Vince Girdhari Chhabria
How Judge Chhabria rules, drawn from 26 signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.
About Judge Chhabria
Vince Girdhari Chhabria is a judge of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California. Appointed by President Barack Obama, Judge Chhabria received a commission on March 7, 2014.
Judge Chhabria's practices and standing orders
Rules for cases before Judge Chhabria, as published on the court's website (checked October 8, 2026). Judges revise these often, so confirm the current version on the court's site before you file.
Key rules
Filing
File each motion, supporting declaration, and declaration exhibit as a separate PDF in ECF.
“When filing motions on ECF, each motion, supporting declaration, and 6 attachment to a declaration (such as an exhibit) should be filed as a separate PDF.”
Discovery
Raise discovery disputes with the magistrate judge promptly; delay can prevent a schedule extension.
“If the parties end up seeking a continuation of the case schedule based on the pendency of discovery disputes, the Court will deny that request if it determines that brewing discovery disputes were not teed up”
Standing orders for every case in this court
Orders the court applies to all of its cases, whichever judge has them, as published on the court's website (checked October 8, 2026).
How Judge Chhabria decides
Patterns drawn from this judge's own signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.
What persuades
In a preliminary challenge to USDA office closures, he found that appropriations restrictions likely barred the challenged reorganization spending and stayed it while the case proceeded.
“Thus, what’s left after the statutes are severed are congressional restrictions on reprogramming funds for reorganization expenditures. And USDA has almost certainly been violating those restrictions.”
In a post-trial trade secret case, he separated proof of intent to benefit a private company from the additional intent required for economic espionage, granting acquittal only on the latter counts.
“But the economic espionage counts require that Ding intended or knew that his conduct would benefit the Chinese government.”
Procedural preferences
In a class-certification ruling, the court denied the proposed multistate class without prejudice because the plaintiffs had not reliably shown which members’ claims remained timely under each state’s limitations law. A renewed request had to narrow the class to members with supportable timely claims.
“the proposed class must only contain people for whom the plaintiffs can reliably show they would be able to bring claims under the statute of limitations in their state of residence.”
In the same class action, narrowly tailored sealing requests protecting current rate-setting practices and competitor information succeeded after broader initial requests were denied.
“The latter sealing requests are much more narrowly tailored and do a better job of only redacting information about Wells Fargo’s current rate-setting practices and competitors.”
Signed rulings
A grounded sample of orders signed by this judge, with the verbatim dispositive language.
“Plaintiff's Motion to Dismiss Without Prejudice is GRANTED. IT IS SO ORDERED. Date: May 15, 2020”
“The bulk of StemExpress's counterclaims survive this motion to dismiss ... However, the California Unfair Competition Law (UCL) claim is dismissed as it is displaced by the California Uniform Trade Secrets Act (CUTSA) claim. Additionally, StemExpress has not adequately alleged that this Court has personal jurisdiction over Eaves, so all claims against him are dismissed as well.”
“The motion to dismiss is granted. The case is dismissed without prejudice. ... On July 12, 2022, Garcia moved to dismiss his ADA claim so that he could litigate both claims in a single forum.”
“The plaintiffs’ motion for a preliminary injunction is denied.”
“The plaintiffs’ motion to appoint interim lead counsel and lead plaintiff is also denied.”
“Monsanto’s motion to dismiss under Rule 41(b) is therefore granted. The above-captioned action is dismissed without prejudice.”
“Meta's motion for partial summary judgment is granted as to the plaintiffs' claim under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. ... So because Meta's copying was not an infringement, its removal of CMI could not have furthered an act of infringement.”
“The special motion to strike is granted in part and denied in part. ... The motion is denied with respect to the second and third claims, which address foreign litigation. ... The motion is granted with respect to the first claim, regarding the Texas litigation. Media Matters has waived the right to sue for breach of contract based on X's failure to adhere to the forum selection clause in bringing the Texas case.”
“The motion for summary judgment is denied. The plaintiffs’ motion to strike is denied.”
“The motion to dismiss is denied. A telephonic case management conference is scheduled for April 7, 2015”
“ORDER DENYING IN PART AND GRANTING IN PART MOTION TO DISMISS ... Silergy's motion to dismiss MPS's willful infringement claim is granted with respect to all three patents-in-suit. Dismissal is with partial leave to amend.”
“The defendants' motion to stay the litigation is denied without prejudice to refiling that motion if the PTAB decides to institute inter partes review.”
“The complaint is therefore dismissed. Dismissal is with prejudice, because the caddies have been unable to identify a way ... they could cure the defects in their complaint”
“The caddies' motion to strike, Dkt. No. 82, is accordingly DENIED.”
“ORDER GRANTING MOTIONS TO DISMISS ... Accordingly, the complaints are dismissed with leave to amend. ... Any amended complaints are due within 28 days”
Caseload & timing
From public federal docket records for this judge.
Chhabria's San Francisco caseload is dominated by the Roundup products-liability multidistrict litigation, including hundreds of individual glyphosate cases. It also includes patent, antitrust, employment and civil-rights, employee-benefit collection, technology, copyright, and First Amendment matters.
Pending matters in the official report
Reported by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts under the Civil Justice Reform Act, as of March 31, 2026.
| Motions pending more than six months | 1 |
| Bench trials submitted more than six months | 0 |
| Bankruptcy appeals pending more than six months | 0 |
| Social Security appeals pending more than six months | 0 |
| Civil cases pending more than three years | 996 |
| Report | Motions over six months | Cases over three years |
|---|---|---|
| Mar 2026 | 1 | 996 |
| Sep 2025 | 2 | 917 |
| Mar 2025 | 1 | 810 |
| Sep 2024 | 1 | 756 |
| Mar 2024 | 0 | 725 |
| Sep 2023 | 0 | 701 |
| Mar 2023 | 0 | 561 |
| Sep 2022 | 0 | 321 |
| Mar 2022 | 1 | 140 |
| Sep 2021 | 4 | 547 |
| Mar 2021 | 8 | 374 |
| Sep 2020 | 10 | 251 |
A snapshot on that date: matters listed may since have been decided or reassigned. A motion referred to a magistrate judge is counted for both judges. Motions in multidistrict litigation, section 2255 cases and Social Security appeals are not counted, and a very large three-year count is generally a multidistrict docket. Source: Appendix A of the report (PDF); about the report.
How long civil cases take in this court
For the whole of United States District Court for the Northern District of California, not for Judge Chhabria: median time from filing to disposition of the civil cases the court closed in the 12 months ending September 30, 2025, as reported by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts.
| Cases | Median time | |
|---|---|---|
| All civil cases closed | 6,017 | 7.7 months |
| Closed with no court action | 2,955 | 5.5 months |
| Closed before pretrial | 1,978 | 7.6 months |
| Closed during or after pretrial | 1,052 | 15 months |
| Closed during trial | 32 | 36.9 months |
| 12 months ending | Cases closed | Median time |
|---|---|---|
| Sep 2025 | 6,017 | 7.7 months |
| Sep 2024 | 9,248 | 20.6 months |
| Sep 2023 | 5,452 | 7 months |
| Sep 2022 | 9,464 | 11.4 months |
| Sep 2021 | 6,437 | 6.3 months |
| Sep 2020 | 6,881 | 11.4 months |
| Sep 2019 | 5,640 | 8.7 months |
The table leaves out prisoner petitions, land condemnations, deportation reviews, recovery of overpayments and enforcement of judgments, and reports no median for fewer than 10 cases. A district that closed a large multidistrict litigation in the period shows very large counts and long medians for that year. Source: Table C-5, U.S. District Courts (spreadsheet).
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