Chun, John H., United States District Judge
Plaintiffs,
v.
AMAZON.COM, INC., a corporation,
Defendant
Counsel
Edward H. Takashima, Caroline Holland, Christina F. Shackelford, Christine M. Kennedy, Colin M. Herd, Daniel S. Bradley, Daniel A. Principato, Danielle C. Quinn, David B. Schwartz, Emily K. Bolles, Emma Dick, Eric Zepp, Ethan Dean Stevenson, Jake O. Walter-Warner, Kara King, Kelly M. Schoolmeester, Kenneth H. Merber, Leigh Barnwell, Leora Tyree, Megan E.B. Henry, Melissa C. Hill, Michael Baker, Nathan Mendelsohn, Sara M. Divett, Shira Alana Steinberg, Stephen E. Antonio, Z. Lily Rudy, Susan A. Musser, Cathleen Williams, Mark J. Woodward, Thomas Miller, Federal Trade Commission, Washington, DC, for Plaintiff Federal Trade Commission.Amy Elizabeth McFarlane, Pro Hac Vice, Elinor R. Hoffmann, Pro Hac Vice, James Yoon, Pro Hac Vice, Michael Youngho Jo, Pro Hac Vice, Tal M. Elmatad, Pro Hac Vice, Office of the New York Attorney General, New York, NY, for Plaintiff State of New York.
Nicole Demers, Pro Hac Vice, Rahul A. Darwar, Pro Hac Vice, Connecticut Office of the Attorney General, Hartford, CT, for Plaintiff State of Connecticut.
Brandon S. Sprecher, Pro Hac Vice, Tracy Wright Wertz, Pro Hac Vice, Jennifer A. Thomson, Pro Hac Vice, Pennsylvania Office of Attorney General, Harrisburg, PA, for Plaintiff Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
Brian Canfield, Pro Hac Vice, Michael A. Undorf, Pro Hac Vice, U.S. Department of Justice, Wilmington, DE, for Plaintiff State of Delaware.
Christina M. Moylan, Pro Hac Vice, Michael Devine, Pro Hac Vice, Maine Office of the Attorney General, Augusta, ME, for Plaintiff State of Maine.
Byron Warren, Pro Hac Vice, Gary Honick, Pro Hac Vice, Office of the Maryland Attorney General, Baltimore, MD, for Plaintiff State of Maryland.
Michael Bruce MacKenzie, Pro Hac Vice, Office of the Massachusetts Attorney General, Boston, MA, for Plaintiff Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
Jason Evans, Pro Hac Vice, Jonathan Comish, Pro Hac Vice, Scott A. Mertens, Pro Hac Vice, Michigan Department of Attorney General, Lansing, MI, for Plaintiff State of Michigan.
Sarah Doktori, Pro Hac Vice, Zach Biesanz, Pro Hac Vice, Attorney General's Office, St. Paul, MN, for Plaintiff State of Minnesota.
Lucas J. Tucker, Pro Hac Vice, Nevada Attorney General's Office, Las Vegas, NV, for Plaintiff State of Nevada.
Alexandra C. Sosnowski, Pro Hac Vice, New Hampshire Department of Justice, Concord, NH, for Plaintiff State of New Hampshire.
Ana Atta-Alla, Pro Hac Vice, Isabella R. Pitt, Pro Hac Vice, Attorney General's Office, Newark, NJ, for Plaintiff State of New Jersey.
Jeff Dan Herrera, Pro Hac Vice, Julie Meade, Pro Hac Vice, Attorney General's Office, Santa Fe, NM, for Plaintiff State of New Mexico.
Caleb J. Smith, Pro Hac Vice, Attorney General's Office, Tulsa, OK, for Plaintiff State of Oklahoma.
Timothy D. Smith, Oregon Department of Justice (Salem - Civil), Salem, OR, for Plaintiff State of Oregon.
Stephen N. Provazza, Pro Hac Vice, Rhode Island Department of Attorney General, Providence, NY, for Plaintiff State of Rhode Island.
Laura E. McFarlane, Pro Hac Vice, Gwendolyn J. Cooley, Pro Hac Vice, Wisconsin Department of Justice, Madison, WI, for Plaintiff State of Wisconsin.
