ROBERT E. PAYNE, Senior District Judge.
This matter is before the Court on three interrelated motions: NON-PARTY THOMPSONMcMULLAN, P.C.'S MOTION TO QUASH SUBPOENAS FOR DOCUMENTS (Docket No. 1), BONA FIDE CONGLOMERATE, INC.'S MOTION TO COMPEL (Docket No. 9), and SOURCEAMERICA'S MOTION TO QUASH SUBPOENAS ISSUED TO THOMPSON McMULLAN, P.C. (Docket No. 12). All three motions pertain to Bona Fide Conglomerate, Inc. ("Bona Fide") seeking documents from ThompsonMcMullan, P.C. ("ThompsonMcMullan") for use in Bona Fide's underlying suit against SourceAmerica ("SourceAmerica") in the Southern District of California.
For the reasons stated below, NON-PARTY THOMPSONMcMULLAN, P. C.'S MOTION TO QUASH SUBPOENAS FOR DOCUMENTS (Docket No. 1) will be granted. BONA FIDE CONGLOMERATE, INC.'S MOTION TO COMPEL (Docket No. 9) will be denied. SOURCEAMERICA'S MOTION TO QUASH SUBPOENAS ISSUED TO THOMPSON McMULLAN, P.C. (Docket No. 12) will be granted.
A coherent explanation of the dispute before this Court requires a brief examination of the relationships between the interested parties.
The "AbilityOne" program is a federal procurement program that requires that the federal government exclusively obtain some goods and services from non-profit organizations ("Affiliates") which employ legally blind or severely disabled persons. (Bona Fide's Mem. in Opp. to ThompsonMcMullan's Mtn. to Quash, Docket No. 5, 2-3) ("Bona Fide's TMM Opp."). SourceAmerica is a "Central Non-Profit Agency" ("CNA") responsible for awarding contracts for such goods and services among Affiliates. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 3). Bona Fide is one such Affiliate. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 3). Between 2009 and 2012, SourceAmerica and Bona Fide were embattled over allegations that SourceAmerica improperly awarded a Las Vegas-based contract to a different Affiliate, when Bona Fide claimed that it was the most qualified vendor under the stated criteria. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 3-5). That dispute settled out of court on July 27, 2012. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 5). The Settlement Agreement included a provision that SourceAmerica must use its best efforts to treat Bona Fide fairly going forward. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 5). The office of SourceAmerica's General Counsel was in charge of monitoring this fair treatment. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 5). Jean Robinson ("Robinson") was, at that time, General Counsel for SourceAmerica. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 5).
Despite the Settlement Agreement, SourceAmerica did not award any new contracts to Bona Fide. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 5). Beginning in May 2013, Bona Fide's CEO, Ruben Lopez ("Lopez"), began speaking to Robinson about SourceAmerica's award decisions. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 5). Lopez recorded "many" of these conversations. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 5). Allegedly, Robinson told Lopez that SourceAmerica used a "variety of schemes" to routinely allocate the majority of its contracts, including high value contracts, to a select "club" of Affiliates whose executives or directors had recently sat on SourceAmerica's Board of Directors. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 5). "Based largely upon the information gained from Ms. Robinson," Bona Fide brought suit against SourceAmerica in the Southern District of California on April 4, 2014, for breach of the Settlement Agreement (the "California litigation"). (Bona Fide' s TMM Opp. 6).
On December 2, 2014, SourceAmerica filed suit against Robinson in the Circuit Court of Fairfax County: case CL-2014-15501. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 6). Bona Fide characterizes CL-2014-15501 as "related to [Robinson's] disclosures of SourceAmerica activities to outside sources including legal malpractice, conspiracy . . . and breach of fiduciary duty." (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 6). SourceAmerica disputes this characterization, and claims that CL-2014-15501 stemmed from several instances of malpractice by Robinson, of which the Bona Fide issue was a small part. (SourceAmerica's Mem. in Supp. of Mtn. to Quash Subpoenas Issued to ThompsonMcMullan, P.C., Docket No. 12, 8, 11) ("SourceAmerica's SA Mem."). In CL-2014-15501, Robinson was represented by ThompsonMcMullen. SourceAmerica and Robinson settled CL-2014-15501 on September 11, 2015. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 6). The order of dismissal mandated that
(Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 6).
