Judge Criticizes Dish During Voom Trial

Dish doesn't provide documents with appeal

By Jon Lafayette -- Broadcasting & Cable, 10/9/2012 3:26:02 PM

The judge hearing Voom's lawsuit against Dish Network criticized Dish for "incredible" behavior he said was delaying the case and could cause a mistrial.

According to Thomas Claps, an analyst for Susquehana Financial Group, Dish's lawyer appealed a ruling by Judge Richard Lowe III to turn over certain documents, but failed to provide the appellate court with a copy of the documents making it impossible for the appellate court to make an immediate decision.

Judge Lowe said the action was further evidence of Dish's ongoing, inappropriate conduct in the case, according to Claps. The judge also accused Dish of attempting to "spin its wheels" and delay the proceedings so that the current trial schedule could be jeopardized  and possibly result in a mistrial, Claps said. He added the judge appeared to be "absolutely furious."

Lawyers for Voom, an HD service started by Cablevision Systems' Rainbow programming unit, now a part of AMC Networks, accused Dish of attempting to cause a mistrial so that it could delay a verdict and attempt to gain further leverage over AMC in its current carriage dispute. Judge Lowe has vowed that he won't let that happen, Claps said.

Voom is suing for $2.4 billion in claiming that Dish, then Echostar, breached its contract to carry Voom, which was subsequently shut down. The documents in question concern whether or not the spending on the Voom service mandated by the contract includes overhead, as Voom maintains.