Zulma Carrasquillo-Almena, Pro Hac Vice, Puerto Rico Department of Justice, San Juan, PR, for Plaintiff Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.
Sarah L.J. Aceves, Pro Hac Vice, Attorney General's Office, Montpelier, VT, for Plaintiff State of Vermont.
Carl R. Metz, Pro Hac Vice, Carol Joan Pruski, Pro Hac Vice, Heidi K. Hubbard, Pro Hac Vice, John E. Schmidtlein, Pro Hac Vice, Jonathan B. Pitt, Pro Hac Vice, Katherine Trefz, Pro Hac Vice, Kevin M. Hodges, Pro Hac Vice, Constance T. Forkner, Pro Hac Vice, Williams & Connolly, Washington, DC, Derek Ludwin, Pro Hac Vice, Katharine Mitchell-Tombras, Pro Hac Vice, Thomas O. Barnett, Pro Hac Vice, Covington & Burling LLP, Washington, DC, Kosta S. Stojilkovic, Pro Hac Vice, Wilkinson Stekloff LLP, Washington, DC, Molly A. Terwilliger, Patricia A. Eakes, Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP, Seattle, WA, for Defendant.
David C. Kiernan, Pro Hac Vice, Jones Day, San Francisco, CA, Koren W. Wong-Ervin, Pro Hac Vice, Jones Day, Washington, DC, Ariel A. Martinez, Tyler Lawrence Farmer, Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner LLP, Seattle, WA, for Intervenor Walmart, Inc.
Timothy W. Bergin, Pro Hac Vice, Potomac Law Group, Washington, DC, William Fisher, Potomac Law Group, Seattle, WA, for Intervenor American Booksellers Association, Inc.
ORDER ON MOTION TO COMPEL DOCUMENTS RELATED TO SPOLIATION
I
INTRODUCTION
Before the Court is Plaintiffs’ Motion to Compel Documents Related to Spoliation. Dkt. # 198. For the reasons below, the Court DENIES the motion without prejudice. After completion of the Rule 30(b)(6) deposition of Defendant’s representative on document retention, Plaintiffs’ may renew their motion if warranted.
II
BACKGROUND
Plaintiffs move to compel production of Defendant’s “document preservation notices and
its instructions about the use of ephemeral messaging applications, including Signal.” Dkt. # 198 at 4. Specifically, Plaintiffs seek documents responsive to their Requests for Production (RFPs)
25 and 27. Dkt. # 198 at 8–9. These RFPs seek: “[a]ll litigation holds, preservation notices or
similar documents sent by Amazon in connection with the June 17, 2019 preservation letters,
August 5, 2019 Voluntary Access Letter, February 20, 2020 Civil Investigative Demand, and/or
September 26, 2023 Complaint in this matter.” Id. at 8 (RFP No. 25). And “[a]ll documents
relating to instructions or advice given to employees about the use of ephemeral messaging,
including but not limited to Signal or Wickr.” Id. at 9 (RFP No. 27).
Defendant responds that documents responsive to these RFPs are privileged and has
refused to produce them. Id. (citing Dkt # 202-17 and Dkt. # 202-18).
III
DISCUSSION
The Court agrees with Plaintiffs that the documents they seek may be necessary to their assessment of whether Defendant spoliated relevant evidence. But Defendant correctly notes that “litigation hold notices are not discoverable, ‘particularly when a party has made an adequate showing that the letters include material protected under attorney-client privilege or the work-product doctrine.’” Agne v. Papa John’s Int’l, Inc., No. C10-1139-JCC, 2012 WL 12882903, at *3 (W.D. Wash. Feb. 6, 2012) (quoting Major Tours, Inc. v. Colorel, C05-3091, 2009 WL 2413631, at *2 (D.N.J. Aug. 4, 2009)); see also Al Otro Lado, Inc. v. Wolf, NO. 3:17- cv-02366-BAS-KSC, 2020 WL 4432026, at *2 (S.D. Cal. July 31, 2020). Confidential legal advice is similarly privileged. United States v. Sanmina Corp., 968 F.3d 1107, 1116 (9th Cir. 2020).