On October 1, 2015, SourceAmerica brought a second suit against Robinson in the Circuit court of Fairfax County: CL-2015-013033. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 6-7). ThompsonMcMullen did not represent Robinson in the second suit. (ThompsonMcMullen' s Mem. in Supp. of Mtn. to Quash, Docket No. 2, 2) ("ThompsonMcMullen's TMM Mem.").
Meanwhile, in the California litigation, SourceArnerica requested to leave to amend its pleadings (October 30, 2015) and subsequently amended its pleadings (January 7, 2016) to bring counterclaims and third-party claims against Bona Fide and Lopez for violations of California privacy and unfair competition statutes. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 7). The amended claims related to Lopez's communications with Robinson and Lopez's recording of those conversations. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 7).
(Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 7).
Initially, Bona Fide issued a subpoena to ThompsonMcMullen seeking documents in ThompsonMcMullen's files relating to the CL-2015-13033 case, in which ThompsonMcMullen was uninvolved. On January 4, 2016, Bona Fide served an Amended Subpoena seeking documents related to both the CL-2015-13033 case and the CL-2014-15501 case. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 7-8). The Amended Subpoena demanded:
(Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 8-9).
ThompsonMcMullen informed Bona Fide by telephone that it did not represent Robinson in CL-2015-13033, that it had no documents from CL-2015-13033, and that it had only a "limited file" regarding CL-2014-15055 because the Settlement Agreement required the firm to return or destroy all documents received during discovery. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 9). Bona Fide offered to pay the expense of producing whatever non-privileged documents remained in ThompsonMcMullen's possession. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 10). ThompsonMcMullen further stated that it would not produce the Settlement Agreement in CL-2014-15055 without a court order on grounds that the Agreement was confidential. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 10). Bona Fide offered to agree to a protective order preventing disclosure of confidential documents; ThompsonMcMullen declined. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 10).
On January 27, 2016, ThompsonMcMullan filed its Motion to Quash Subpoenas for Documents (Docket No. 1) ("ThompsonMcMullan's TMM Mtn.") and a Memorandum in Support (Docket No. 2) ("ThompsonMcMullan's TMM Mem."). Bona Fide filed a Memorandum in Opposition (Docket No. 5) ("Bona Fide's TMM Opp.") and ThompsonMcMullan filed a Rebuttal Brief (Docket No. 11) ("ThompsonMcMullan's TMM Reply").
After filing its Memorandum in Opposition but before ThompsonMcMullan filed its reply, Bona Fide filed a Motion to Compel (Docket No. 9) ("Bona Fide's BF Mtn.") and a Memorandum in Support (Docket No. 10) ("Bona Fide's BF Mem.") which reiterated the points made in its earlier Motion in Opposition. ThompsonMcMullan's Memorandum in Opposition (Docket No. 14) essentially rests on ThompsonMcMullan's memorandums in support of its own motion. Bona Fide did not file a reply.
SourceAmerica also filed a Motion to Quash (Docket No. 12) ("SourceAmerica's SA Mtn.") and a Memorandum in Support (Docket No. 13) ("SourceAmerica's SA Mem."). Bona Fide filed a Memorandum in Opposition (Docket No. 15) ("Bona Fide's SA Opp.") and SourceAmerica filed a reply (Docket No. 16).
Fed. R. Civ. P. 45 governs standing to bring a motion to quash, and Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(c) governs the right to bring a motion for a protective order.
First, SourceAmerica has standing to seek a protective order under Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(c)(1). "A party or any person from whom discovery is sought may move for a protective order in the court where the action is pending . . . The court may, for good cause, issue an order to protect a party or person from annoyance, embarrassment, oppression, or undue burden or expense." Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(c)(1). This encompasses one party's right to challenge an opposing party's subpoenas directed at a third-party.
