Habr v. RXMAPPER, LLC

Nature of the order

This is an additional pretrial order issued after filings and a pretrial conference held on February 19, 2025. It sets the schedule and procedures for the upcoming jury trial.

Trial schedule and time limits

The court rescheduled trial to begin August 18, 2025, in Courtroom 1. Jury selection is scheduled for August 15, 2025. Trial is scheduled Monday through Friday, beginning daily at 8:30 a.m., with counsel expected to be available earlier to address matters outside the jury’s presence. Each side is allowed 10 hours to present its case, including opening and closing arguments. The court reserved 30 minutes for closing argument for each side.

Trial procedures

The order establishes rules concerning witnesses, deposition transcripts, objections, juror questions, jury questioning, peremptory challenges, and counsel’s conduct. The court will seat eight jurors and no alternates, and each side will have three peremptory challenges. Parties may review publicly available information about jurors’ internet presence but may not communicate with jurors or request access to nonpublic social-media information.

The order also prohibits references to settlement discussions, mediation, or insurance, and generally prohibits evidence of a party’s wealth or lack of wealth except during a punitive-damages phase if one occurs. Parties must tell opposing counsel about trial witnesses 24 hours in advance unless they agree otherwise. Failure to comply with the order may result in sanctions, including monetary fines or terminating sanctions.

Additional filings and deadlines

The parties must meet and confer and submit a joint filing by April 18, 2025, addressing:

- whether the plaintiffs may seek benefit-of-the-bargain damages for their fraud claim or are limited to out-of-pocket damages; - whether and how mitigation of damages applies to an intentional-misrepresentation claim; - whether a conversion claim may cover intellectual property; and - the defendants’ basis for their Lanham Act claim and whether they intend to proceed with it.

The defendants must submit exhibits they contend form the operative contract by February 21, 2025. The parties must submit a renewed exhibit chart by May 30, 2025, and the plaintiffs may update their expert report until August 1, 2025. The court will hold another pretrial conference after the additional trial filings.

Counterclaims and disposition

The order states that the defendants elected to abandon their unjust-enrichment and trespass-to-chattels counterclaims. Those claims were dismissed. The order also provides that all Doe defendants will be deemed dismissed once the jury or the first witness is sworn, whichever occurs first.

Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers did not decide the parties’ underlying claims in this order. The order instead manages trial preparation and resolves the status of the abandoned counterclaims.