Adecco USA, Inc. v. Staffworks, Inc.
Adecco USA, Inc. v. Staffworks, Inc.
2022 WL 20053434 (N.D.N.Y. 2022)
February 2, 2022
Dancks, Therese W., United States Magistrate Judge
Summary
The Court directed the parties to produce certain information to each other, including full forensic imaging of Staffworks' issued computers, text, social media, emails, and other ESI sources. Additionally, the Court issued directives for the parties to follow regarding responses, demands, and disputes.
Additional Decisions
ADECCO USA, INC., et al., Plaintiffs,
v.
STAFFWORKS, INC., et al., Defendants
v.
STAFFWORKS, INC., et al., Defendants
6:20-cv-00744 (MAD/TWD)
United States District Court, N.D. New York
Signed February 02, 2022
Counsel
TYLER TARNEY, ESQ., Gordon & Rees, LLP, Counsel for Plaintiffs.PRESTON ZARLOCK, ESQ., Phillips Lytle, LLP, Counsel for Defendants.
Dancks, Therese W., United States Magistrate Judge
ORDER
*1 Presently before the Court in this action are multiple discovery disputes between the parties concerning their respective demands and responses. The Court reviewed various disputed discovery issues as set forth in the parties’ letter briefs and responses. (Dkt. Nos. 199, 200, 201, and 202.) The Court has also discussed many of the disputes in prior telephone conferences with the parties.
I. LEGAL STANDARD
Rule 26(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure sets forth the scope and limitations of permissible discovery:
Parties may obtain discovery regarding any nonprivileged matter that is relevant to any party's claim or defense and proportional to the needs of the case, considering the importance of the issues at stake in the action, the amount in controversy, the parties’ relative access to relevant information, the parties’ resources, the importance of the discovery in resolving the issues, and whether the burden or expense of the proposed discovery outweighs its likely benefit. Information within this scope of discovery need not be admissible in evidence to be discoverable.
Fed.R.Civ.P. 26(b)(1).
Information is relevant if: “(a) it has any tendency to make a fact more or less probable than it would be without the evidence; and (b) the fact is of consequence in determining the action.” Fed. R. Evid. 401. Relevance is a matter of degree, and the standard is applied more liberally in discovery than it is at trial. “ ‘[I]t is well established that relevance for the purpose of discovery is broader in scope than relevance for the purpose of the trial itself.’ ” Refco Grp. Ltd., LLC v. Cantor Fitzgerald, L.P., 13 Civ. 1654 (RA)(HBP), 2014 WL 5420225 at *7 (S.D.N.Y. Oct. 24, 2014) (Pitman, M.J.) (brackets in original), quoting Arch Assocs., Inc. v. HuAmerica Int'l, Inc., 93 Civ. 2168 (PKL), 1994 WL 30487 at *1 (S.D.N.Y. Jan. 28, 1994) (Leisure, D.J.); see Degulis v. LXR Biotechnology, Inc., 176 F.R.D. 123, 125 (S.D.N.Y. 1997) (Sweet, D.J.); Quaker Chair Corp. v. Litton Bus. Sys., Inc., 71 F.R.D. 527, 530–31 (S.D.N.Y. 1976) (Motley, D.J.).
As the advisory committee notes, the proportionality factors have been restored to their former position in the subsection “defining the scope of discovery,” where they had been located prior to the 1993 amendments to the rules. Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(1) advisory committee's notes to 2015 amendment. Relevance is still to be “construed broadly to encompass any matter that bears on, or that reasonably could lead to other matter that could bear on” any party's claim or defense. Oppenheimer Fund, Inc. v. Sanders, 437 U.S. 340, 351 (1978). However, the amended rule is intended to “encourage judges to be more aggressive in identifying and discouraging discovery overuse” by emphasizing the need to analyze proportionality before ordering production of relevant information. Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(1) advisory committee's notes to 2015 amendment. The burden of demonstrating relevance remains on the party seeking discovery, and the newly-revised rule “does not place on the party seeking discovery the burden of addressing all proportionality considerations.” Id. In general, when disputes are brought before the court, “the parties’ responsibilities [ ] remain the same” as they were under the previous iteration of the rules, so that the party resisting discovery has the burden of showing undue burden or expense. Id.; see also Fireman's Fund Insurance Co. v. Great American Insurance Co. of New York, 284 F.R.D. 132, 135 (S.D.N.Y. 2012) (“Once relevance has been shown, it is up to the responding party to justify curtailing discovery.”). Moreover, information still “need not be admissible in evidence to be discoverable.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(1).
*2 The advisory committee's notes to the recent amendment of Rule 26 further explain that “[a] party claiming that a request is important to resolve the issues should be able to explain the ways in which the underlying information bears on the issues as that party understands them. The court's responsibility, using all the information provided by the parties, is to consider these and all the other factors in reaching a case-specific determination of the appropriate scope of discovery.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 26 advisory committee's note to 2015 amendment.
