*1 Plaintiffs’ Motion to Compel Production of Documents from Deutsche Bank Securities, Inc. is granted. Plaintiffs are to pay the sum of $15,000 to Deutsche Bank to cover the cost of document production.

The Plaintiffs have moved to compel non-party Deutsche Bank Securities, Inc. to produce documents in compliance with a subpoena duces tecum served on it. The gravamen of Plaintiffs’ Complaint is that the Defendants conspired to limit the supply of container board products and raise prices to supra-competitive levels. Plaintiffs contend that the Defendants used Deutsche Bank and its employee Mark Wilde to facilitate their collusion. This is Plaintiffs second go at Deutsche Bank. They initially sought documents by way of subpoenas issued out of the Southern District of New York. On March 18, 2013 Deutsche Bank produced more than 7,000 pages of documents in response to the New York subpoena. After numerous meetings and conferences the parties attempted to narrow the scope of the subpoena and then finally decided to withdraw the New York proceeding and have a subpoena issued out of this Court which is the subject of the instant Motion to Compel.

Deutsche Bank initial production consisted of e-mails from Mr. Wilde as well as his presentations and analyst reports for the years 2007 to 2010. The new subpoena added the years 2003 to 2005 to Mr. Wilde's documents as well as e-mails from a Ms. Jones and Mr. Chun, apparently Deutsche Bank employees who worked for or with Mr. Wilde. Deutsche Bank has taken the position that it will make the production but at Plaintiffs’ cost. The Plaintiffs then wanted to know exactly what costs they would be incurring. Deutsche Bank asked for an initial payment of $15,000 and estimated the ultimate cost of compliance of between $100,000 and $200,000. Plaintiffs have declined to agree to any such payment.

Non-parties are subject to similar scope of discovery when subpoenaed under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 45 as are parties. DeGeer v. Gillis, 755 F.Supp.2d 909, 924 (N.D. Ill. 2010). Under this Rule the non-party may be entitled to a protective order if compliance would impose “significant expense” in order to comply. However the “presumption is that the responding party must bear the expense.” DeGeer at 927. The following factors are considered in connection with cost-shifting: (a) the scope of the request, (b) the invasiveness of the request, (c) the need to separate privileged material, (d) the non-party's interest in the litigation, (e) whether the party seeking production ultimately prevails, (f) the relative resources of the party and the nonparty, (g) reasonableness of the costs sought, and (h) the public importance of the litigation. Id.

As might be expected, the parties (and Deutsche Bank) dispute the relevance of the Plaintiffs’ request. Each has submitted portions of Wilde's deposition which previously has been taken. As is the case with most motions to compel and requests for protective orders regarding discovery, the parties know considerably more about the case than the Court does which makes it difficult for the Court to determine the relevance or lack thereof. This is one of the reasons why the breath of discovery is considerably broader than an admissibility standard. Accordingly, the Court has adopted what it refers to as “the straight face” standard, i.e., if the requesting party can justify its request without laughing the court will usually grant the request. Here Plaintiffs have made the requisite showing of relevance so the Motion is granted.

*2 However, the cost-shifting is another matter. Based on what little the Court knows, the Plaintiffs’ theory involving Deutsche Bank complicity is a long shot at best. Given that Deutsche Bank as already produced four (4) years of documents at no cost to Plaintiffs, it seems only fair to the Court that Plaintiffs make some payment to Deutsche Bank for the additional discovery. Here Deutsche Bank as requested an initial payment of $15,000 with additional payments of anywhere from $100,000 to 200,000. This seems to the Court to be unreasonable since four (4) years of production consisted of only 7,000 documents. Three additional years should be less than that. The Court believes that a one-time payment by Plaintiffs of $15,000 should be sufficient to compensate Deutsche Bank. The Plaintiffs point out, correctly, that Deutsche Bank has made no attempt to itemize its fee request as was done in DeGeer at page 928.

The Court will make one additional suggestion. Since one of the factors in cost shifting is whether the requesting party ultimately prevails, and if the costs of production to Deutsche Bank truly are as high as it suggests they may be, the Court would entertain a request to reconsider costs after the case is concluded.

The Court grants the Motion of the Plaintiffs to compel production from non-party Deutsche Bank upon payment of the sum of $15,000.