Quote:
Originally Posted by Graham
You're the one who said I was interpreting it as a series of notes.
I haven't interpreted it as any particular level of detail, as it's impossible to work that out from the comments as recorded.
What I'm interpreting the phrase 'draft opinion' to mean is... 'draft opinion'.
i.e. she wrote out her preliminary opinion on the evidence presented for the pretrial in draft form.
It's entirely possible that some or even a lot of that draft text made it into the final judgement, and I have agreed that it's perfectly possible that the first 112 pages of the final document - but not the accompanying footnotes - could have been written in advance as it covers the events leading up to the trial and the prior cases that have relevance.
Entirely possible. But nothing we've seen proves that it was.
Your contention was that it was a fact that she had written the majority in advance, and you've mentioned this repeatedly to support the idea that Judge Cote was biased during the main trial.
Even if draft text made it to the final document, all that means is that Judge Cote felt that it was appropriate for that text to be there in the final judgement.
Graham
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If your assumption is that she wrote a draft opinion rather than just take notes, then yes I have an issue with that. There is a reason that I referred "How We Decide" earlier. I'm afraid that your standard of proof is far, far higher than Judge Cotes' standard of proof. What exactly would be required for you to say that it is likely that Judge Cote wrote much of her opinion before the actual trial? What is the verbiage that will satisfy you? If you are looking for Judge Cote to say "Sure I wrote most of it before the trial, and you know it sure would take some major evidence before I was going to change my mind. I would rather call the only witnesses to the events liars than change it"? There is no way she would admit that. Few people will admit, even to themselves, that once they form an opinion, they are very resistant to changing it.