The panel of multidistrict litigation judges will decide whether to consolidate the cases in a hearing in Boise, Idaho, on July 29.

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The idea is to avoid the so-called multidistrict litigation (MDL) process, in which hundreds of cases are under the oversight of a single federal judge in New Orleans.

FORBES: Money & Investing

Vince Galvin of Bowman and Brooke, who represents Toyota in the current multidistrict litigation over unintended acceleration in its cars, acknowledged that preemption was unlikely to be an issue in that case.

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"No other venue offers immediate access to the evidence of liability that will come from the defendants in this case, " Transocean said in court papers filed Tuesday with the Joint Panel on Multidistrict Litigation in Washington D.

WSJ: Fight Erupts Over Oil Trial Venues

But this week Bank of America scored an important legal victory when the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation combined a bunch of mortgage-related lawsuits that had been filed against Countrywide and assigned them to a federal judge in Los Angeles.

FORBES: Bank Of America Scores A Victory