I was a trial court judge in a busy metropolitan court in Minnesota for two decades. During my time in family court, we developed two early neutral evaluation programs: the Social Early Neutral Evaluation (SENE) program for social issues (custody and parenting time) and the Financial Early Neutral Evaluation (FENE) program for financial issues. Developed over 25 years ago, both programs remain strong today, with SENEs yielding full settlements in 50% of cases and partial settlements in another 22%. By embracing ENEs, combined with aggressive case management, I was able to reduce my caseload by about 35% after the first year, which in turn allowed me to substantially reduce the time to disposition for my remaining caseload. 

Consistent with my experience, two federal trial courts have used ENEs for decades to settle myriad complex civil matters. Along with lofty settlement rates, the case management component of many ENE programs also facilitates prompt, informal exchanges of information, which reduces the frequency and scope of discovery disputes and offers an opportunity for better informed and better prepared litigants early on if the case fails to settle.

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