FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE WEDNESDAY, JUNE 18, 2003 WWW.USDOJ.GOV AT (202) 514-2007 TDD (202) 514-1888 WASHINGTON, D.C. - R. Hewitt Pate, Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Departments Antitrust Division, issued the following statement today after the Department filed its brief in the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in case 03-5030, United States of America, Appellee v. Microsoft Corporation, Appellee, Computer and Communications Industry Association and Software & Information Industry Association, Appellants: The Microsoft settlement is in the public interest and the Department remains committed to actively enforcing its terms. As todays brief explains, the District Court properly rejected CCIA and SIIAs attempt to intervene in this case. Following painstaking review of the record, the District Court correctly found that the Department fully complied with the Tunney Act procedures, and that the settlement was in the public interest. BACKGROUND * Todays brief is filed in the appeal of the District Courts Jan. 11, 2003, order denying the attempt by two non-parties, CCIA and SIIA, to intervene in the Departments case in order to appeal the courts approval of the settlement. Under the District Courts intervention decision, the two trade groups cannot appeal the District Courts decisions that the Department complied with the Tunney Act and that the settlement is in the public interest. The trade groups are appealing this intervention decision, and have no standing to appeal the merits of the settlement unless the District Court is found to have abused its discretion in denying intervention.
* In its brief, the Department shows that the District Court properly rejected CCIA and SIIAs motion to intervene for purposes of appeal. Although their arguments on the merits are not properly before the court, the Departments brief addresses them, and demonstrates that the United States complied with the Tunney Act procedures and that the District Court properly found that entry of the settlement was in the public interest.
* On Mar. 26, 2003, the D.C. Circuit issued an order limiting the Department and Microsoft, who are both appellees in this appeal but were adverse parties in the governments antitrust case, to a total of 14,000 words in their separate briefs. The Department had limited space to address both the intervention issue-the only issue properly before the court-and the trade groups various attacks on the settlement. Appellants, CCIA and SIIA acting jointly, had 14,000 words for their opening brief and filed a single brief.
* Also in its Mar. 26, 2003 order, the D.C. Circuit ordered that the parties file their briefs not only in the usual form, but also on CD-Rom with all citations to the record, filings, and other briefs hyperlinked so that a click on any cite will immediately take the reader to the original source. The issue before the Court, whether on intervention or on the merits, is whether the record supports what the District Court did. The use of CD-ROM filing with hyperlinking makes that record more readily available to the Court than it would otherwise be.
* CCIA and SIIAs reply brief, limited to 7,000 words, is due to be filed on or before July 16, 2003. Oral argument, to be heard en banc, has been set for November 4, 2003.
* The Department is not a party to the State of Massachusettss appeal of the District Courts Nov. 1, 2002 decision denying the vast majority of the remedies sought by Massachusetts, eight other states, and the District of Columbia. The Massachusetts appeal and the CCIA/SIIA appeals are separate appeals with separate briefing, and the Department has not filed a brief in the Massachusetts case. The two appeals are, however, being briefed on the same schedule and will be heard on the same day. 03-360
Source: US Department of Justice
