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Anneliese J. Thomson OCR-USDC/EDVA (703)299-8595
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                   UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
               FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF VIRGINIA
                       ALEXANDRIA DIVISION
BLUE FLAME MEDICAL LLC,
.
Civil Action No. 1:20cv658
.
Plaintiff,
.
.
vs.
.    Alexandria, Virginia
.    April 15, 2021
CHAIN BRIDGE BANK, N.A.,
.    10:00 a.m.
JOHN J. BROUGH, and
.
DAVID M. EVINGER,
.
.
Defendants,
.
.
------------------------------X
CHAIN BRIDGE BANK, N.A.,
.
.
Counterclaim Plaintiff,
.
.
vs.
.
.
BLUE FLAME MEDICAL LLC,
.
.
Counterclaim Defendant.
.
.
------------------------------X
.
CHAIN BRIDGE BANK, N.A.,
.
.
Third-Party Plaintiff,
.
.
vs.
.
.
JPMORGAN CHASE BANK, N.A.,
.
.
Third-Party Defendant.
.
.
.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  X
TRANSCRIPT OF FINAL PRETRIAL CONFERENCE
BEFORE THE HONORABLE LEONIE M. BRINKEMA
UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE
(Via Teleconference)
                          (Pages 1 - 9)
COMPUTERIZED TRANSCRIPTION OF STENOGRAPHIC NOTES
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Anneliese J. Thomson OCR-USDC/EDVA (703)299-8595
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APPEARANCES:
FOR BLUE FLAME MEDICAL LLC:
PETER H. WHITE, ESQ.
Schulte Roth & Zabel LLP
901 15th Street, N.W., Suite 800
Washington, DC. 20005
FOR CHAIN BRIDGE BANK, N.A.; GARY A. ORSECK, ESQ.
    JOHN J. BROUGH; AND
Robbins Russell Englert Orseck
    DAVID M. EVINGER:
Untereiner & Sauber LLP
2000 K Street, N.W., 4th Floor
Washington, DC. 20006
FOR JPMORGAN CHASE
ALAN SCHOENFELD, ESQ.
    BANK, N.A.:
Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale &
Dorr LLP
7 World Trade Center
250 Grenwich Street
New York, NY 10007
OFFICIAL COURT REPORTER:
ANNELIESE J. THOMSON, RDR, CRR
U.S. District Court, Third Floor
401 Courthouse Square
Alexandria, VA 22314
(703)299-8595
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Anneliese J. Thomson OCR-USDC/EDVA (703)299-8595
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P R O C E E D I N G S
THE COURT:  All right, this is the matter of Blue
Flame Medical LLC versus Chain Bridge Bank, and then Chain
Bridge Bank, N.A., Counterclaim-Plaintiff, versus Blue Flame
Medical LLC, Civil Action 20cv658.
Who will be -- who will be speaking for Blue Flame,
please?
MR. WHITE:  This is Pete White of Schulte Roth &
Zabel, for Blue Flame, Your Honor.
THE COURT:  All right, Mr. White.
And who's speaking for Chain Bridge?
MR. ORSECK:  Good morning, Your Honor.  This is Gary
Orseck from Robbins Russell for the Chain Bridge defendants.
THE COURT:  All right.  And for JPMorgan Chase?
MR. SCHOENFELD:  Good morning, Your Honor.  This is
Alan Schoenfeld from Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale & Dorr.
THE COURT:  All right.  Well, this is on for our
final pretrial.  Have you-all had a chance to exchange your
exhibits and witness lists?
MR. WHITE:  This is Pete White, Your Honor.  Yes, we
have.
THE COURT:  All right.  Are there going to be any
dispositive motions, Mr. White?
MR. WHITE:  Yes, Your Honor.  I believe there will be
for plaintiff.
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Anneliese J. Thomson OCR-USDC/EDVA (703)299-8595
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THE COURT:  What are you anticipating, a motion for
summary judgment or what?
MR. WHITE:  Yes, ma'am, a motion for summary judgment
on several of the counts.
THE COURT:  I'm sorry, you-all cannot rustle your
papers.  We can't hear you.  What was that, Mr. White?
MR. WHITE:  We expect to file a motion for summary
judgment on at least some of the, at least some of the counts.
THE COURT:  All right.  And how about on behalf of
Chain Bridge?  Does Chain Bridge plan to file any motions?
MR. ORSECK:  This is Gary Orseck.  We do plan to file
a dispositive motion as to all the remaining counts in Blue
Flame's complaint.  We also intend to file a summary judgment
motion as to our third-party claim against JPMorgan Chase.
THE COURT:  All right.  And how about JPMorgan Chase?
Are you also planning to file something?
MR. SCHOENFELD:  We may well, Your Honor.  We're
still deciding --
THE COURT:  All right.
MR. SCHOENFELD:  -- on the indemnification claim and
the unjust enrichment claim in Chambers as complained.
THE COURT:  All right.  Well, discovery is over at
this point, so I'm assuming that you can get your motions filed
within the next 14 days.  Does that sound about right?
MR. ORSECK:  This is Gary Orseck, Your Honor.  We
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Anneliese J. Thomson OCR-USDC/EDVA (703)299-8595
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will, of course, comply with whatever schedule you impose.  We
would request a bit of additional time because of the number of
issues and the fact that we're filing two complaints.
