Mealey's Discovery : Mealey's : Legal News & Analysis

Mealey's Discovery

March 11, 2024
English Justice Addresses Broker Disclosure In Light Of Sanctions On Russia

LONDON — A reinsurance placing broker would not contravene a set of United Kingdom sanctions against Russia by providing certain documents requested under an application for third-party disclosure in a case involving insurance and reinsurance for aircraft and engines leased to Russian entities, an English justice concluded.
March 11, 2024
Covington Client Dismisses D.C. Circuit Appeal Of SEC Disclosure Order

WASHINGTON, D.C. — More than eight months after a judge ordered Covington & Burling LLP to identify for the Securities and Exchange Commission seven of its clients whose information had been compromised in a cybersecurity attack, one of those clients, proceeding pseudonymously, on March 11 filed a stipulation voluntarily dismissing his appeal to the District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals of that ruling.
March 08, 2024
School District: Information About Monsanto’s Knowledge Of PCB Dangers Is Relevant

BURLINGTON, Vt. — The Burlington School District (BSD) has filed a brief in Vermont federal court opposing Monsanto Co.’s motion to quash the BSD’s notice of deposition and opposing Monsanto’s motion for a protective order related to testimony from a time period other than 1935 to 1977, arguing that information related to years since 1977 is relevant because Monsanto disputes allegations regarding the information it may have obtained about polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) after that year and disputes the proposition that PCBs pose a public health threat.
March 08, 2024
DOJ, ACLUF Settle Social Media Monitoring FOIA Row For $240,000 In Fees, Costs

OAKLAND, Calif. — After almost two years of conferring, filing status reports and submitting documents, the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation (ACLUF) and several government agencies jointly filed a stipulation and proposed order of dismissal in California federal court, under which they agree to end a five-year-old Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) dispute with the payment of $240,000 in attorney fees and costs by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and other agencies.
March 04, 2024
J&J Special Master Wants Responsive Documents Prior To Decision On Subpoena

TRENTON, N.J. — The special master overseeing the federal Johnson & Johnson multidistrict asbestos talc litigation said a consulting firm should produce documents responsive to a subpoena seeking communications between it and law firms the defendant seeks to disqualify, after which the parties can confer about any resulting privileged documents prior to a ruling on a motion to quash.
March 01, 2024
Talc Special Master Quashes Subpoena Seeking Moline Study Participants

TRENTON, N.J. — Because asbestos expert Jacqueline Moline will not testify at trial, and no other expert appears to rely on her study involving asbestos-talc exposure and mesothelioma, Johnson & Johnson’s subpoena seeking the names of individuals in the study is irrelevant, a special master in the federal talc multidistrict litigation said Feb. 29 in granting a motion to quash.
February 29, 2024
Canadian Lab Opposes Israeli Firm’s Discovery Efforts In WhatsApp Spyware Row

OAKLAND, Calif. — A nonparty Canadian lab that focuses on “digital espionage” filed a motion in California federal court on Feb. 28, seeking to specially appear in the computer fraud lawsuit between WhatsApp Inc. and NSO Group Technologies Limited for the purpose of opposing NSO’s motion to serve it with a letter rogatory to obtain “sweeping discovery” that it contends is “almost exclusively unrelated to the claims and defenses” in the case.
February 28, 2024
Judge: Former Libby, Mont., Asbestos Clinic Director Must Sit For Deposition

GREAT FALLS, Mont. — A federal judge in Montana overseeing an asbestos action against a railway denied two motions to quash a subpoena issued to the former director of a medical clinic in Libby, Mont., giving the parties two hours to depose the witness and circumscribing what may be asked at the deposition.
February 20, 2024
Israeli Firm Seeks Discovery From Canadian Research Lab In Spyware Suit

OAKLAND, Calif.— With competing motions to compel pending in its computer fraud dispute with WhatsApp Inc., Israeli surveillance technology company NSO Group Technologies Limited asked a California federal court to issue a letter rogatory requesting a Canadian court to compel discovery from a Toronto-based research laboratory that aided WhatsApp in the present suit.
February 27, 2024
Judge Clarifies Discovery Scope After Confusion About AI Insurance Tools

CHICAGO — Given the court’s and parties’ own confusion about the scope of artificial intelligence tools potentially used in sorting complex and potentially fraudulent claims from more standard ones, homeowner plaintiffs and their insurer should confer and determine what exactly is at issue before conducting further discovery, a federal judge in Illinois said in a docket entry order in a case involving the Fair Housing Act.
February 27, 2024
Oregon Seeks Rehearing After 9th Circuit Ruling In Prisoner Vaccine Case

SEATTLE — A Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel created intra- and inter-circuit conflict with a decision denying Oregon’s petition for a writ of mandamus seeking to quash a trial court’s order compelling the deposition of the former governor in a class lawsuit by prisoners suing over the distribution of COVID-19 vaccinations and deaths due to the virus, the state argues in a petition for rehearing or rehearing en banc.
February 22, 2024
Tobacco Defendant’s Failure To Produce Asbestos Evidence Not Willful, Justice Says

NEW YORK — There is no evidence that a tobacco company’s failure to produce reports it no longer has in its possession about testing performed on asbestos-containing Micronite cigarette filters was willful, a New York justice said in denying a motion that sought to compel production or dismiss the company’s answer.
February 22, 2024
5th Circuit Vacates Discovery Order, Remands For Stay Pending Arbitration Ruling

