At the commencement of a lengthy construction dispute trial, the defendants sought to set aside an earlier bifurcation order so that liability and damages could be tried together, while the plaintiff moved to strike the defendants’ jury notice.
The court exercised its inherent jurisdiction to manage the trial process and set aside the earlier order, finding that trying all issues together would avoid multiplicity of proceedings and that evidentiary overlap justified a single trial.
The court also held that the case involved exceptionally complex factual, technical, and legal issues, including numerous expert reports, extensive documentary evidence, multiple causes of action, crossclaims, and potential apportionment under a Pierringer agreement.
Given these complexities, the court concluded that justice would be better served by a judge-alone trial rather than a jury.
The jury notice was therefore struck and the matter ordered to proceed on all issues before a judge.
