Civil action at its simplest and most fundamental form is a legal dispute between one single party plaintiff and one single party defendant over one single claim. Economic development and more complex social structure, however, have begun to engender...
Civil action at its simplest and most fundamental form is a legal dispute between one single party plaintiff and one single party defendant over one single claim. Economic development and more complex social structure, however, have begun to engender civil legal disputes among multiple parties over more than one claim. Such form of litigation is known as complex litigation of which definition encompasses multi-party litigation as well as multi-claim litigation. Due to its complexity, delays and complications in court proceedings are not uncommon in complex litigation. Furthermore, it can even result in unexpected and unfavorable outcomes to all the parties. Therefore, it is imperative that civil procedure must have effective system and policy in place so as to achieve efficient and fair resolution of complex litigation. In addition, it also requires professional collaboration among the court, counsels, and involved parties.
Though Korean civil procedure has implemented a variety of systems and policies for efficient resolution of complex litigations, it needs further improvement to deal with ever-increasing complexity of litigations, particularly of those that involve multiple claims among multiple parties. In an effort to design a solution to the shortcomings, I painstakingly studied the following three practices commonly used in complex litigations in U.S.: 1) interpleader, 2) impleader(third-party practice), and 3) cross-claim. My thesis explains the practices in detail and discusses the possibility of their implementation in Korean civil procedure.
The practices mentioned above are similar in that they complicate one-dimensional dispute into multi-dimensional one, and a third party may be brought into a lawsuit and assigned a party without its initiative or intention. The latter is rather different from intervention practice where an outsider joins a lawsuit on its own accord, and it is not a widely accepted practice in Korean civil procedure custom. The purpose of my thesis is to provide a foundation for future scholarly discussions as well as implications for further development of Korean civil procedure.
Interpleader practice allows a stakeholder, who is subject to multiple and controversial claims to face two or more claimants in one single action; hence protecting the stakeholder from overlapping liabilities and avoiding multiple litigations. In today’s federal practice, there exists two forms of interpleader exist: statutory interpleader and rule interpleader. The practice protects the stakeholder from multiple overlapping liabilities, promotes efficient use of judicial resources by resolving multiple claims over “stake” or “res” in one single proceeding, and leads to fair and just allotment of the property, especially when the dispute is over limited fund.
Impleader practice is a procedural device in which the defendant files a complaint against a party not already in the lawsuit who may be liable for all or part of the damages that the original plaintiff may win from the original defendant. Its purpose is to avoid multiplicity and circuity of action, to resolve the dispute in one proceeding, and to prevent inconsistencies in court ruling, all of which ultimately promote judicial economy.
Cross-claim is a claim asserted between co-defendants or co-plaintiffs that is pertinent to the subject matter of the original action or counterclaim. Cross-claim practice prevents multiplicity and circuity of action, promotes efficiency and consistency in court ruling, and allows resolution of dispute in minimal proceedings. When compared with counterclaim, there are several differences among which the most notable difference is that counterclaim is either compulsory or permissive whereas cross-claim is always permissive and never compulsory.
In the thesis, I reviewed the feasibility of the three practices mentioned above in Korean civil procedure; interpleader and impleader practice were compared with “Proposition on the procedural device to bring a third party into trial.”
The first priority is to fastidiously analyze advantages and disadvantages that result from implementation. Only when the advantages clearly and significantly outweigh the disadvantages is it sensible to have positive outlook toward the implementation.
As far as the method of implementation is concerned, there are three possible methods: 1) application of existing practices, 2) contemporary interpretation of civil procedure, or 3) legislation. However, there is a limit on the extent to which the current practices and procedures may be applied or interpreted; thus new legislation must be considered to promote optimal implementation. With the regard to cross-claim practice, the majority of scholars share positive outlook toward introducing the practice to Korean civil procedure, nevertheless with opposing view on the implementation methodology. However, the contemporary interpretation of civil procedure does not render optimal implementation of cross-claim practice, therefore legislation of the practice must be reviewed.
In conclusion, the intention and instrumentality of the practices must be understood in prior to implementation and their implementation must be tailored to the necessity and context of Korean civil procedure.