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Mealey's Discovery

  • May 07, 2024

    Judge Dismisses Group’s Continued FOIA Claims, Says Agency Complied

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — Saying an environmental group “is having a hard time accepting ‘yes’ for an answer,” a District of Columbia federal judge granted a motion by the U.S. Forest Service to dismiss the group’s continued pressing of its Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) claim even after getting the documents it requested.

  • May 07, 2024

    State Says Production Request Valid In Federal Fracking Lease Dispute With DOI

    BISMARCK, N.D. — The state of North Dakota on May 6 filed a reply brief in North Dakota federal court contending that its production request in its ongoing dispute with the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) and the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) should be granted because the BLM is not complying with its duty to provide information related to the agencies’ decision to cancel certain hydraulic fracturing lease sales, which the state calls “the Stop.”

  • May 07, 2024

    Tech Firm Must Provide Records In Age Discrimination, Retaliation Lawsuit

    NEW YORK — A New York federal judge largely granted a plaintiff’s motion to compel further discovery responses from his former employer, finding that “liberal civil discovery rules” were appropriate to permit the plaintiff to find support for his allegations of a companywide practice of discrimination, as well as the claim that he was retaliated against for reporting illegal behavior by a company executive.

  • May 06, 2024

    Freddie Mac Dismisses Lead Insurer From D&O Coverage Dispute Over SEC Subpoena

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp. (Freddie Mac) and its lead insurer on May 3 filed a joint stipulation asking a District of Columbia federal court to dismiss the insurer from Freddie Mac’s breach of contract and bad faith lawsuit seeking directors and officers liability coverage for underlying expenses it incurred on behalf of its directors, officers and employees who were subpoenaed by the Securities and Exchange Commission during an investigation and subsequent lawsuit.

  • May 06, 2024

    Motion To Compel Granted In Bad Faith Row With Insurer Making Fraud Counterclaim

    SEATTLE — A Washington federal judge on May 3 granted in part an insurer’s motion to compel more complete responses to interrogatories in a bad faith suit filed against the insurer that counterclaimed for a declaration that it has no obligation to cover the insured due to his purported fraudulent misrepresentations about his auto accident injuries, finding that the insurer made reasonable requests, including requests for the insured’s social media postings.

  • May 06, 2024

    Express Scripts Must Turn Over Some Financial Records In Blue Cross Contract Row

    DETROIT — Partly granting an insurance company’s motion to compel financial documents from its pharmacy benefit manager (PBM), a Michigan federal magistrate judge found that many of them were relevant to determining the PBM’s understanding of a 2019 agreement between the parties, including disputed rebates for medical supplies to which the insurer claims it was entitled.

  • May 03, 2024

    Appeal Of Bestwall Asbestos Claimants’ Discovery Sanctions Dismissed By Split Panel

    RICHMOND, Va. — A Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel in a divided opinion dismissed an appeal by asbestos personal injury claimants and their law firm in the Chapter 11 case of Georgia-Pacific spinoff Bestwall LLC of the dismissal of their challenges to a bankruptcy judge’s contempt finding and sanctions against them for not providing complete information to the debtor in a discovery questionnaire.

  • May 03, 2024

    Judge Denies Letter Rogatory To Name ‘Civil Society’ Members Targeted By Spyware

    OAKLAND, Calif. — A spyware maker’s attempt to demonstrate that its surveillance software targeted terrorists and criminals, rather than members of “civil society,” can be made without obtaining discovery from a research lab, a California federal judge ruled May 2, denying the defendant’s motion to issue a letter rogatory on the nonparty Canadian entity while seeking to defend itself from computer fraud claims brought by WhatsApp Inc.

  • May 03, 2024

    Production, Brief Ordered In Nonparty Discovery Disputes In Apple Antitrust Suit

    SAN FRANCISCO — In response to recently filed briefs concerning discovery plaintiffs seek from two nonparties in their iPhone app monopolization class action against Apple Inc., a California federal magistrate judge issued an order partly granting their motion to compel certain records from app developer Rocket Money, while addressing the company’s concerns about discovery burdens and protecting the confidentiality of its records.

  • May 03, 2024

    Discovery Sought In Abuse Suit Against Care Home Over Demeaning Snapchat Videos

    LEWISBURG, Pa. — The attorney-in-fact for a resident of a personal care home moved a Pennsylvania state court to compel discovery in a negligence suit against the care home, related entities, administrators and staff, alleging that the care-dependent resident incurred abuse when staff purportedly posed the resident and took photos and videos of her that were uploaded to Snapchat “for no legitimate reason other than to demean” her.

  • April 30, 2024

    FTC Seeks Evidence Of Amazon’s Use Of Self-Destructing Messages In Antitrust Suit

    SEATTLE — Asserting that Amazon.com Inc. executives, including Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos, have been discussing “sensitive business matters,” including the present monopolization lawsuit against it, via an encrypted-messaging app that “irrevocably destroys messages,” the Federal Trade Commission filed a motion in Washington federal court seeking to compel the online retailer to produce any corporate documents related to “preservation notices and its instructions about the use of ephemeral messaging applications.”

  • April 30, 2024

    Shareholders To 3rd Circuit: Revive Securities Case Against Reinsurer, Execs

    PHILADELPHIA — Arguing in part that one holding “invented a ‘total eclipse’ standard lacking any basis in” Omnicare, Inc. v. Laborers Dist. Council Constr. Indus. Pension Fund, shareholders filed an appellant brief challenging discovery and summary judgment rulings in a suit over allegations that a reinsurer and some of its former executives violated federal securities laws.

