Free Motion for Extension of Time to File Response/Reply - District Court of Federal Claims - federal

Case 1:98-cv-00126-JFM

Document 892

Filed 01/07/2005

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

No. 98-126C (Senior Judge Merow)

DEFENDANT'S UNOPPOSED MOTION FOR A TWO-DAY ENLARGEMENT OF TIME1 Pursuant to Rule 6(b) of the Rules of the United States Court of Federal Claims ("RCFC"), defendant, the United States, respectfully requests that the Court grant the parties an enlargement of time of an additional two days, to and including January 12, 2005, within which to file their responses to the opposing parties' proposed post-trial findings of fact and post-trial response briefs. Currently, those pleadings are due to be filed on January 10, 2005. Pursuant to the Court's December 17, 2004 order, the parties' post-trial response briefs and responses to proposed findings of fact are due to be filed by January 10, 2005. Counsel for plaintiff, Jerry Stouck, has represented that plaintiffs do not oppose this motion. This motion should not affect the currently scheduled date for closing arguments on January 24, 2005. As the Court is aware, on December 17, 2004, the parties agreed to request that the Court modify the scheduling order to permit the filing of these responsive pleadings on January 10, 2005, with closing arguments scheduled on January 14, 2005. That motion was based in large part upon the Government's need for additional time to complete its responses to the three plaintiffs' separate sets of proposed findings of fact and their separate briefs, as well as the fact

The Government requests that this motion also be deemed applicable in Connecticut Yankee Atomic Power Co. v. United States, No. 98-154C, and Maine Yankee Atomic Power Co. v. United States, No. 98-474C.

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Case 1:98-cv-00126-JFM

Document 892

Filed 01/07/2005

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that counsel for defendant was scheduled to be out of the office from December 24, 2004, through January 6, 2005, on previously scheduled annual leave. The Court granted the motion and moved the date for the response briefing to January 10, 2005. Subsequently, on December 20, 2004, the Court moved the date for the closing arguments from January 14, 2005, to January 24, 2005. Counsel for defendant returned to the office on January 6, 2005,2 but discovered that, even though work continued upon the Government's response briefing during his absence from the office, the briefing still requires significant work to permit its filing. Unfortunately, some other matters in the spent nuclear fuel cases required attorneys to devote their attention to those issues during the past two weeks, including the need to respond to a show cause order in Florida Power & Light Co. v. United States, No. 98-483C (Fed. Cl.) (Sypolt, J.), by January 4, 2005, and to deal with discovery issues in three other spent nuclear fuel cases. Further, counsel had not known on December 17, 2004, that the supervisor within the Department of Justice who must review the Government's pleadings before they are submitted to the Court would be out of the office, and unavailable to review the pleadings to be filed on January 5, 6, and 7, 2005, and he will need sufficient time to review the Government's draft pleadings when we expect him to return to the office on January 10, 2005. Given that the date for closing arguments has been moved to January 24, 2005, this motion for an additional two days of time should not cause any prejudice to plaintiffs or the Court and should not affect the currently scheduled closing argument date.

For reasons unrelated to these three cases, he also was unexpectedly required to return to the office for one day on December 28, 2004. However, he was required to devote his attention to another matter at that time. -2-

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Case 1:98-cv-00126-JFM

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For the foregoing reasons, defendant respectfully requests that the Court grant this motion for an enlargement of time of two additional days. Respectfully submitted, PETER D. KEISLER Assistant Attorney General s/ David M. Cohen DAVID M. COHEN Director s/ Harold D. Lester, Jr. HAROLD D. LESTER, JR. Assistant Director Commercial Litigation Branch Civil Division Department of Justice Attn: Classification Unit 8th Floor Washington, D.C. 20530 Tele: (202) 305-7562 Fax: (202) 307-2503 January 7, 2005 Attorneys for Defendant

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Case 1:98-cv-00126-JFM

Document 892

Filed 01/07/2005

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CERTIFICATE OF FILING I hereby certify that on this 7th day of January, 2005, a copy of foregoing "DEFENDANT'S UNOPPOSED MOTION FOR A TWO-DAY 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/Harold D. Lester, Jr.