Judge Bell Scolds NASCAR and 23XI-FRM Legal Teams Over Abusing Narrative Freedom in Their Opening Statements

The proceeding Judge for the charter lawsuit case called out both legal teams for negatively taking advantage trial opening statements.

Judge Bell Scolds NASCAR and 23XI-FRM Legal Teams Over Abusing Narrative Freedom in Their Opening Statements

Denny Hamlin and Michael Jordan (via Newsweek), Steve Phelps (via imago)

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The NASCAR community is going through one of the toughest phases in the series’ history, with the charter lawsuit starting trial. Michael Jordan and Denny Hamlin’s team 23XI Racing joined hands with Front Row Motorsports’ Bob Jenskins, to sue NASCAR alleging monopolistic practices. As expected, day one of the trial started with drama.

Once the jury selection was done, teams lawyer Jeffrey Kessler and NASCAR’s lawyer John E. Stephenson provided their opening statements. But before these statements there was some drama, as both parties were planning to use presentations that can considered prejudicial than probative for the jury.

This angered Judge Bell, who is proceeding the case and he called out both set of lawyers for their comments. He pointed out that both sides have opening statements included inadmissible evidence or arguments, hence banned the use of such exhibits during the respective opining statements. This move was intended to stop the lawyers from attacking characters of each side.

Judge seemed perturbed that both sides’ proposed visual presentations for opening statements included inadmissible evidence or arguments so he banned all visuals and exhibits from opening statements.

Bob Pockrass reported on X.

What are the arguments made by NASCAR and the teams in the opening statements?

Jeffrey Kessler made the initial opening statements and revealed some past chats from NASCAR leadership to build a narrative of monopoly. He accused the sanctioning body of having deals with track that limit their freedom to host races for other series. One issues with this argument is that there are no clear other series that is on the same level as NASCAR.

Jeffrey Kessler
Jeffrey Kessler (Via breakingthelines.com)

The second argument was NASCAR has provisions in their deals that bans Cup teams from participating in competitor division races. The next accusation was about NASCAR having full control over single-source supplied NextGen car and protecting its Intellectual Property, alongside controlling the cars parts market.

NASCAR on the other hand pointed out that 23XI Racing and FRM initially filed the lawsuit to have an edge during the negotiations, and they had illicit objectives. They pointed out that the charter system was created to stabilize the teams and insisted that it a system that benefit the teams more than ever.

He pointed out that the plaintiffs refused to sign the deal because they didn’t like the deal offered to them and it wasn’t because of any monopolistic clauses. These arguments seem to be rational from NASCAR perspective and the same can be said about the teams’ claims. It would be interesting to see how everything is going to playout for him.

Also Read: Why Did Jude Bar Denny Hamlin and Curtis Polk from Courtroom During Charter Lawsuit Trial?