin Chesney, Macfarlane, who's director of the project, compared the
results of summary
judgment motions involving self - represented parties in both 2004 and 2014, the year in which the Supreme Court of Canada released its landmark decision in Hryniak v. Mauldin.
We have achieved successful
results for clients at every phase of the class action litigation process in both trial and appellate courts, including obtaining dismissals of class action complaints, defeating class certification, winning summary
judgment motions, prevailing at trial or on appeal, and obtaining highly favorable settlements.
In determining whether to grant the
motion, the court will consider several factors including whether unfair prejudice will
result if the court does not set aside the default
judgment.
(1) If a supplemental petition or a
motion for modification of time - sharing and parental responsibility is filed because a parent is activated, deployed, or temporarily assigned to military service and the parent's ability to comply with time - sharing is materially affected as a
result, the court may not issue an order or modify or amend a previous
judgment or order that changes time - sharing as it existed on the date the parent was activated, deployed, or temporarily assigned to military service, except that a court may enter a temporary order to modify or amend time - sharing if there is clear and convincing evidence that the temporary modification or amendment is in the best interests of the child.
Reiser, Inc. v. Roberts Real Estate (292 A.D. 2d 726)-- claims that broker breached listing agreement based on extrinsic evidence can not survive the explicit language of the listing agreement granting to broker «full discretion to determine the appropriate marking approach» for the listed properties; broker establishes its entitlement to commission under the listing agreements by introducing uncontroverted evidence that three properties sold as a
result of broker's efforts while the listing agreements where in effect; owner's claims of breach of fiduciary duty fail where owner, builder / developer, did not list all of its properties with broker as broker's duty is limited to protecting its principal's interest only with respect to properties which have been listed with the broker; broker's duty to refrain from taking action adverse to its principal's interests is necessarily tied to the transaction that formed the agency relationship; owner's claim of fraud in the inducement under one of two listing agreements survives
motion for summary
judgment