Putting the court bundle together is often the standard job for junior staff in many law firms. When I was a trainee, with a newbie secretary who knew less than I did, we learned by experience some of the mistakes you can make when putting court papers together.
When I read about the Coventry v Lawrence Supreme Court judges struggling through their court bundles earlier this week, it brought back memories of some of those trials and tribulations and I thought now would be an ideal time to look at good practice and commonly made mistakes.
In an ideal world, creation of the court bundle should not
be left to the trainee or junior staff. Even though it can be time consuming
and, let’s be honest, quite boring, this is how your case will be seen by the
trial judge for the first time. It is your only opportunity in most cases to
make a good first impression. If junior staff members are working on the
bundles, their work must be supervised by someone more senior who has a good working
knowledge of the claim.
The starting point is the list of documents. Earlier on in
the proceedings each party will have made and served their list of documents
which identified those documents which exist or had existed, or which exist,
but which the party claims a right to withhold from inspection. See CPR 31 for
the detail. As there is a continuing duty to disclose, this may not be the
authoritative list of all relevant documentation and a careful examination of
the file should be made to ensure all relevant documents have been located.
The trial bundles are the responsibility of the claimant’s
legal representatives. The detailed rules are in PracticeDirection 39A. I will not go into the detail – just some useful
pointers.
Manual bundles
It is possible to create your bundles manually (ie paper in folders) or electronically. These notes assume you are creating a manual bundle. If you are tasked with creating an electronic version of the bundle, then even a reasonably basic version of adobe acrobat can be used. Once you have assembled the bundle, you can scan it in its entirety, insert pages, remove pages, update the index and auto-number the pages. There are more sophisticated bits of software out there specifically for this task, but I won’t look at those here.
The folder
Choose a sturdy lever arch file for the court bundle. Where the papers extend to more than one file, ensure they are clearly marked and numbered. The case name, court and court number should also be printed clearly on the file spine.
It is possible to create your bundles manually (ie paper in folders) or electronically. These notes assume you are creating a manual bundle. If you are tasked with creating an electronic version of the bundle, then even a reasonably basic version of adobe acrobat can be used. Once you have assembled the bundle, you can scan it in its entirety, insert pages, remove pages, update the index and auto-number the pages. There are more sophisticated bits of software out there specifically for this task, but I won’t look at those here.
The folder
Choose a sturdy lever arch file for the court bundle. Where the papers extend to more than one file, ensure they are clearly marked and numbered. The case name, court and court number should also be printed clearly on the file spine.
· Where the total number of pages is more than 100, you should insert
use numbered dividers between groups of documents. (CPRPD 39A 3.5).
·
There is no hard and fast rule
on how many pages should be in each folder. You just need to make sure that it isn’t over-full
and bursts open in the post so that the judge’s copy is all in the wrong
order. Believe me: there is nothing worse than sitting behind a fuming counsel
while the judge complains that he can’t find page 97 in the bundle...
Before you punch
holes in any papers ask yourself these questions
·
What is the hearing or trial about?
·
What are the key issues which are going to be
aired in court?
·
What do we need to prove?
·
What evidence have we got to prove it?
·
What other documents will the court need?
If it’s an interim hearing of some sort, then you will be
able to decide which documents to put in and which to leave out once you have
answered these questions. If it’s a trial, then you need to follow the practice
direction and include (PD39A rule 3.2) the documents listed there.
Agreeing the bundle
Make sure that you ask the other parties’ legal representatives which documents they want to see included in the bundle. Do this as early as possible, as sometimes there will be disputes about this – particularly if the other side has just ‘found’ a document which hasn’t been disclosed before.
If there are a lot of medical notes in a personal injury
claim for example, you may want to agree with the other side to only include
those notes which each side agrees are relevant. I have seen judges get very
grumpy about having to wade through several inches of copied medical notes to
discover that only the last three pages are relevant. Less is sometimes more.
Assembling the documents
No hole-punch needed yet. Papers should be in chronological order and grouped into sections. For example, the pleadings should all be together; witness statements (possibly sub divided into claimant/defendant if there are several); medical report; expert reports; photographs and so on.
Once you are happy that you have all the papers you need,
create a draft index, itemising each document and grouping them as described
above. Send the draft index to the other parties and ask them to agree it.
Ok, now you can get the hole punch out. Assemble the bundle in the lever arch file, insert post it notes where the dividers will go and, once you are happy with it, number each page sequentially (bottom right of the page – not too close to the edge) and update the draft index so that it matches exactly the order of the bundle, including the page numbers which you have just created.
This is your master bundle. Take the documents back out of
the file and copy them, so that you have identical copies: one for each of the
following:
·
Claimant’s solicitor
·
Claimant’s counsel
·
Defendant’s solicitor
·
Defendant’s counsel
·
One each for any other parties (second
defendant/Part 20 – solicitor and counsel)
·
The judge (or if more than one judge – one for
each judge)
·
The witness box.
Return the documents to the file. Insert the dividers. Check
there are no missing pages. Repeat for each copy of the bundle.
Securely package up the files and post or DX them to the
other parties. Make sure that the files
cannot be crushed in the post – it’s not just over-filling which makes them disintegrate
upon arrival.
Additional pages
You can be sure, that as soon as you have numbered the pages and created six copies of the bundle, you will be asked to insert an additional page or pages. Don’t panic. All you need to do is ascertain exactly where they need to go into the bundle, then sub-number or alphabetise them. For example. If you need to insert three pages between page 97 and 98, you could number them 97a, 97b, 97c. Alternatively, you could number them 97.1, 97.2, 97.3 and so on. Don’t forget that you will need to amend the index too. If you have already sent the bundles out, then serve an updated index with the additional pages as soon as possible.
Additional pages
You can be sure, that as soon as you have numbered the pages and created six copies of the bundle, you will be asked to insert an additional page or pages. Don’t panic. All you need to do is ascertain exactly where they need to go into the bundle, then sub-number or alphabetise them. For example. If you need to insert three pages between page 97 and 98, you could number them 97a, 97b, 97c. Alternatively, you could number them 97.1, 97.2, 97.3 and so on. Don’t forget that you will need to amend the index too. If you have already sent the bundles out, then serve an updated index with the additional pages as soon as possible.
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