Court Docket - 25; Judge orders Mediation between parties

    Court Docket (25 ORDER that by July 26, 2016, the parties shall select a mediator pursuant to Local Rule 16.2, schedule a time, date, and place for mediation, and jointly file a proposed order scheduling mediation. Signed by Judge Cecilia M. Altonaga on 7/22/2016. (wc)


    Judge John J O'Sullivan may be well placed as 'mediator' http://fba-sdfla.org/wp-conten…sullivan-octnov14.pdf.pdf but could be another court official.


    Is this a signal that the parties do not want to go to full trial or just the next step in the court procedure?


    Best regards
    Frank

    This an automatic step in the legal process.


    Edit : since the motion to dismiss was denied (or at least suspended pending discovery, eg the "6-cylinder" question, which Rossi answered on his blog) I would have expected the next step would be for IH to file an actual answer to the "intact" complaints. (Even if just saying "we deny all allegations").

    Edit : wrong court.


    Here's the official Civil procedure:


    http://www.floridabar.org/TFB/TFBResources.nsf/0/10C69DF6FF15185085256B29004BF823/$FILE/Civil.pdf


    [ Lots of legal mumbo-jumbo ... ]


    and FL Bar's summary of the process for reporters :


    https://www.floridabar.org/DIV…69cb004ca402!OpenDocument


    "In lieu of, or in addition to, filing an answer, the defendant may move to challenge the legal sufficiency of the claims raised by the plaintiff ..." [ Motion to Dismiss etc ]


    I'd also expect any cross-complaints to be filed real soon.

    Hey, guys, Behind the Times. Yesterday on newvortex: https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/g…onversations/messages/804


    The Order is in the newvortex filespace with all other significant documents. Above is the usual meshegas, showing no care in research. I studied the rules and report on this in the followup post on newvortex. Quick summary:


    The parties were previously ordered to choose a mediator and file a document regarding that, by July 21. They did not, so the judge is now rapping their wrists. It looks neutral, but ... the rules actually place responsibility for making sure this happens on the plaintiff. If the plaintiff cannot manage this, the plaintiff may then request a mediator be chosen by the Clerk of the Court.


    And thus the penalty for failure would be dismissal of the case, as she warns. Obviously, if the defendant could get the case dismissed by refusing to cooperate, it would be unfair. But the responsibility to arrange a mediator by agreement or to ask for the Clerk to arrange it is with the plaintiff. And that did not happen, so Altonaga has filed the Order sua sponte, which is legalese for "I know and you don't."


    So Annesser has until July 26 to handle this, or the suit could be toast and his ass, grass.


    The Rules and summary linked by Alan Fletcher are not for this court, those are Florida state court rules, this is U.S. Federal District Court. The Rules are in that newvortex filespace.


    I had to look up sua sponte, I confess. It's important here because it complete negates the idea that this is somehow related to what the parties want to do, i.e., based on a request. In general, unless court is actually in session, documents will be filed with the court. We'd see the request.


    The idea that the Magistrate would handle mediation is nuts. The parties may select any mutually agreeable person to mediate. whether the person is a certified mediator or not, apparently. However, the Clerk has a list of certified mediators to choose at random from if asked. (In this case, by agreement of the parties, the Magistrate will handle discovery issues.)


    The mediator is not, per se, a "Court Official."

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