NEW ORLEANS — The Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals held that no discovery is needed to determine whether there is a valid agreement to arbitrate because a Hurricane Laura coverage dispute can be decided as a matter of law, vacating the lower federal court’s discovery order and remanding for the lower court to immediately grant a stay pending its ruling on arbitration.
February 20, 2024
Petition By Wrestlers’ Attorney Challenging Sanctions Denied By U.S. High Court

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Feb. 20 denied a petition for a writ of certiorari filed by an attorney and his firm who represent allegedly injured wrestlers in a class tort complaint and a mass action against World Wrestling Entertainment Inc. and Vincent K. McMahon (together, WWE) and asking the justices to consider the appropriateness of attorney fees and costs as sanctions that they have been ordered to pay.
February 16, 2024
Agency: Evidence Production In Ohio Train Derailment Case Poses ‘Undue Burden’

YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio — The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) filed a brief in Ohio federal court arguing that it should deny a third-party defendant’s motion to compel the production of certain evidence related to the NTSB’s investigation of the train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, on grounds that the motion imposes an undue burden on the agency.
February 16, 2024
Groups Sue EPA For Withholding Information On PFAS Use In Plastics Manufacturing

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Two environmental groups on Feb. 15 sued the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia seeking a permanent injunction directing it to disclose under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) all “wrongfully withheld documents” related to the formation of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) during the fluorination of plastic containers by chemical company Inhance Technologies LLC.
February 14, 2024
GitHub, Microsoft, Coders To Confer Over Discovery In AI Copyright Licensing Row

OAKLAND, Calif. — In a dispute over licensing and attribution of computer code in open-source artificial intelligence (AI) collaborations, a California federal judge scolded defendants GitHub Inc. and Microsoft Corp. and five John Doe plaintiffs for not complying with the proper procedures for submitting discovery letters, leading him to deny the relief sought by the parties and to once again order them to meet and confer over their remaining discovery disputes.
February 13, 2024
Hospital Says Burden, Third-Party Status Warranted Quashing Asbestos Subpoena

RICHMOND, Va. — Third-party subpoenas fall under a higher standard that an asbestos defendant cannot meet given the evidence’s marginal relationship to the case, a hospital told the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Feb. 12, also arguing that the burden that disclosing anonymous study participants would impose supports a trial court’s decision to quash the subpoena.
February 13, 2024
Magistrate Judge Allows Supplemented Expert Reports, Extends J&J MDL Deadlines

TRENTON, N.J. — A magistrate judge in the federal multidistrict litigation for Johnson & Johnson talc-related liabilities declined to strike expert reports, saying the importance of the reports and the ability to mitigate any resulting harm by extending discovery deadlines do not support such a harsh outcome.
February 08, 2024
Monsanto Seeks To Quash Deposition In Vermont School PCB Contamination Case

BURLINGTON, Vt. — Monsanto Co. on Feb. 7 moved in Vermont federal court seeking to quash the Burlington School District’s (BSD) notice of deposition in the polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) lawsuit it has filed related to alleged contamination of school buildings and moved for a protective order to the extent that the BSD seeks testimony from a time period other than 1935 to 1977, when Monsanto made PCBs.
February 07, 2024
4th Circuit Defers Ruling On Sanctions In Asbestos Case Referral Appeal

RICHMOND, Va. — The Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals will defer any ruling on a separate motion for sanctions pending review of the merits of an appeal involving whether a trial court properly imposed sanctions for conduct in an asbestos bankruptcy trust referral fee dispute.
February 07, 2024
Colgate, Asbestos-Talc Plaintiff Face Off About Genetics, Expert Testimony

OAKLAND, Calif. — After a plaintiff moved to exclude argument about why she didn’t undergo genetic testing and what her genetics might mean for her mesothelioma, an asbestos-talc defendant filed its own motion seeking to exclude what it termed unreliable non-witness expert testimony that it says the plaintiff hopes to introduce into the case through the “backdoor.”
February 06, 2024
Panel Upholds Sanction But Reinstates Loofah Patent Infringement Case

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A federal magistrate judge in Arkansas did not abuse his discretion in sanctioning a patent owner for discovery abuse but committed several errors during claim construction, leading to a jury verdict and final judgment of noninfringement that must be vacated, the Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals found Feb. 5.
February 06, 2024
North Dakota: Agencies Are Not Complying With Order For Fracking Lease Information

BISMARCK, N.D. — The state of North Dakota has filed a brief in North Dakota federal court in response to a status report filed by the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI), in which the state argues that the DOI and other federal defendants have not complied with the court’s prior orders regarding transparency and the production of documents related to the parties’ dispute over an order that enjoined and restrained the federal agencies from imposing what the state calls “the Stop.” That term refers to the federal agencies’ decision to cancel certain hydraulic fracturing lease sales.
February 05, 2024
Rail Company Defends Need For Testimony Of Former Libby, Mont., Clinic Director

GREAT FALLS, Mont. — A railway tells a federal judge in Montana in opposition to a motion to quash the railway’s subpoena that trial preservation testimony is the best way to secure potentially admissible evidence from an asbestos clinic’s former medical director and that his status as a former employee doesn’t matter since he can testify about how a clinic patient described her exposures to asbestos.