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Reason
Reason
Politics
Eugene Volokh

If You're Asking the Court for Something, Don't Just Put It in a Footnote

From yesterday's decision by Judge Aileen Cannon (S.D. Fla.) in Romspen Investment LP v. Dibert:

Plaintiff also objects to the Magistrate Judge's refusal to consider one of its sanctions requests (specifically, to resume Defendant's deposition under special conditions) because the request was presented in a footnote. Plaintiff characterizes this refusal as contrary to law, arguing that courts routinely consider unopposed arguments, even when raised in footnotes, and that Magistrate Judge Reinhart's reliance on Sony Music Ent. v. Vital Pharms., Inc. (S.D. Fla. 2022), was misplaced. This objection is overruled. While a court certainly can address a properly preserved argument made in a footnote, Plaintiff cites no Eleventh Circuit or Supreme Court precedent requiring consideration of such buried arguments. Magistrate Judge Reinhart did not clearly err in declining to consider that request, made in a footnote, in the context of Plaintiff's many other requests.

And here's a similar passage from Judge William Dimitrouleas's decision in Sony:

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