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Justice Bedsworth and Trial Continuences: Sometime a Great Motion

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Justice Bedsworth, in his Criminal Waste of Space column in the OC Lawyer Magazine, gives litigants some advice from the bench (and the stadium sidelines):

December 2010: “Take Me Out to the Pre-Trial,” by Justice William W. Bedsworth:

Excerpt: “…I have a particular interest in continuances. I’ve gone all over the world urging lawyers to devote less time to their practice and more time to their family. My remarks on this topic have been cited to me more than once in continuance requests. It’s difficult—though, I should warn you, not impossible—to turn down a continuance when you are the primary authority cited in support of the request.

And I’ve seen some unusual ones. When I was in Superior Court, we had an attorney phone in a continuance request from his sailboat. It was suggested to him that, “I’m busy sailing” was not going to get him a continuance. At which point, he explained he was stuck on a tiny island near Guam with a broken mast. Continuance granted….” (Link to full column.)

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