Bona Fide argues that SourceAmerica lacks standing to challenge the Amended Subpoena on the ground of undue burden. For this proposition, Bona Fide relies on a series of cases out of the Southern District of Ohio. (Bona Fide's SA Opp. 7) (relying on
Second, Source America has standing to quash the instant subpoena because of the interplay between Rules 26 and 45. SourceAmerica unquestionably has standing to challenge any confidential or privileged material covered by the Amended Subpoena. "Ordinarily, a party does not have standing to challenge a subpoena issued to a nonparty unless the party claims some personal right or privilege in the information sought by the subpoena."
The interaction between Rules 26 and 45 also gives SourceAmerica standing to quash those portions of the subpoena which do not implicate SourceAmerica's privileges or personal rights on undue burden grounds. Courts in this district take a pragmatic approach to the interactions of Rules 26 and 45.
SourceAmerica has standing to quash the subpoena under Fed. R. Civ. P. 45 and standing to seek a protective order under Fed. R. Civ. P. 26.
Rule 45 governs third-party subpoenas. Fed. R. Civ. P. 34(c);
A party may seek to quash or modify a subpoena on grounds of irrelevance or overbreadth, even though irrelevance and overbreadth are not explicitly listed as grounds to quash in Rule 26(c)(1) or Rule 45(c)(1), because either irrelevance or overbreadth necessarily establishes undue burden. This corollary to Rules 26(c)(1) and Rule 45(c)(1) arises from their interaction with Rule 26(b).
The
The
Bona Fide's Subpoena requests, essentially, documents related to SourceAmerica's litigation against Robinson, the CL-2014-15501 case. However, according to SourceAmerica, a substantial portion of the CL-2014-15501 case had nothing to do with the subject matter in the California liigation. SourceAmerica states that the CL-2014-15501 case asserted causes of action for legal malpractice, conspiracy, and breach of fiduciary duty relating to more than just Bona Fide: SourceAmerica alleged that Robinson made unauthorized disclosures to another Affiliate, violated her duties with regard to handling SourceAmerica's response to a subpoena issued by the federal government, "egregiously mishandled" an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission charge, and "violated her employment contract by providing legal services to third parties after the start of her employment." (SourceAmerica's SA Mem. 3-4). SourceAmerica also points out that ThompsonMcMullen likely possesses communications between SourceAmerica executives and SourceAmerica's outside counsel in several other cases wholly unrelated to Bona Fide's contract claim in the California litigation or to SourceAmerica's claims in the California litigation. (SourceAmerica's SA Mem. 8).
It is clear that the Amended Subpoena encompasses
Bona Fide believes that if it were to include any subject matter limitations, SourceAmerica would interpret those limitations in such a way as to prevent disclosing information that is essential to the [underlying case.] Because of these concerns and the high likelihood that any documents SourceAmerica would produce . . . will be filtered or incomplete, it is also essential that Plaintiff receive the documents from Thompson McMullan [sic] directly.
(Bona Fide's SA Opp. 11). Even taking Bona Fide's allegations of obstructionism as true for the moment,
The briefing contains a factual dispute over unfair burden as it pertains to producing and privilege logging documents; however, it is not necessary to resolve that factual dispute to rule on these motions. ThompsonMcMullen stated in its memorandum that the production of non-privileged communications related to the Robinson cases would "require the collection and review of potentially hundreds if not thousands of emails each working day over a nearly eight month period," along with "time intensive" privilege review. (ThompsonMcMullen's TMM Mem. 4). Bona Fide alleges that ThompsonMcMullen, in a phone conference, stated that ThompsonMcMullen had only a "limited case file," due to the Settlement Agreement's provision that ThompsonMcMullen destroy or return much of the discovery in the case. (Bona Fide's TMM Opp. 9-10). If this issue were dispositive to undue burden, the Court might seek testimony on the size of ThompsonMcMullen' s Robinson files.
