United States v. Marshall Medical Center

          NOTICE OF SETTLEMENT IN PRINCIPAL AND JOINT STIPULATION AND ORDER TO CONTINUE EXPERT EXCHANGE DATES TO ALLOW PARTIES TO FINALIZE SETTLEMENT DOCUMENTS

          JOHN A. MENDEZ, District Judge.

         Plaintiff-Relator Colleen Herren and Defendants Marshall Medical Center ("MMC"), Hematology & Medical Oncology II, and Drs. Soe and Tsai, constituting all parties appearing in this action (collectively referred to as "the Parties"), hereby notify the Court that they have reached a settlement in principal of the above referenced action and requests that the court continue the expert disclosure deadline from May 24, 2016 until June 6, 2016, and the rebuttal deadline from June 13 until July 5, 2016, so that the parties can focus their efforts on finalizing the settlement documents. Specifically, two separate settlements are needed in this case: one involving the Government (counts I-VI) and the other involving non-government parties (counts VII-X).

         The parties expect the settlement agreement with the United States and the State of California on the False Claims Act ("FCA") causes of action (counts I-VI) will be finalized today. As to the remaining counts, the parties have an agreement in principal; however, the parties still need to finalize a settlement of the remaining causes of action (counts VII-X). The parties worked at breakneck speed this week to try to finalize this matter but need additional time. Some of this additional time is for MMC to meet its internal institutional requirements and secure necessary board approvals. Because the parties focused their efforts on trying to resolve this action this week, they request a brief extension of the expert disclosure deadline until June 6, 2016. This additional time will let the parties focus on finalizing the settlement and not incurring the time and expense associated with expert reports and depositions.

         This brief addition time from May 24th until June 6, 2016 will not impact any of the remaining deadlines including the dispositive motion deadline (July 27, 2016), the motion hearings deadline (August 24, 2016), the pre-trial conference (September 30, 2016) or the trial date (November 7, 2016). Moreover, final resolution of this action would allow all of those deadlines to be vacated. This will enable the court to devote its resources to matters that are not resolving.

         This stipulation and request is made pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure Rules 26, 37, 78 and Local Rules 133, 137, 138 143, 144, 230, 240(a) and (c), and 281.

         The Office of the United States Attorney has indicated through Assistant United States Attorney Kelli Taylor that the United States supports this stipulation.

          Therefore, IT IS HEREBY STIPULATED, and respectfully requested, by and between the Parties to this action that

1. The Last Court Day for the Parties to Submit Expert Witness Disclosures, currently set for May 23, 2016, be continued to June 6, 2015;

2. The Last Court Day for the Parties to Submit Supplemental Disclosures and Disclosure of Rebuttal Experts, currently set for June 13, 2016, be continued to July 5, 2016;

3. All other pre-trial deadlines will be unaffected by these changes;

4. The parties will file a notice confirming the settlements with the Court no later than June 6, 2016.

          ORDER

         Based on the Joint Stipulation of the parties, and good cause ...