Welcome to the new militarybackpay.com and to our inaugural updates post! The blog section of this website will now include regular, publicly available updates for class members and their families to stay current on the goings-on of each case. Being that this is the first update post, I would highly recommend checking out the first post linked here, to give you a sense of how civil lawsuits work.
As always: if you lost pay or benefits due to the DoD’s COVID mandate, and have not yet connected with us, please fill out our contact form and a team member will reach out to you to discuss your potential claim.
November & December Lawsuit Updates
Bassen v. US
After the government filed their motion to dismiss in response to our complaint, we submitted our response back in September, and they submitted their reply on October 6th. Since then, the filings have been sitting with the Judge, who will read and make a determination on if the case will proceed. Unfortunately, there is no rule or strict timeline on how long the Judge may take to make their decision. Bassen is ahead of the other two lawsuits in terms of timelines, but not by much. As with other professions, the holiday season tends to slow things down, so I would not expect a ruling before the New Year, however you never know! Of course, once we have an update or a ruling, the filings and the status of the case will be posted here.
Botello v. US
Botello is following the same general path as Bassen, only a few weeks behind. We filed our response to the government’s motion to dismiss on September 29th and the government has until November 24th to file their reply. Once the government files their reply, all of the writing will sit before the Judge in this case and we will wait for our ruling.
Harkins v. US
Harkins case is the most recent case filed and is very similar to the Bassen suit. Harkins is a few weeks behind Botello and therefore not as far in the process. After we filed our complaint, the government filed their motion to dismiss and we are now finishing our response to that motion. We have until November 27th to file our response and in turn, the government will file their reply in the following three weeks (unless there is an extension granted, etc.). Once we file our response, I will post the filing and continue to update the blog with timelines, deadlines, and any updates we receive!
If you would like to read the filings for yourself, all of the pertinent filings for each case are listed in our “Filings” section of this website and will be updated as new filings are published to the docket.
The holidays are generally quite slow in the courts, so we encourage you all to take this time to reach out to our team with any questions about your claim, the Courts, the filings, or any further concerns.
Happy Thanksgiving!