Twenty-one days would be substantially better for us if the
Court will allow that.
THE COURT:  All right.  I'll make that ruling then.
For all parties, any affirmative motions need to be filed
within 21 days.  Response times will be the standard 14 days.
Reply briefs, seven days thereafter.
And in terms of oral argument, I will tell you we're
going to be back on a June -- I'm sorry, on a Friday motions
docket by the time these are ready for oral argument, so you
can go ahead and you can notice argument for any Friday at ten
o'clock, and if it bumps into something we've got, we'll let
you know, but we're going to go back to the old system.
It will be in person by the time these motions are
filed.  We're going back to as much in-person work as possible.
So I recommend, counsel, that you do everything you can to get
vaccinated before then.
I'll let you, as I said, work among yourselves to
decide what kind of motions date, you know, when you want the
motions to be argued, but obviously, you've got to give us in a
case like this at least a week after the reply brief comes in
before we want to have oral argument.
In terms of a trial date, I think at this point it
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Anneliese J. Thomson OCR-USDC/EDVA (703)299-8595
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may make sense, because I suspect a lot of the issues in this
case will be resolved on motions, just from my background in
this case, I think I'm going to wait on setting a trial date
until we see how the motions are resolved.
Does anyone have a problem with that?
MR. WHITE:  This is Pete White for plaintiffs, Your
Honor.  No, that is perfectly acceptable.
THE COURT:  All right.  And the other thing is right
now this is set as a jury trial; is that correct?
MR. WHITE:  Yes, Your Honor.  Pete White again.
THE COURT:  All right.  Well, as you know, civil jury
trials are taking second priority after criminal cases, and
we're backed up on criminal cases.  Until the epidemic gets
really under control, we're not able to run more than two jury
trials at a time in the courthouse, and we have multiple
criminal cases that are mounting up.  So I would expect that
you cannot -- you probably will not get a trial date until
quite late in the fall of 2021 and possibly into next year, but
we'll wait and see.  Again, I don't know how much of the case
will be left after the motions are heard.
Have you-all tried to settle this case?  I thought
when I was last with you-all, I recommended that you give
settlement a try.  Have you made any effort to do that?
MR. ORSECK:  Judge, this is Gary Orseck from Robbins
Russell.  I did reach out to Mr. White in early December in
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Anneliese J. Thomson OCR-USDC/EDVA (703)299-8595
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response to your comments at the motion to dismiss hearing and
said that we would be willing and open to such a discussion.
I've not heard back from Blue Flame since that date.
THE COURT:  Well, now that the discovery is done, I
mean, all of the attorneys now have a pretty good picture as
to, you know, what the evidence looks like, and at this point,
you ought to be able to make reasonable assessments as to the
strengths and weaknesses of your positions.
Mr. White, are you -- do you think a settlement
conference at this point would be of any use?
MR. WHITE:  Your Honor, I don't think so.  I almost
take partial issue with what Mr. Orseck said.  He did reach out
in December.  It was clear to me from where he was signalling
that they were in terms of settlement that it wouldn't be
productive to have a conversation at that point given where my
clients were.  I think it's always worth reassessing that and
speaking with my clients and Mr. Orseck.  I think having those
conversations, we can make an assessment of whether the Court's
assistance would be helpful or not.
THE COURT:  Well, I think it would not be unwise for
you to do that, Mr. White.  As I recall, I thought there were
quite a few significant hurdles that the plaintiff faced in
this case.  Now, the discovery may have shown something new,
but it would not be foolish on your part to seriously talk with
your clients.
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Anneliese J. Thomson OCR-USDC/EDVA (703)299-8595
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Again, this is the time when good lawyers start to
really assess the strengths and weaknesses of their cases, and
even though you may have a client who's, you know, come into
the case thinking they're going to hit a home run, at best they
might get to first base, and, you know, at this point, it's
going to get very expensive.  These are going to be complex
motions, I suspect, and it's going to cost a fair amount of
time, and that means money, and, you know, it could result in
the case going away entirely or big chunks of it going away or
possibly none of it going away, but this is a really opportune
time.  If you're serious about settling, this would be the time
to do it.
So that's what I'll give you.  You know, that's the
bully pulpit here.  But if you don't settle, then we'll see you
back here sometime in the summer for the argument of the
motions.
All right, anything else we need to address today?
MR. WHITE:  Not for plaintiffs, Your Honor.  Thank
you for your time.
THE COURT:  All right.  And just as soon as you get a
date for the argument of motions, you should get that noticed
so that we can be sure it's on the calendar.
All right, thank you.  We'll sign off at this time.
MR. ORSECK:  Thank you, Your Honor.
MR. SCHOENFELD:  Thank you, Your Honor.
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Anneliese J. Thomson OCR-USDC/EDVA (703)299-8595
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(Which were all the proceedings
 had at this time.)
CERTIFICATE OF THE REPORTER
I certify that the foregoing is a correct transcript of
the record of proceedings in the above-entitled matter.
                 /s/
Anneliese J. Thomson

Case 1:20-cv-00658-LMB-IDD     Document 102     Filed 04/22/21     Page 9 of 9 PageID# 695

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