Paramount Seeks Recusal Of Judge On State AGs’ Antitrust Challenge

Paramount is seeking to have the judge assigned to the state attorneys general challenge to its merger with Warner Bros. Discovery recused from the case, arguing that he has an “appearance of bias” because of his prior legal work for the Writers Guild of America.

In a motion filed in federal court on Wednesday, Paramount’s legal team wrote that U.S. District Judge P. Casey Pitts previously was in private practice for Altshuler Berzon LLP and served as “long standing labor counsel” for the WGA. They noted that the WGA has filed a related case, and that the guilds had expressed support for the state AGs lawsuit.

Paramount’s legal team asked that the case be reassigned to Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín, who is overseeing a lawsuit that was brought by a group of consumers in April.

Pitts, appointed to the bench by President Joe Biden in 2023, was randomly assigned the case on Tuesday.

More to come.