Party Unsuccessfully Seeks Interlocutory Appeal Of Court ADR Order

A federal court matter in the Western District of Pennsylvania is not off to a good start, with the plaintiff seeking an interlocutory appeal over the court’s order, following the initial Rule 16 conference, that the parties engage in an early neutral evaluation. In Pennsylvania Skill Games, LLC v. Action Skill Games, LLC, the plaintiff, challenging the method of ADR, and the asserted cost burden, sought certification of an interlocutory appeal of the order to the Third Circuit, asserting that the court is implementing the ADR process “in violation of the United States Constitution, Amendments V, XIII and XIV.” The court disagreed, holding that the District’s ADR program was well-established under the the Alternative Dispute Resolution Act of 1998, 28 U.S.C. § 652(a), and that plaintiff’s request for certification failed to meet the requirement that certification be granted “only in exceptional cases in which an intermediate appeal may avoid protracted and expensive litigation.”