2023 ORCS Case Changes

Hot Damn.

I know a lot of the discussion will be around the new witness/what a mess they are and how much Fullertin and Danny did it have been buffed but what I'm most surprised by is the new case law about intervening and superseding causes not having to be an affirmative defense (and thus not needing to have a burden). This reads very weird to me, because I've always understood intervening and superseding cause as an affirmative defense but idk. Also do we think the effect of having no burden coupled with the much stronger fact pattern for D theories will now shift the balance strongly to D?

I think the change to no required affirmative defense changes the case structure back to previous years. In previous years the best defense theories essentially followed the structure of attacking the plaintiff/prosecution-claimed causation and then offering a different explanation as to what happened. For example, in last year's case, the pros-claimed causation was that Dakota burned down the bar. The best defense theories would attack that causation and then also offer up a second explanation as to what happened, with no burden to necessarily prove it; theories like blame Maddox (guilty portrayal is the easy/scummy way out), electrical failure, or Ruel Ellis did it.

The new case law brings back the option for this type of defense case. The only difference being that now AMTA has spelled out every possible defense theory for competitors, no creativity needed. If you choose not to pick up the burden, judges might still wonder why you're not trying to disprove plaintiff's contention if you choose not to say anything about it, like the case law gives you the option to. With there being so much evidence for defense theories now, I wouldn't be surprised if we see teams choosing to ignore this case law and instead go ahead and still pick up the burden of proving the affirmative defense by the preponderance of the evidence.