Working Groups are offered in-person only.

This interactive working group will provide you with the essentials of MDL defense. Workshop leaders will guide you through key components, leveraging the small-group setting, as you tackle the unique challenges of mass-tort MDLs, providing a robust foundation for broader conference discussions.

Topics of discussion include:

• Best practices for case management, screening procedures and settlement negotiations
• Implementing effective strategies for managing discovery, scheduling, case management, pre-trial motions, and bellwether considerations unique to consolidated proceedings
• Developing tactics for approaching negotiations with plaintiffs’ counsel throughout the MDL process
• Utilizing screening orders and lone pine orders to limit meritless filings
• Developing social media and online investigation tools to quickly identify and control meritless claims early on
• Developing an aggressive bellwether trial selection strategy to help cull meritless cases
• Quickly identifying issues most likely to be raised on appeal
• Navigating the remand process from transfer to trial
• Implementing and developing technological innovations to assess and project settlement values
• Understanding techniques that federal and state judges are currently using to affect settlement agreements
• Understanding how the defendants and the defense bar can improve organizational coordination