What Is a Case Conference?
After you have started a court action in family law, the first major appearance that you can expect to have is a pre-trial hearing called a case conference. The case conference has been called the most important step in family law litigation. This hearing is held in front of a judge and allows both sides, either self-represented or with their lawyers, to obtain orders on procedural matters and possibly hear a judge’s view of the case at an early stage.
While a judge may offer preliminary opinions on the issues, no binding decision will be made on a substantive issue in your case. Obtaining a judge’s feedback can be helpful because it allows the parties to see their arguments from a different point of view and possibly reassess the strength of their claims. In turn, this may help to resolve matters through negotiation or mediation.
What Can I Expect at My Case Conference?
While a case conference may allow for a judicial opinion, frequently, judges will decline an opinion at this hearing if disclosure has not been completed. A judge that does offer an opinion on any issue at a conference – case conference, settlement conference and even a trial management conference – is precluded from hearing the matter at trial. The thinking behind this rule is that the judge can no longer be a neutral decision-maker because he or she has been influenced by the settlement process.
While judges may explore settlement at a case conference, their primary function at this stage is to make procedural orders. These can include orders for disclosure of assets, giving permission for oral questioning of a witness, inviting the Office of the Children’s Lawyer to make a report, ordering appraisals or valuations of real property or businesses, and setting timelines for producing these documents to the other side.
Also, if the parties agree on settling a certain issue, the judge will often grant this order. In some rare cases, if it's crystal clear what should be done, such as an amount for child support, then a judge if asked properly would make a temporary order for this.
A judge may also schedule a motion or indicate that motions can now be brought since a case conference has been held.
As a side note, motions may be brought prior to a case conference on the basis of urgency. A judge will determine the issue of urgency first, prior to allowing the motion to proceed before a case conference is held. We will discuss motions in a separate article.
As a general point, though, don't get your hopes up. A case conference is merely the first hearing, and it's main benefit is that it rolls the disclosure ball forward and clears the way for you to bring a motion on a substantial issue. This may be the reason you are in the dispute in the first place. I'll write about motions in a separate post.
A Case Conference Story
Something a good family law lawyer will do is protect you from unnecessary disclosure demands. I did a case conference a few months ago where the other party wanted a ridiculous amount of business financial information from my client. If ordered, it would have cost my client an extra $8,000 to obtain and would not have shed any more light on the finances that what we were offering. The judge agreed with me and refused to order the additional business disclosure.
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