Saturday, July 3, 2010

KUDOS TO THE UTAH SUPREME COURT ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON THE RULES OF CIVIL PROCEDURE





For many years the Civil Rules Committee has been concerned with the increased expansion and cost of discovery and the impact of this on our civil justice system. Rule 1 states that the rules “shall be liberally construed to secure the just, speedy, and inexpensive determination of every action.” The discovery rules may have contributed to “just” results in the sense that they provide parties of sufficient means with the ability to discover all facts relevant to the litigation, but modern, expansive discovery has had a decidedly negative impact on the “speedy” and “inexpensive” resolution of civil disputes. Current civil discovery practice fosters one of the goals of Rule 1 at the expense of the other two.


Discovery has become the focus and the most expensive part of modern litigation. Discovery is viewed also as a primary contributor to delay.

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