Litigation Support Eastern District of Virginia Timelines
The reputation is about speed. The local rules are about something more useful: they remove the tool every litigator reaches for when a schedule gets tight. Most of what is written about the Eastern District of Virginia describes how fast it is. That is true and it is not actionable. What is actionable is what […]
Cross-Border Discovery: What Changes When the Data Is Overseas
Arlington, Virginia · Washington DC, Maryland & Nationwide Pro-Legal Services, Inc. supports Section 337 practices before the Commission and handles cross-border matters generally. Cross-border discovery breaks the assumptions domestic matters are built on. The custodians are asleep when your team is working, the documents are in another language, local IT has never seen a U.S. […]
Every Filing Has Two Versions. Keep Them Consistent.
Confidential and public versions are a production discipline, and the place 337 productions most often come apart. Nearly every substantive filing in a Section 337 investigation exists twice: a confidential version and a public version with the business information removed. Both are filed electronically through EDIS, on a schedule that leaves no time to rebuild […]
Domestic Industry Is a Document Production Problem
The economic prong turns on investment records that live in systems nobody collects from in ordinary litigation. The economic prong of the domestic industry requirement asks whether there are significant investments in plant and equipment, significant employment of labor or capital, or substantial investment in exploitation including engineering, research and development, or licensing. Each of […]
The 100-Day Order: What It Demands of a Respondent
An early disposition request compresses an already short schedule into a sprint that starts before institution. A respondent who wants a dispositive issue decided early asks for it before institution, typically around two weeks after the complaint is filed. If the Commission grants it, the notice of institution directs the ALJ to issue an initial […]
Read the Ground Rules Before You Process a Single Document
Each ALJ sets their own. Production format, exhibit handling and witness statements are decided there, not by a Commission-wide standard. The first thing that should happen on a Section 337 investigation, before collection and well before processing, is that somebody reads the assigned judge’s ground rules and writes down what they require. Vendors who skip […]
Discovery Starts the Day After Institution. Your Collection Has Not.
Requests can issue immediately and responses come due in days, not the thirty a federal civil case allows. In a federal civil case, a party has thirty days to respond to document requests and the schedule is negotiable. In a Section 337 investigation, discovery requests may be served the day after the institution notice publishes, […]
ITC Hearing Exhibits: What to Settle Before Hearing Week
ITC Hearing Exhibits: What to Settle Before Hearing Week Arlington, Virginia · Minutes from the Commission · Nationwide Pro-Legal Services, Inc. supports Section 337 practices before the Commission, and we have handled ITC matters. ITC hearing exhibits get built in the compressed window between the close of expert discovery and hearing week, usually while the […]
Respondent-Side 337: What to Have in Place in the First Thirty Days
Arlington, Virginia · Minutes from the U.S. International Trade Commission · Nationwide Pro-Legal Services, Inc. supports Section 337 practices before the Commission, and we have handled ITC matters — including on the respondent side, which is where the document burden usually lands. Respondent-side 337 work starts at a disadvantage that has nothing to do with […]
Foreign-Language Discovery in a 337: Eight Questions Before the Documents Arrive
Arlington, Virginia · Minutes from the U.S. International Trade Commission · Nationwide Pro-Legal Services, Inc. supports Section 337 practices before the Commission, and we have handled ITC matters. Section 337 is an import statute, so the record arrives in Mandarin, Korean, Japanese, German, and Traditional Chinese more often than not. Firms that treat Section 337 […]