Want Better Litigation Outcomes? Know Your Judges

Countless moving pieces go into winning a litigation. For better or for worse, the judge assigned to your case can have a huge impact on both its outcome and how you craft your litigation strategy. It stands to reason, then, that obtaining reliable judge intel should be a priority from the outset of your case.

The problem, though, is that quantifiable information on judges, particularly in state court, has always been hard to obtain. Sure, the profession is full of anecdotes, but any litigator who has been tasked with researching judges will tell you that useful information and actual data are scarce. Instead, litigators are usually left with haphazard web searches that provide little help, and end up having to craft one-size-fits-all case strategies and hope for the best.

Not any more. Meet Gavelytics. Based out of California, Gavelytics uses an AI-powered algorithm to analyze existing data from state court filings to give you as thorough a picture as possible of a given judge, in a fraction of the time it would take you to amass that information on your own (if you even could). Simply put, with Gavelytics, you finally get the quantifiable and reliable judge information you need to customize your litigation strategy and increase your chances of winning.

Separating the Good from the Bad

Let’s face it — not every judge will be good for your particular client or case. Knowing which situation you’re in upfront is crucial to making the right litigation decisions going forward.

At its most basic level, Gavelytics offers reports on individual judges, so you can know right off the bat whether you’re facing the good or the bad. For a very small flat fee, you can request a comprehensive judge report that provides you with:

• basic judge background information;
• a summary of that judge’s past actions on certain types of filings and motions;
• an objective judge review prepared by James Publishing, addressing things like knowledge and demeanor; and
• an analysis of how your judge stacks up when it comes to CCP § 170.6 peremptory challenges.

The information comes with user-friendly graphics, like a Gavelscore, showing if your judge more often rules for plaintiffs or defendants.

Also handy for planning purposes are summaries of your judge’s typical workload and progress rates in cases.

Without wasting valuable time running incomplete Google and database searches, you now have the basic information you need at your fingertips to see how your judge tends to rule on your type of filing or in your type of case.

You can also quickly see how often your judge receives peremptory challenges under CCP § 170.6, both compared to the county average or on particular types of cases. Knowing whether or not you should challenge is crucial to getting your case started on the right foot.

It’s hard to think of a better way to make sure you’re pursuing a case strategy that will lead to victory than knowing the person who will decide the outcome.

Dive Deeper for Better Insights

While the individual reports are incredibly useful in their own right, Gavelytics subscribers have access to features that provide even more crucial judge information.

In addition to the standard reports, subscribers can order unlimited custom reports, which are typically prepared in under an hour. Want to see every summary judgment order issued in an employment case by a particular judge, or know whether your opposing counsel has appeared before your judge in previous matters, or has been to trial at all in the last five years? Gavelytics can get those answers for you.

A subscription also gives you access to a searchable ruling database, so you can poke around for answers on your own, as well as a motion analyzer, which compiles data on over 100 different kinds of motions and breaks it down by useful parameters like motion time, case type, and plaintiff vs. defendant outcomes. For your 170.6 challenges, you can compare your judge with other judges in the county. They’re also in the process of adding a feature that will allow you to predict which judge you’ll end up with if you do decide to challenge your current judge, allowing you to make an even more informed decision.

Currently, Gavelytics has over hundreds of thousands of searchable rulings, and that number will soon increase dramatically as Gavelytics expands its coverage beyond California and Florida. Only subscribers can search those rulings, and not all of the rulings have yet been incorporated into the standard individual judge reports. There’s no question that subscribing gets you far more bang for your buck.

Business Development

In today’s competitive legal market, it’s always valuable to know your competition and potential clients. While Gavelytics was initially developed for litigation strategy purposes, it can also be invaluable from a business development standpoint.

For example, Gavelytics can tell you which companies had the most litigation appearances in LA county in employment matters in the last two years. It can also tell you who represented those companies. For employment lawyers looking to expand their client roster and improve their business pitches, the available information is a virtual gold mine.

Because state court information is so notoriously hard to find and analyze, Gavelytics has been systematically building its expertise on a county-by-county basis. Originally only available in California, they’re now expanding to Las Vegas and some counties in Florida, with Texas, New York, and Illinois planned for later this year. Eventually, they’ll be your go-to source for reliable judge information in all major metropolitan areas in the country.

As they say, sometimes the best offense is a good defense. Litigation isn’t a one-size-fits-all proposition, so it’s time to stop preparing your cases as though it is. Knowing the judge you’re up against is the best way to create a tailored winning strategy. If you want better outcomes in 2019, give Gavelytics a try.