Lexecon Inc. v. Milberg Weiss Bershad Hynes & Lerach

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Lexecon Inc. v. Milberg Weiss Bershad Hynes & Lerach

Supreme Court of the United States

Argued November 10, 1997
Decided March 3, 1998

Full case name:	Lexecon Inc. et al. v. Milberg Weiss Bershad Hynes & Lerach

Citations:	523 U.S. 26
Prior history:	Defense verdict upheld by the Ninth Circuit.

Holding

A district court conducting pretrial proceedings pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1407(a) has no authority to invoke 28 U.S.C. § 1404(a) to assign a transferred case to itself for trial.

Court membership

Chief Justice: William Rehnquist
Associate Justices: John Paul Stevens, Sandra Day O'Connor, Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy, David Souter, Clarence Thomas, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer

Case opinions

Majority by: Souter
Joined by: Rehnquist, Stevens, O'Connor, Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas, Ginsburg, Breyer

Laws applied

28 U.S.C. § 1407(a)

Lexecon Inc. v. Milberg Weiss Bershad Hynes & Lerach, 523 U.S. 26 (1998), unanimously held that a district court conducting pretrial proceedings pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1407(a) has no authority to invoke 28 U.S.C. § 1404(a) to assign a transferred case to itself for trial.

On remand, a jury decided in favor of Lexecon and Daniel Fischel and against Milberg Weiss for $50 million; the case settled for that amount before the jury could decide punitive damages.