In conclusion, the Amended Subpoena must be quashed as irrelevant and overbroad, and thus unduly burdensome, under Fed. R. Civ. P. 45.
Fed. R. Civ. P. 26 (b) (2) (C) states that, "on motion or on its own, the court must limit the frequency or extent of discovery otherwise allowed. . . if it determines that the discovery sought . . . can be obtained from some other source that is more convenient, less burdensome, or less expensive." As previously noted, Fed. R. Civ. P. 45's rules for quashing or modifying third-party subpoenas are subject to the general relevance discovery limitations of Rule 26.
ThompsonMcMullen raised the "obtainable from some other source that is more convenient, less burdensome, or less expensive" argument in its opening memorandum. (ThompsonMcMullen's TMM Mem. 3, 5) ("Bona Fide has access to the requested information from another source . . . SourceAmerica. SourceArnerica has each and every non-privileged communication requested in the Subpoenas. It would seem that the most efficient and least burdensome method of obtaining these communications would be through discovery in the underlying lawsuit."). Bona Fide acknowledged this argument (
The Court finds ThompsonMcMullen's argument compelling. There is no reason to burden a third party with discovery when the opposing party has all of the information requested. Moreover, although Bona Fide reiterates that it is willing to compensate ThompsonMcMullen for the time spent producing these documents and completing privilege logs, this misses a fundamental fact of the practice of law: forcing ThompsonMcMullen to divert resources to an unnecessary subpoena will divert ThompsonMcMullen from working on active cases for clients whose further needs it must serve. That is also a factor in assessing the burden issue.
Bona Fide argues that it has "serious concerns about its ability to obtain accurate, unfiltered information about the events and disclosures at issue and their impact on Ms. Robinson's testimony about SourceAmerica directly" (Bona Fide' s SA Opp. 8, 11), such that obtaining discovery from third-party ThompsonMcMullen is actually "more convenient, less burdensome, [and] less expensive" than obtaining discovery from SourceAmerica. In particular, Bona Fide argues that SourceAmerica has employed "heavy and often obstructionist motions practice" in the underlying case and "repeated[ly] attempt[ed] to discourage or prevent Ms. Robinson from testifying in that case." (Bona Fide's SA Opp. 8, 11). To demonstrate this alleged obstructionism, Bona Fide also argues that SourceAmerica actually shredded documents relevant to the underlying suit. (Bona Fide's SA Opp. 11) (relying on Docket No. 7, Ex. 1, p. 65-66).
If the Amended Subpoena were merely overbroad or sought irrelevant information, as discussed in the previous section, then the Court might simply quash this Amended Subpoena and leave Bona Fide free to seek another subpoena tailored to the subject matter of the California litigation. However, on the facts as presented, even a more narrowly tailored subpoena would still be inappropriate on the grounds that such information could "be obtained from some other source that is more convenient, less burdensome, or less expensive," and obtained in a way which better respects the California court's authority to control discovery.
ThompsonMcMullen did not actually request a protective order, but SourceAmerica did. (SourceAmerica's SA Mem. 12-14). As noted in the discussion of SourceAmerica's standing, Bona Fide contests SourceAmerica's standing to seek a protective order on the basis of undue burden. (Bona Fide's SA Opp. 6-8). However, as explained in the discussion on standing, Rule 26 and precedent in this district make it clear that (1) third parties may seek protective orders on the basis of undue burden and (2) either overbreadth or irrelevance necessarily establish undue burden. Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(c)(1);
For the reasons stated below, NON-PARTY THOMPSONMcMULLAN, P.C.'S MOTION TO QUASH SUBPOENAS FOR DOCUMENTS (Docket No. 1) will be granted. BONA FIDE CONGLOMERATE, INC.'S MOTION TO COMPEL (Docket No. 9) will be denied. SOURCEAMERICA'S MOTION TO QUASH SUBPOENAS ISSUED TO THOMPSON McMULLAN, P.C. (Docket No. 12) will be granted.
It is so ORDERED.