  • April 29, 2024

    Special Master Won’t Reconsider Discovery Into Drug Savings Plan

    NEWARK, N.J. — The special master overseeing a dispute in federal court in New Jersey between two drug payment assistance programs declined to reconsider or clarify her early ruling limiting discovery into the plaintiffs’ program or how Johnson & Johnson Health Care Systems Inc. prices certain drugs.

  • April 29, 2024

    Google Search Antitrust Judge Unseals Some Court Records For New York Times

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The New York Times Co. was partly successful in its ongoing effort to obtain unsealed versions of court documents in the government’s antitrust lawsuit against Google Inc., when a District of Columbia federal judge issued a document-by-document ruling directing the parties and two nonparties to provide unredacted versions of certain documents related to Google’s agreements that purportedly contributed to its dominance in the internet search engine market.

  • April 26, 2024

    Indivior Proposes Plan For Phased Discovery In Suboxone MDL

    CLEVELAND — Indivior Inc., a defendant in the Suboxonefilm multidistrict litigation, filed a supplemental proposal for phased discovery on general causation following a request from the judge overseeing the MDL during a conference meeting.

  • April 24, 2024

    Parties In WhatsApp Spyware Suit Argue Whether Letter Rogatory Is Appropriate

    OAKLAND, Calif. — WhatsApp Inc., NSO Group Technologies Limited and a nonparty research lab filed briefs in California federal court disputing whether discovery NSO seeks to obtain from the lab via a letter rogatory is relevant, appropriate or necessary to the computer fraud claims at the heart of the lawsuit over the defendant’s spyware.

  • April 24, 2024

    Juul Gets Partial Win In FOIA Suit Against FDA For E-Cig Ban Docs

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A District of Columbia federal judge on April 23 granted in part and denied in part opposing motions for summary judgment filed by Juul Labs Inc. (JLI) and the Food and Drug Administration in an action brought by JLI to obtain materials documenting the FDA’s decision to deny Juul’s premarket tobacco application (PMTA) and ban its products from the market under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

  • April 24, 2024

    Monsanto: School District’s Opposition To Motion To Quash Deposition Should Fail

    BURLINGTON, Vt. — Monsanto Co. has filed a reply brief in Vermont federal court contending that the Burlington School District’s (BSD) opposition to Monsanto’s motion to quash the BSD’s notice of deposition in litigation related to polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in the school and the BSD’s challenge to Monsanto’s motion for a protective order related to testimony from a time period other than 1935 to 1977 constitute “a hidden attempt to argue a belated claim that [Monsanto] had a post-sale duty to warn.”

  • April 23, 2024

    Magistrate Orders Engineering Firm To Produce Documents In Flint Water Crisis Case

    ANN ARBOR, Mich. — A federal magistrate judge in Michigan ruled April 22 that an engineering firm that is a defendant in litigation stemming from the lead-contaminated water crisis in Flint must provide 40 documents in response to a motion to compel compliance with a discovery order, saying that the judge presiding over the case has already determined that the work product doctrine does not protect the documents in question.

  • April 17, 2024

    Clerk Issues Discovery Order In N.C. Guaranty Association’s MSP Suit Against CMS

    RALEIGH, N.C. — A North Carolina federal court clerk on April 16 issued an amended discovery order in the North Carolina Insurance Guaranty Association’s (NCIGA) suit against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), its secretary and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), seeking a determination that the NCIGA is not a primary plan under the federal Medicare Secondary Payer (MSP) statute and therefore not obligated to reimburse CMS regarding a workers’ compensation claim involving an insolvent insurer.

  • April 17, 2024

    Apple, Plaintiffs, App Makers Differ On Discovery Issues In IPhone Antitrust Suit

    SAN FRANCISCO — In a trio of discovery letter briefs filed in California federal court, Apple Inc., a class of consumers and a nonparty app developer bicker over the relevance of the plaintiffs’ discovery requests related to notification of the recently certified class and the merits of the class monopolization claims against Apple.

  • April 17, 2024

    Deadlines For 1st Bellwether Trials In Covidien Hernia Mesh MDL Pushed Back

    BOSTON — The federal magistrate judge overseeing the multidistrict litigation involving Covidien hernia mesh agreed to extend dates in the current scheduling order by eight months after the plaintiffs cited “significant discovery deficiencies” on the part of the defendants.

  • April 15, 2024

    Judge Partly Grants Insurer’s Motion To Compel In D&O Coverage Dispute Over Merger

    WILMINTON, Del. — A Delaware judge on April 12 granted in part and denied in part a directors and officers liability insurer’s motion to compel discovery in a coverage dispute over claims that directors, officers and controlling shareholders breached their fiduciary duties in connection with the 2019 merger of Viacom and CBS Corp.

  • April 15, 2024

    Paper Mill, Contractor Debate Discovery Scope In Asbestos Indemnity Action

    RALEIGH, N.C. — In opposing a motion to compel production of evidence tied to its possible negligence, a paper product company tells a federal judge in North Carolina that it owed no duty to the employee of a contractor and is entitled to contractual indemnification for defending and ultimately settling the asbestos-related claim, the company says.

  • April 12, 2024

    Tepezza Hearing Loss MDL Judge Clarifies Discovery Order, OKs Bellwether Extension

    CHICAGO — The judge overseeing the Tepezza hearing loss multidistrict litigation clarified an order he signed in March compelling Horizon Therapeutics USA Inc. to hand over certain information to reflect that the drug manufacturer disputes the relevance of data that was requested by the plaintiffs.