I have no idea what part of bifurcate State Farm attorney Bob Galloway doesn’t understand – only that Haag Engineering’s attorney, the infamous “what-do-you-think-of-that-Larry” Canada can’t seem to grasp the concept either. Rigsby Attorney August Matteisa “gets it” but, of course, you have to know your vocabulary words to graduate magna cum laude from Georgetown Law. 
Since the word rolls off Judge Senter’s tongue like water (no pun intended) in the pre-trial orders he issues in Katrina litigation, he “gets it”, too. Obviously, Georgetown Law isn’t the only place the word is taught. Judge Senter, as a matter of fact, graduated from Ole Miss Law; so how Galloway missed it is hard to figure. Canada, on the other hand, is an Alabama Law graduate and could have made it out without catching on, despite the fact that Bear Bryant bifurcated the football team.
Robert Frost even wrote a famous poem about bifurcation – “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both…” and Joe Diffie sang a bifurcation song all the way to #40 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs – “Yesterday I missed my exit on my way to Sears…”
Simply stated bifurcate means “divided into two” – and when Judge Senter issues an Order to bifurcated one trial into two, he puts a fork in the road and you follow his directions.
I will hear the evidence on the Relators’ qui tam claim first. I will stay discovery on State Farm’s counterclaim until the trial of the Relators’ claim has been completed, and I will schedule a separate trial to reach the merits of the counterclaim.
The way Bob Galloway ran over Judge Senter’s Order in State Farm’s 420-page Motion to Compel, you’d think it was an armadillo. Sop could have treated my typing fingers to a manicure for what it cost to pull the Motion off PACER, not to mention it took all but an entire ream of paper to make copy. Consequently, one post can’t begin to cover the Motion and we look first at the related correspondence between Galloway and Metteis, a mere 53 pages, starting with Galloway’s 28-page letter of February 12, 2010, to Matteisa: Continue reading “Forked! “Bifurcation for Dummies” – a Rigsby qui tam Update (part 1)”