Update: Note that Judge Carney, who granted the motion to expedite, was not on the panel that decided the original Naranjo case. It’s not clear whether this is significant or whether she consulted her colleagues before deciding the motion.

This just in … the Second Circuit, on the motion of the Lago Agrio plaintiffs, has expedited the pending petition for a writ of mandamus, which I covered in early March. The case will now be heard by a three-judge panel in May.

What does this mean? It is a mistake to read too much into such decisions. We know, though, that a panel of the Second Circuit earlier concluded, correctly I think, that Judge Kaplan, by entering his world-wide anti-suit injunction, had overstepped his bounds. Is it possible the appellate judges think Judge Kaplan is skirting their mandate and that they want to intervene before the case progresses much farther? Yes, it’s possible. But it’s impossible to tell.