Free Status Report - District Court of Federal Claims - federal

Case 1:01-cv-00495-EGB

Document 311

Filed 06/06/2008

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IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF FEDERAL CLAIMS KENT CHRISTOFFERSON, et al., Plaintiffs, v. THE UNITED STATES, Defendant. ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ) )

No. 01-495C (Senior Judge Bruggink)

DEFENDANT'S STATUS REPORT Counsel for the United States respectfully submits this status report upon behalf of the parties. Counsel for plaintiff has read and concurs with this report. Status of Settlement Of Concord Plaintiffs' Claims On March 28, 2008, defendant responded to plaintiffs' settlement proposal of January 11, 2008, which concerned ten unsettled Concord claims and the correction of the error in the 2007 settlement of Luita Lynch's claim. Plaintiffs accepted defendant's proposed settlements for seven Concord plaintiffs. The parties have yet to conclude their discussions concerning the remaining three Concord plaintiffs (Ms. Hunt, Mr. Owens, and Ms. Lynch) before defendant's counsel, Steven Gillingham, left the country for military duty. The parties anticipate they will discuss the remaining issues by the end of his month. Other Outstanding Issues The parties continue to meet and confer regarding two issues that will require the Court's attention. The issues are: 1. Whether the notes written by plaintiffs' counsel regarding their conversations with claimants and relating to changes plaintiffs' counsel made to information supplied by plaintiffs on the questionnaire responses, or information that was added or deleted by plaintiffs' counsel

Case 1:01-cv-00495-EGB

Document 311

Filed 06/06/2008

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on the questionnaire responses, are protected from disclosure by applicable privileges or the Court's prior orders. 2. Whether questionnaire responses may be amended by plaintiffs' counsel with plaintiffs' consent subsequent to their execution under penalty of perjury. Defendant's Review Of Claims During the January 16, 2008 status conference with the Court, defendant estimated that it needed through May 2008 to complete its review of plaintiffs' questionnaire responses. Defendant states that its initial review is complete and is approximately 20 percent of the way through a re-review to assure consistency between the claim reviews. However, as explained below, completing this review effort depends upon resolution of the issues set forth above. During this review, by letter dated February 28, 2008, defendant's counsel identified the names of 42 plaintiffs whose claims defendant had determined should be rejected and requested plaintiffs' counsel to provide information or evidence why they should not be dismissed based on the information in the questionnaires. Defendant's counsel has informed plaintiffs' counsel that it has another 120 claims ready to be sent to plaintiffs' counsel. Defendant's intent is to consider any information that plaintiffs might supply and recognizes that such information could affect defendant's legal conclusions regarding the viability of the various categories of claims.

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Case 1:01-cv-00495-EGB

Document 311

Filed 06/06/2008

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Request For Status Conference The parties respectfully request a status conference and/or a briefing schedule with the Court to resolve the outstanding issues noted above. Respectfully submitted, GREGORY G. KATSAS Acting Assistant Attorney General

s/ Jeanne E. Davidson JEANNE E. DAVIDSON Director

s/ Steven J. Gillingham STEVEN J. GILLINGHAM Assistant Director Commercial Litigation Branch Civil Division Department of Justice 1100 L St. NW Attn: Classification Unit 8th Floor Washington, D.C. 20530 Tele: (202) 616-2311 Attorneys for Respondent June 6, 2008

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Case 1:01-cv-00495-EGB

Document 311

Filed 06/06/2008

Page 4 of 4

CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE I hereby certify that, on June 6, 2008, a copy of the foregoing "DEFENDANT'S STATUS REPORT" 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/ Steven J. Gillingham