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So This Is How Jurors Think – Who Would Have Guessed?

  • Jurors like to be able to submit written questions during trial (who wouldn’t want that option?)
  • Jurors like preliminary jury instructions from the judge (who wouldn’t want to be oriented on the legal issues in the case at the outset?)
  • Jurors like interim statements by counsel, rather than waiting until the end of the case (who wouldn’t like to be told what’s going on at various points during a long trial, rather than have to wait until the end, when it may be difficult to remember the testimony of witnesses who testified weeks earlier?)

All of this, and a bit more, is in the Seventh Circuit Bar Association American Jury Project Commission Report.

Lets see, the commission was comprised of three co-chairs, a four-person Executive Committee, and fifty eight (58) lawyers and judges, mostly from Chicago, and took three years to generate its report. Wow, those commission meetings must have been great networking opportunities. The full two hundred page-plus pdf report is here (click at your own risk).

Will the FTC Appeal the D.C. Circuit's Decision in FTC v. Rambus?

At least one FTC Commissioner recently stated that he would support an appeal:

As I said earlier, I personally support a petition for certiorari in Rambus. I think the D.C. Circuit’s decision is wrong and given the fact that it rests on important legal principles respecting causation in Section 2 cases. I think its implications are much broader than the standard setting context. The petition is due in mid- November and it is my hope that the Solicitor General weighs in to support us on this important effort.

Section 2 and Standard Setting: Rambus, N-Data & The Role of Causation
J. Thomas Rosch, Commisioner, Federal Trade Commission, Oct. 2, 2008

Click here for an earlier discussion of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals’ decision in the FTC/Rambus litigation.