Plaintiffs do not dispute these presumptions. Dkt. # 198 at 9. Instead, they assert that
“[a] preliminary showing of spoliation overcomes the protections against disclosure that may
otherwise apply to document preservation notices . . . and attorney-client communications about litigation holds or spoliation.” Dkt. # 198 at 9. Many district courts have employed this
“preliminary showing” approach. See, e.g., Al Otro Lado, Inc., 2020 WL 4432026, at *2
(concluding that, despite the presumption of privilege, “plaintiffs have made a sufficient
preliminary showing of spoliation to overcome the attorney-client privilege that presumably
attached to the litigation hold notice); see also Major Tours Inc., 2009 WL 2413631, at *5; In re
Cathode Ray Tube Antitrust Litig., No. 07-cv-05944-JST, 2023 WL 5667882, at *5 (N.D. Cal.
Jan. 27, 2023) (facts provided by plaintiffs “suffice to make a preliminary showing of spoliation
adequate to overcome the attorney-client privilege.”).
Among its various responses to Plaintiffs’ “preliminary showing” arguments, Defendant asserts that the proper relief would be not to order the production of the privileged documents but to “order a corporate deposition of the non-movant[.]” Dkt. # 223 at 16. The Court agrees. This “deposition first” approach has also been employed by various district courts. For example, in Thomas v. Cricket Wireless, LLC, the court declined to grant plaintiffs’ motion to compel litigation hold notices before the Rule 30(b)(6) deposition. No. 19-cv-07270-WHA (AGT), 2020 WL 7344742, at *2–*3 (N.D. Cal. Dec. 14, 2020) (“Plaintiffs have offered no convincing reason why the Court should deviate from the Rule 30(b)(6) deposition-first approach, and the Court declines to do so here.”). Similarly, in Al Otro Lado, the court found a preliminary showing of spoliation was made sufficient to warrant production of litigation hold letters, based in part on deposition testimony that had been obtained. 2020 WL 4432026, at *1–*2.
Plaintiffs assert that they “have already sought corporate testimony on Amazon’s preservation efforts” and that “Amazon asserted privilege over and deliberately did not prepare its witness to answer questions about the contents of its legal holds.” Dkt. # 235 at 8 (citing Dkt. # 202-15 at 6). They cite excerpts from the October 7, 2022, Investigational Hearing of Amazon’s corporate representative, Robert Stangler, conducted during the pre-Complaint investigation. Dkt. # 202 at 4. When the witness was asked about the document preservation notices that had been circulated at that point, counsel for Defendant explained “we view the hold notices, including and specifically how they are laid out and what’s in them as privileged, and for that reason we have not had the witness review the specific hold notices, and so I don’t think he’s going to be able to answer that.” Dkt. # 202-15 at 6. This, Plaintiffs assert, indicates that a Rule 30(b)(6) deposition would be fruitless.
Notwithstanding the foregoing, the Court does not believe that a deposition-first approach
would necessarily be fruitless. The Court orders that a Rule 30(b)(6) deposition of Defendant’s
representative on document retention take place within 30 days of this order. During the
deposition, Plaintiffs may inquire into (1) when and to whom the litigation hold notices were
given, (2) what kinds and categories of information and data Defendant’s employees were
instructed to preserve and collect, and (3) what specific actions they were instructed to take to
that end. See Thomas, 2020 WL 7344742, at *3. If, after the deposition, Plaintiffs have still not
obtained the information necessary to analyze the “full extent of the possible spoliation[,]” Dkt. #
198 at 5, they may renew their motion to compel. See, e.g., Thomas v. Cricket Wireless, LLC.,
No. 19-cv-07270-WHA(AGT), 2021 WL 1017114, at *1 (N.D. Cal. Mar. 16, 2021) (after denial
without prejudice of plaintiffs’ motion to compel defendant’s litigation hold letters and related
correspondence pending a Rule 30(b)(6) deposition, the court considered a renewed motion to
compel after the deposition did not provide “relevant answers about the basic details surrounding
the hold letters at issue.”).
IV
CONCLUSION
For these reasons, the Court DENIES Plaintiffs’ motion to compel without prejudice. After the Rule 30(b)(6) deposition, Plaintiffs may renew their motion to compel if warranted.
Dated this 9th day of July, 2024.