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Research Reports
This report summarizes the results of a Center survey of district court judges to assess the frequency with which jurors used social media to communicate during trials and deliberations in the past two years, and to identify strategies for curbing this behavior. The survey was conducted at the request of the Judicial Conference Committee on Court Administration and Case Management. The survey also assessed the frequency with which attorneys use social media to conduct research on potential jurors during voir dire. The survey is a follow-up to one conducted in 2011 on jurors’ use of social media; attorneys’ use of social media was not addressed in the original survey.
This report to the Judicial Conference’s Advisory Committee on Appellate Rules focused on class action objector appeals filed in the Second, Seventh, and Ninth Circuits from settlements approved by the district courts in class actions filed after January 1, 2008. The objector appeals studied were filed from January 1, 2008, through March 1, 2013, in the Seventh Circuit, through June 1, 2013, in the Second Circuit, and through July 1, 2013, in the Ninth Circuit. The study focused on the overall frequency of class action objector appeals during the study period, the final disposition of the class action objector appeals filed and no longer pending, and the prevalence of Appellate Rule 7 cost bonds imposed on the objector appeals identified.
In response to the global economic turmoil that began in late 2007, the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 (Act) introduced a broad array of regulatory reforms in the financial sector. This report focuses on the reforms in Title II of the Act, which are intended to mitigate risks posed by the failure of systemically important financial institutions. Title II directs the Administrative Office of the United States Courts (AOUSC) to study the resolution of these institutions and report on its findings. The AOUSC submitted its first report pursuant to section 202(e) of the Act on July 21, 2011 (First Report), and its second report on July 17, 2012 (Second Report). The AOUSC now submits this third report in compliance with section 202(e). This report to Congress was prepared with the assistance of the Federal Judicial Center.
At the request of the Advisory Committee on Rules of Bankruptcy Procedure, the Center collected and reviewed local bankruptcy rules regarding signatures of non-registrants of CM/ECF (e.g., debtors) and requirements for retention of documents bearing original handwritten signatures of non-registrants. Staff also reviewed district court rules regarding signatures and retention, reviewed an OMB document on the use of electronic signatures in federal transactions, and solicited the views of interested parties regarding potential rules changes in these areas.
This report presents the results of the Federal Judicial Center's retrospective process-descriptive study of judge-involved supervision programs for offenders in the federal courts. It is part of a larger research effort to investigate how programs modeled on state and local drug and reentry court programs operate in the federal system. This report does not evaluate these programs, but describes the population served, the services provided, and, through official data, how the participants fared when compared with a group of similar offenders who were not in a program.
The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 (“the Act”) introduced a broad array of regulatory reforms in the financial sector. Among those reforms is Title II of the Act, which provides a process for the identification and orderly liquidation of distressed, systemically important financial institutions. Title II also directs the Administrative Office of the United States Courts (AOUSC) to study the resolution of distressed financial institutions under Title 11 of the United States Code (the Bankruptcy Code). The AOUSC submitted its first report pursuant to section 202(e) of the Act on July 21, 2011 (“First Report”). The AOUSC now submits this second report in compliance with section 202(e)’s instruction that it summarize the results of its study in a report “[n]ot later than 1 year after the date of enactment of th[e] Act [and] in each successive year until the third year.” This report to Congress was prepared with the assistance of the Federal Judicial Center.
This report was prepared for the Advisory Committee on the Federal Rules of Evidence. Under the current version of Fed. R. Evid. 801(d)(1)(B), prior consistent statements are admissible for their substance as well as for their rehabilitation only if they rebut recent fabrication because they occurred before the fabrication motive. If a prior consistent statement is admissible for credibility but not admissible for substance, the opposing party is entitled to a jury instruction. Because of perceived difficulties with such an instruction, an amendment to Rule 801(d)(1)(B) was proposed to the Evidence Rules Committee. This paper reports the results of an FJC survey of district judges on matters related to the proposed amendment.
This report summarizes the findings of a study of the operation of Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 26(f) and 16(b) in a nationwide sample of recently terminated civil cases.
The Judicial Conference Committee on Federal-State Jurisdiction and the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation ("JPML") asked the Federal Judicial Center to survey transferee judges in multidistrict litigation proceedings about their experiences in coordinating with state judges. The purpose of the survey was to provide the committee and the JPML with information to assist in the development of practical resources to facilitate coordination between federal and state parallel proceedings in complex litigation.
The Judicial Conference Committee on Court Administration and Case Management (CACM) asked the Federal Judicial Center to develop and administer a short survey of district court judges to assess the frequency with which jurors use social media to communicate about cases during trial and deliberation. The survey also sought to identify strategies judges have found to be effective and appropriate in curbing this behavior. This report presents the findings from the survey. A subsequent survey in 2014 also considered attorneys' use of social media.
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