Philips and Hunt may have been debating the ownership of the tagline “Sense and Simplicity,” but it seems the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey was more interested in exploring the sense and simplicity of Rule 26 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure when it handed down the ruling in Koninklijke Philips N.V. v. Hunt Control Systems. After noting that Rule 26 permits a broad scope of permissible discovery, Magistrate Judge James B. Clark, III held that a responding party need not use every tool in their toolbox in order to comply with a Fed.R.Civ.P. 30(b)(6) deposition request.
In his memorandum opinion, Judge Clark held that an alternative approach to ESI collection, as requested by Hunt, was burdensome and likely to be unproductive. The collection was such a burden, in fact, that Judge Clark granted Philips’ motion for a protective order against further such requests.
Hunt had previously interviewed “a Philips IT/ESI discovery professional” regarding Philips’ ESI practices. Months later, Hunt noticed a deposition for an IT witness claiming that Philips’ responses for eight questions were not adequately answered by the interviewee. Philips objected to the deposition request and petitioned the court for a protective order.
Hunt argued that the IT deposition was necessary in order to discover whether Philips was using appropriate search tools for the ESI discovery requests. Hunt’s argument was supported by an IT professional who opined that Philips’ “cloud-based IT structure” and Philips’ “sophisticated and comprehensive state-of-the-art document search and location tools” meant that Philips was obligated to use a particular method to accommodate Hunt’s electronic discovery requests. Hunt further argued that the deposition did not create an undue burden on Philips so as to outweigh the likely benefits.
In seeking a protective order, Philips counters that the provided answers were accurate and that Philips has consistently used “a custodian-based approach to collecting ESI” and thus, shouldn’t be required to employ alternative approaches at the request of Hunt.
The court agreed with Philips, citing three individual reasons. First, the Court found that Hunt failed to carry its burden of showing that Philips’ production has been materially deficient. Significantly, Judge Clark wrote that just because Hunt was dissatisfied with the result of Philips’ production, such dissatisfaction was “not enough to reopen the door to the collection of ESI discovery under an entirely different method.” Because Philips’ responses were true and accurate, there was “no compelling reason” to force Philips to use Hunt’s preferred method of production.
Second, the court held that even if an alternative approach to ESI collection was more appropriate than Philips’ “custodian-based” search, Hunt still failed to produce evidence showing that conducting another search under their preferred methods would substantially alter the results Philips already produced. Again, Judge Clark takes the opportunity to emphasize that employing multiple methods of production would be “duplicative” and “an inefficient use of time and resources.”
Third, and most importantly for future cases involving these circumstances, Judge Clark wrote that it was not Hunt’s requested deposition that caused an undue burden on Philips, but rather “the possibility of opening the door to more (and likely unproductive) discovery with no apparent end in sight.”
Putting a stern period on the end of a judicial statement, Judge Clark concluded by noting that the proposed deposition contained only a “marginal benefit” to Hunt that is “heavily outweighed” by the “tremendous burden” to Philips. Judge Clark made it clear (and seemingly warned future litigators) that the court will not entertain duplicative and seemingly petty disputes over the method of e-discovery production, so long as the information produced is not “materially deficient.”
In light of this decision, parties requesting discovery would be wise to make their requests as specific as possible in the first instance, including a specified or desired approach to collecting ESI. Such specificity (accompanied with reasonability) may result in more beneficial discovery as well as preventing the scorn of wasted judicial time.
Nicole was a 2010 magna cum laude graduate of Northeastern University located in Boston, Massachusetts, where she earned her B.A. in English and Political Science. In 2015, Nicole will receive her J.D. from Seton Hall University School of Law. After graduation, Nicole will serve as a clerk to a trial judge of the Superior Court of New Jersey in the Morris-Sussex Vicinage.
collapse footer
expand footer
March 26, 2015 at 5:15 PM
I agree with Nicole’s suggestion that parties seeking discovery should make their requests as specific as possible. Assume that you will only get one opportunity to request the information you seek, so make sure that you are as clear as possible about what it is you are looking for. The lesson to be learned here is that you must not take your discovery requests lightly. Make sure to get it right the first time, because you may not get another chance.
[Reply to this comment]