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Kirk Jenkins

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Kirk Jenkins brings a wealth of experience to his appellate practice, which focuses on antitrust and constitutional law, as well as products liability, RICO, price fixing, information sharing among competitors and class certification. In addition to handling appeals, he also regularly works with trial teams to ensure that important issues are properly presented and preserved for appellate review.  Mr. Jenkins is a pioneer in the application of data analytics to appellate decision-making and writes two analytics blogs, the California Supreme Court Review and the Illinois Supreme Court Review, as well as regularly writing for various legal publications.

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A few weeks ago, we established that court-wide, the party which is likely to lose tends to get the most questions in oral argument.  Now, we’re investigating individual Justices’ records – when the Justice agrees with the majority, does he or she follow the usual pattern, and when he or she doesn’t agree, does the Justice more heavily question that party that will lose, or the party he or she thinks should lose?  This week, we’re looking at Chief Justice Cantil-Sakauye’s data.
Continue Reading What Are Chief Justice Cantil-Sakauye’s Question Patterns in Civil Cases When She Disagrees With the Majority?

For the last two weeks, we’ve been looking at the Supreme Court’s question patterns at a court-wide level.  We reviewed the academic literature studying oral argument questions at the U.S. Supreme Court, which has concluded that the party which will lose averages the most questions.  We then reviewed the year-by-year data at the California Supreme…

Now we turn to the data for the criminal docket.  In outright reversals, respondents averaged more questions than appellants in three of five years between 2016 and 2020 – 2016, 2018 and 2020.

We mentioned in a previous post that there was some indication – notwithstanding the tiny data sets – that partial reversals might…

Last week, we reviewed the academic literature on oral argument analytics and compared the data on oral arguments at the California Supreme Court.  Last week, we aggregated the data on reversals – reversals plus partial reversals (“affirmed in part, reversed in part”).  This week, we’re checking if the oral argument data is any different for…

Yesterday, we surveyed the academic literature in oral argument analytics and then reviewed the data for 2016-2020 civil cases from the Supreme Court.  Today, we’re looking at the criminal docket.

Between its earliest posted arguments in 2016 and the end of August, the Court asked 8,256 questions in criminal, quasi-criminal, juvenile and mental health matters:…

Between 2005 and 2019, the Supreme Court decided 53 civil constitutional law cases.  Thirty-two of those cases involved challenges to state government actions.  Ten cases involved claims of individual rights.  Seven cases involved civil procedure and judicial issues.  Finally, four cases related to challenges to local government actions.

Join us back here next Thursday as…

In the past two weeks, we’ve taken a deeper look at the Supreme Court’s cases in two areas of law, asking which sub-areas those cases fall in.  Today, we’re moving on to another subject – civil constitutional law cases.

Between 1990 and 2004, the Supreme Court decided ninety-six civil constitutional law cases.  Just short of…

Last week, we drilled down on the Supreme Court’s tort cases, looking year by year at what sub-areas of tort law produced the Court’s cases.  This week, we’re doing the same thing for the Court’s docket of insurance cases.  We’re dividing the field of insurance law into six sub-areas: coverage; separate torts against insurers (outside…