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December 2004 “Tips from the Bench” By Judge John Wittmayer, Multnomah County Circuit Court. Early assignment to a trial judge Some civil cases need more certainty about the trial date than do others. You have a case with out-of-town lawyers or experts or other “issues,” and it would be a big expense to the litigants to get carried or set-over at daily call because we are short judges available for trial the day your case is set. Presiding Judge Dale Koch is here to help. At least a month before your trial date, schedule an afternoon conference with Judge Koch and you can ask him to make an early assignment of a trial judge to your case. Be prepared to give a firm commitment as to the maximum length of the trial. Although that request cannot always be granted, the court will be happy to see if it is possible to pre-assign a judge to your case for that trial date. Email addresses Email correspondence has become increasingly common. The OSB includes lawyer email addresses in the bar directory, both the printed version, and the online version that is available on the bar’s web site. Court staff and lawyers frequently link to the OSB web site directory, www.osbar.org and “copy and paste” email addresses for ease of correspondence to lawyers. UTCR 2.010(7) has been revised to require that as of August 1, 2005, you must include your email address (and your fax number), if any, on pleadings, motions and other documents you file with the court. Lawyers should all have email addresses. This is no longer “cutting edge” technology. Email is easy and quick. And your email addresses should be available on the bar’s Web site directory. Some lawyers choose not to have the bar list their email addresses. This is very frustrating. Don’t do it. Some judges believe that correspondence with the court via email is inappropriate. Other judges embrace this simple and cheaper alternative to formal correspondence. Before corresponding with a judge via email, call the judge’s office to learn any preference that judge may have. Also, do not include the judge on the “cc” list for emails from lawyer to lawyer. Judges are not interested in reading your emails to each other. Written submissions - keep them short Sure, you know everything there is to know about your motion or your opposition to the other lawyer’s motion, but the judge does not need to know everything - just the important things. And the judge does not need all of the citations, just the most recent Oregon citation, if there is one. Unfortunately, trial judges do not have time to read every case you cite in your memorandum, but the judge will be encouraged to read a cited case if you clearly point out to the judge in your submission that the case does not stand for the proposition claimed for it by the other lawyer. When there is a disagreement between the lawyers about what a case means, the judge is much more likely to make time to read it. Be clear about this in your submission. Before you send anything longer than a couple of pages to a judge via fax, you should call the judge’s office and ask permission. Our fax capability operates through the computer of our judicial assistant, and must be printed on our assistant’s printer. This ties up the assistant’s printer for lengthy fax transmissions. Long email file attachments are the same as long fax transmissions.
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