Free Motion for Extension of Time - District Court of Federal Claims - federal

Case 1:00-cv-00697-JFM

Document 252

Filed 12/07/2006

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IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF FEDERAL CLAIMS WISCONSIN ELECTRIC POWER COMPANY, Plaintiff, v. UNITED STATES, Defendant. ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ) )

No. 00-697C (Senior Judge Merow)

DEFENDANT'S UNOPPOSED MOTION FOR AN ENLARGEMENT OF TIME Pursuant to Rule 6(b) of the Rules of the United States Court of Federal Claims ("RCFC"), defendant, the United States, respectfully requests an enlargement of time of 42 days, to and including Friday, January 19, 2007, within which to file its RCFC Appendix A, paragraph 14(b) memorandum of contentions of fact and law, its paragraph 15 witness list, and its paragraph 16 exhibit list. Our deadline for filing each of these three items is currently Friday, December 8, 2006. This is defendant's first request for an enlargement of time to meet this particular deadline. The pretrial deadlines applicable to both parties in this case have been enlarged on other prior occasions for various reasons. Counsel for plaintiff has represented that plaintiff, Wisconsin Electric Power Company, does not oppose this motion. The requested enlargement was the subject of a telephone conference conducted by the Court at the plaintiff's request on November 9, 2006. At that time, plaintiff had timely filed its Appendix A, paragraph 14(a) memorandum by the October 27, 2006 pretrial deadline, but had not filed either its paragraph 15 witness list or its paragraph 16 exhibit list.1 We objected to this omission based upon the language in paragraphs 15 and 16 requiring that these lists be filed By this time, the parties also had exchanged their paragraph 13 witness and exhibit lists by the applicable September 18, 2006 pretrial deadline.
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Case 1:00-cv-00697-JFM

Document 252

Filed 12/07/2006

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"together with" a party's paragraph 14 memorandum. RCFC App. A, ¶¶ 15 and 16. We then proposed a schedule that would allow plaintiff another five weeks, until December 18, 2006, to file its lists, and a corresponding enlargement of the deadline applicable to defendant's filings to the date requested in this motion. This would provide us with a proper understanding of the nature of the entire case that plaintiff intends to present at trial before filing a disclosure intended for a similar purpose. During the telephone conference, the Court agreed that a filing schedule similar to the one proposed by the Government would allow the parties sufficient time to make the necessary pretrial filings as long as it also allowed the time necessary for the parties to conduct certain depositions of newly-disclosed witnesses. As a result, the Court concluded the telephone conference by leaving it up to the parties to agree upon the dates by which the filings would be made. After the telephone conference, the parties began working together to schedule the depositions of the newly-disclosed witnesses. To that end, at least one of those already has been conducted. It is our belief that the other depositions can be conducted in sufficient time to allow the plaintiff to file its lists by December 18, 2006,2 and to allow us to file our paragraph 14(b) memorandum, paragraph 15 witness list, and paragraph 16 exhibit list by the date requested. Therefore, we respectfully request that the Court grant this motion for an enlargement of time.

The parties have discussed allowing plaintiff additional time after the December 18, 2006, date to supplement its lists with additional documents and the names of additional witnesses relating to the depositions. The time frame proposed by the Government for this supplementation would allow it to complete its filings within the enlargement period requested. -2-

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Respectfully submitted, PETER D. KEISLER Assistant Attorney General DAVID M. COHEN Director OF COUNSEL: JANE K. TAYLOR Office of the General Counsel U.S. Department of Energy 1000 Independence Ave., S.W. Washington, D.C. 20585 s/ Harold D. Lester, Jr. HAROLD D. LESTER, JR. Assistant Director

ALAN J. LO RE Senior Trial Counsel RUSSELL A. SHULTIS SONIA M. ORFIELD Trial Attorneys Commercial Litigation Branch Civil Division Department of Justice

s/ Kevin B. Crawford KEVIN B. CRAWFORD Trial Attorney Commercial Litigation Branch Civil Division Department of Justice Attn: Classification Unit 8th Floor 1100 L Street, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20530 Tele: (202) 305-9640 Fax: (202) 307-2503 Attorneys for Defendant

December 7, 2006

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CERTIFICATE OF FILING I hereby certify under penalty of perjury that on December 7, 2006 a copy of this "DEFENDANT'S UNOPPOSED MOTION FOR AN ENLARGEMENT OF TIME" was filed electronically. I understand that notice of this filing will be sent to all parties by operation of the Court's electronic filing system. Parties may access this filing through the Court's system.

s/ Kevin B. Crawford