*1 Before the Court is Plaintiff's Motion to Compel Full and Complete Responses to Plaintiff's Document Request Nos. 43, 44 and 45 filed on March 12, 2021. [Dkt. No. 50.] Defendants oppose. [Dkt. No. 51.] The Court ordered the supplemental briefing after conducting a hearing on the parties' discovery dispute on March 10, 2021. [Dkt. No. 47.]

Plaintiff seeks to compel responses to the following:

[Dkt. No. 50 at 5.]

Defendant opposes all three requests on the grounds that: (1) Plaintiff has failed to identify the trade secret at issue with reasonable particularity pursuant to California Code of Civil Procedure § 2019.210 (“CCCP § 2019.210”) and is thus not entitled to discovery; and (2) Defendants' financial matters are privileged, and release of the tax returns would be against public policy. Defendants also argued at the hearing that discovery into these matters should not be permitted because the allegations in the Complaint lack merit, which Defendants contend has been shown by the discovery conducted to date.

The Court has considered all of the oral and written arguments by counsel. The Motion to Compel is granted in part and denied in part, as follows:

Request No. 43:

The materials sought by Document Request No. 43 are relevant to Plaintiff's claims that trade secrets were misappropriated and that Defendant Morgan breached a fiduciary duty to Plaintiff and to Plaintiff's alleged damages. Defendants' objection on the ground that California Code of Civil Procedure § 2019.210 prohibits the discovery of these matters is overruled. The Ninth Circuit has not determined whether district courts are required to apply § 2019.210, and courts within this Circuit do not uniformly apply it. See Conversion Logic, Inc. v. Measured, Inc., 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 77188, at *4 (C.D. Cal. 2020).[1] In Inteliclear, LLC v. ETC Global Holdings, Inc., 978 F.3d 653, 658 n.1, 662 (9th Cir. 2020), the Ninth Circuit held that whether the Plaintiff had sufficiently identified its trade secrets under the federal and state statutory standards was a triable issue of fact in that case, and it explained how refining trade secret identifications through discovery “makes good sense.”

*2 For Request No. 43, Plaintiff is ordered to provide Defendants with a list of every person or entity that was a buyer, supplier, or customer of Plaintiff as of January 1, 2020, for which Plaintiff seeks the requested records. Defendants are required to comply with Request No. 43 by providing “any and all documents, including any sales records, which reflect the total amount of gross revenue and net profits that Call Haven has generated from performing work with any person or entity” on the list provided by Plaintiff.

Request No. 44:

The materials sought by Document Request No. 44 are relevant to Plaintiff's request for punitive damages. See City of Newport v. Facts Concerts. Inc., 453 U.S. 247, 270 (1981) (“[E]vidence of a tortfeasor's wealth is traditionally admissible as a measure of the amount of punitive damages that should be awarded.”); S. Cal. Hous. Rights Ctr. v. Krug, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 65330, at *11 (C.D. Cal. 2006). However, Request No. 44 is overly broad. Defendants are ordered to comply with Request No. 44, modified to require production of “all financial statements which evidence the amount of gross and net income that Defendants have received through Call Haven.”

Request No. 45:

Plaintiff's Motion to Compel responses to Document Request No. 45 is denied. Public policy strongly cautions against the production of a defendant's tax returns. See Premium Service Corp. v. Sperry & Hutchinson Co., 511 F.2d 225, 229 (9th Cir. 1975). While the returns may contain information relevant to damages, Plaintiffs have shown no compelling need to obtain the tax return information in light of the public policy and Court's order to Defendants produce information in response to Request Nos. 43 and 44. A. Farber & Ptnrs., Inc. v. Garber, 234 F.R.D. 186, 191 (C.D. Cal. 2006).

IT IS SO ORDERED.