Jay Bhimani and Allie Ozurovich Discuss Due Process in Action: Plaintiff’s Leadership Roles in JCCPs

Judicial Council Coordinated Proceedings (JCCPs) are playing an increasingly critical role in managing complex litigation. Los Angeles-based Dechert lawyers Jay Bhimani and Allie Ozurovich, both members of the firm’s product liability and mass torts practice, explore some of the challenges of JCCPs in a compelling new article for the Daily Journal titled “Due Process in Action: Plaintiff’s Leadership Roles in JCCPs.” 

See below for an excerpt from the article.

"The last decade has been a busy one for courts. As limited budgets and growing dockets have put pressure on judges, mass tort and other complex litigation filings have taken off. These types of cases often have thousands (sometimes tens of thousands) of claimants with alleged damages in the many billions of dollars. They also span a range of industries and subject matter—from wildfire lawsuits to claims against social media companies.

To meet these unique demands, courts have increasingly used coordinated proceedings or “JCCPs” (more formally, “Judicial Counsel Coordinated Proceedings”). Under Code of Civil Procedure section 404, the Chairperson of the Judicial Council may “coordinate separate complex civil actions pending in different counties involving common issues of fact or law into a coordination proceeding for pretrial and trial before a single assigned judge.” Prescription Opioid Cases, 57 Cal. App. 1039, 1047 n.4 (2020) (citing Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 404). JCCPs have been used in mass tort and product liability litigation when common issues—such as company and expert discovery, or general causation—span across the filed cases."

To read the full article, click the link below.