Rule 12 Not Popular With Judges

Colorado Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b) provides that rather than filing an answer to a complaint in a civil action, which delineates which facts alleged are admitted or denied and setting the parameters of the subsequent litigation, that a defendant can file a "motion to dismiss" arguing either that the court lacks jurisdiction (or something closely related to it) over the case, or that the allegations in the Complaint, even if taken as true, don't entitle the person filing the Complaint to relief.

A Denver District Court judge today (in a case to which I was not a party) commented as an aside in a hearing, that the effect of this rule is to delay proceedings until the motion to dismissed is fully briefed and ruled upon, and that most of the time, in his experience, these motions are filed to delay the proceedings rather than out of bona fide belief that an entitlement to legal relief on some grounds has not been set forth (assuming that the facts alleged are true). He also indicated that this view is widely shared among Colorado judges.

In federal practice, the equivalent rule does not have such a strong delaying effect on other aspects of the case such as disclosure and discovery practice, as it does in state court practice in Colorado.