Flying Pig Spotted: Fifth Circuit Grants Mandamus Relief in Privilege Dispute

In the Texas state appellate system, petitions for writs of mandamus are a recurrent feature of the pretrial litigation landscape.

In federal court, however, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit is famously reluctant to grant a mandamus petition. A recent opinion, for example, invoked authority from 1881 as the reason for denial. Another found that the “substantial settlement pressure” arising from a multi-week bellwether trial in a mass tort case was not an appropriate injury for a writ of mandamus to address.