An existing procedure in the legal system allows the relocation of every similar pending civil case in the States and filed as one to a federal judge who is tasked with the pretrial proceedings. This is known as Multidistrict Litigation (MDL). The judge presiding over these cases is called a “transferee judge”, the selection of which is dictated by a committee of seven federal judges selected by the Supreme Court’s Chief Justice solely for determining which cases are to be merge into an MDL. This is commonly seen in cases like transportation disasters or product liability suits, such as hip implant recalls, and are determined by having one or more questions of fact and have been pending in several different districts.

The committee in charge of the creation of these litigations is called the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation. It was created in 1968, a product of Title28, Section 1407 of the United States Code. Its first task was to bring together all the cases with the same complaint across many districts about a company’s price fixing. When the cases were consolidated into an MDL it then became more convenient for all the parties involved.

The only thing more difficult when having a Multidistrict Litigation is that the judge has to use the layer upon layer of laws from a multitude of jurisdictions as a filter to determine if the petitioner has the set of facts justifying the right to gain something against the other party. But this is mostly at the judges’ expense. The lawyers, on the other hand, have the advantage of sheer numbers if ever their cases are approved for a Multidistrict Litigation. Different experience levels with various cases will help in building stronger and stronger cases. And the cost and effort of obtaining necessary documents can be kept to a minimum.