GoKawiilUpdate, July 26: Apple’s form has now been made public, confirming that the company declined magistrate judge jurisdiction and requested that the case be reassigned to a district judge. The original story follows below.
Apple’s trade secrets lawsuit against OpenAI has been reassigned to U.S. District Judge Edward Davila, replacing the magistrate judge initially assigned to the case. Here are the details.
New judge assigned, October hearing vacated
When a civil lawsuit is filed in the Northern District of California, it is randomly assigned to either a district judge or a magistrate judge. If the case is assigned to a magistrate judge, each party must then indicate whether it agrees to let that judge oversee the entire case.
That is because district judges have the authority to oversee federal civil cases from start to finish, while magistrate judges can do so only with the consent of every party involved.
On the day Apple filed its trade secrets lawsuit against two former employees, OpenAI, and Jony Ive’s io Products, the case was randomly assigned to Magistrate Judge Virginia K. DeMarchi.
This meant that all parties involved in the lawsuit would need to submit forms indicating whether they consented to DeMarchi overseeing the case in full.
Apple, for its part, appears to have declined. Yesterday, the company submitted a consent-or-declination form, which has yet to be made public, that appears to have triggered the process of reassigning the case to a district judge.
There do not appear to be any other filings that would explain the reassignment, which strongly suggests that Apple checked the box declining magistrate judge jurisdiction.
As a result, the case has now been reassigned to U.S. District Judge Edward Davila, with Magistrate Judge Nathanael Cousins assigned to handle discovery matters.
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