With the above discovery principles in mind, the Court directs the following discovery, which each party must produce to the other on a rolling basis beginning immediately and to be completed by February 28, 2022.
II. PLAINTIFFS’ DEMANDS TO DEFENDANTS
(1) Full forensic imaging of Staffworks’ issued computers of Walser, Rodabaugh, Rodhe, Gloria, Flint, Stanford, and Vitullo - This request is denied in part as not proportional to the needs of the case and because the information sought can be obtained in a less intrusive and less expensive way. Thus, defendants are to provide the information requested as outlined in Dkt. No. 199-1, Section II. A-D for the computers that are in the custody of defendants’ counsel, as well as any such information located on any other Staffworks’ computer storage system(s) including, but not limited to, cloud and USB storage devices;
(2) Text, social media, emails and other ESI sources - This request is denied in part as overly broad, and not proportional to the needs of the case. However, in addition to the information defendants have already produced, defendants must provide responsive information from the jim.walser@adlertankrentals.com account since that email account was used by defendant Walser to send, receive, and print Adecco documents. The individual defendants must also provide any responsive text message information from any of their personal cell phones, or cell phones issued by Staffworks or Adecco, as used by the named defendants since 5/12/2020;
(3) Other clients pursued - This request is granted as follows: defendants must produce responsive information and documents regarding the Adecco clients pursued by the Staffworks and/or named defendants while at Staffworks. The Court finds this information relevant to the plaintiffs’ claims regarding the named defendants alleged breaches of their non-solicit, duty-of-loyalty, and non-disclosure covenants;
(4) Employee solicitation - This request is granted as follows: defendants must produce responsive information and documents regarding the Adecco employees pursued by Staffworks and/or the named defendants while at Staffworks. The Court finds this information relevant to the plaintiffs’ claims regarding the named defendants alleged breaches of their non-solicit, duty-of-loyalty, and non-disclosure covenants;
(5) Other discovery - This request is denied except: (a) to the extent defendants have agreed to produce or log communications with third party witnesses, defendants must do so; and (b) defendants must also produce contact information including last known addresses and all phone numbers (including cell phone numbers) for individuals identified in defendants’ initial Rule 26 disclosures.
III. DEFENDANTS’ DEMANDS TO PLAINTIFFS
(1) Adecco's corporate restructuring - This request is granted in part as follows. Plaintiffs must provide all documents and communications related to its corporate restructuring undertaken in May 2020, along with information regarding its office closures and other cost-cutting measures. The Court finds this information relevant to plaintiffs’ claims for damages. The request for information concerning Plaintiffs’ June 2021 restructuring is denied without prejudice;
*3 (2) Employment agreements - This request is granted in part as follows. Plaintiffs must produce all employment agreements for New York based employees from June of 2015 through and including May of 2020. This information is relevant to the viability of plaintiffs’ restrictive covenants. To the extent plaintiff cannot locate any employment agreement for any New York based employees in that time frame, plaintiff must then produce and identify the names and contact information including last known addresses and all phone numbers (including cell phone numbers) for any such individuals;
(3) Employees who left Adecco but continued to work in the staffing industry after 5/12/2020 - this request is granted as follows. Plaintiff must produce documents, communications, and the names of all former Adecco employees in New York who continued to work in the staffing industry, including the 25 individuals whose names were provided by defendants that Adecco was aware continued to work in the staffing industry. Plaintiff must also produce contact information including last known addresses and all phone numbers (including cell phone numbers) for any such individuals. This information is relevant to Adecco's enforcement of its restrictive covenants.
IV. OTHER COURT DIRECTIVES
(1) Any response by any party directing the other party to documents shall state the Bates number of the relevant document for all discovery responses;
(2) No further demands are permitted to be served by any party until further direction or permission from the Court is obtained;
(3) No further letter motions, briefs, requests, or other disputed discovery issues are to be filed with the Court other than what is permitted in this Order until further direction or permission from the Court is obtained;
(4) Parties MUST have good faith meet and confer conferences encompassing actually speaking to each other for any further disputes before requesting Court intervention;
(5) Any violation of any directives set forth in this entire Order will result in sanctions.
Accordingly, it is hereby,
ORDERED, that the parties’ respective discovery motions set forth and briefed in Dkt. Nos. 199, 200, 201, and 202 are GRANTED in part and DENIED in part in accordance with this Order; the parties shall provide all directed disclosure in the manner and time frame as directed herein; and it is further
ORDERED, that the parties must confer in good faith to schedule all necessary fact depositions, and file a joint status report by 3/3/2022 setting forth the exact confirmed dates for such depositions which shall be completed by 4/29/2022 per Dkt. No. 158.
SO ORDERED.