On July 1, 2018, the amendments to the Arizona Rules of Civil Procedure became effective. Under the new rules, all cases are assigned to one of three tiers based on the value of the case:
Tier One: Cases where the Plaintiff is claiming $50,000.00 or less in damages and can be tried in one or two days.
Tier Two: Cases where the Plaintiff is claiming $50,000.00 to $300,000.00 in damages, and likely have more than a few witnesses, including experts, and multiple theories of liability.
Tier Three: Cases where the Plaintiff is claiming $300,000.00 or more in damages. This tier typically includes class actions, anti-trust, multi-party commercial or construction cases, security cases, environmental torts, construction defect cases, medical malpractice cases, products liability cases, and mass torts.
The amount of discovery allowed in any particular case depends on the tier to which it has been assigned. For smaller cases, the parties only have four (4) months to complete discovery, and written discovery and fact witness depositions are significantly limited. Even complex cases are limited to eight (8) months of discovery. All insurers, third-party administrators, self-insured entities, carriers and their retained defense counsel must be aware of the new rules.
For more information on the rule changes and how they may affect your claims, please contact Thomas Rubin & Kelley PC at 602-274- 8289 or brubin@trkfirm.com.