Lynwood Investments CY Limited v. Konovalov
- Maxine Chesney
- 3:20-cv-03778
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 3
In Lynwood Investments v. Konovalov, Judge Kim required more briefing before deciding whether Lynwood could use alternative service.
Lynwood Investments CY Limited and the four individual defendants—Maxim Konovalov, Igor Sysoev, Maxim Dounin, and Andrey Alexeev—were affected by the court’s requirements concerning proposed service. F5 Networks, Inc. was also involved because Lynwood proposed serving three of the individual defendants through F5.
What happened
Lynwood Investments CY Limited asked to serve four individual defendants—Maxim Konovalov, Igor Sysoev, Maxim Dounin, and Andrey Alexeev—by email under a rule allowing court-approved alternative service. It also proposed serving three of them through their employer, F5 Networks, Inc.
The court said Lynwood had not adequately addressed whether email service on Russian residents was barred by an international agreement. The court also questioned whether serving F5 would be valid for a vice president, senior architect, and principal software engineer, and asked Lynwood to explain how it confirmed the defendants’ email addresses.
The court did not grant or deny the service request. It ordered Lynwood to file a further brief and a motion to file unredacted materials under seal by July 15, 2020. The order was issued by United States Magistrate Judge Sallie Kim in Lynwood Investments CY Limited v. Konovalov.
The detailed version
- Lynwood Investments CY Limited v. Konovalov · No. 3:20-cv-03778
- Maxine Chesney
- July 10, 2020
Background
Lynwood Investments CY Limited filed an administrative motion asking the court to authorize alternative service of process on four individual defendants: Maxim Konovalov, Igor Sysoev, Maxim Dounin, and Andrey Alexeev. The proposed methods were email service and, for Konovalov, Sysoev, and Dounin, service through their employer, F5 Networks, Inc. The request relied on Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 4(f)(3), which permits service by a method directed by the court if an international agreement does not prohibit it.
Court’s concerns
The court said Lynwood had not substantively addressed whether service by email on Russian residents was prohibited by an international agreement. Russia had objected to part of Article 10 of the Hague Convention concerning service through postal channels. The court directed Lynwood to address conflicting decisions about whether that objection also affects email service.
The court also found it unclear whether serving F5 would be permissible for employees who were a senior architect and a principal software engineer, rather than company officers or directors. In addition, although Lynwood allegedly had confirmed email addresses for the individual defendants, it did not explain how it found and confirmed those addresses.
Order
The court did not grant or deny the request for alternative service in this order. Instead, it ordered Lynwood to file a further supporting brief addressing the identified deficiencies by July 15, 2020. The court also noted that Lynwood had redacted the defendants’ email addresses without first obtaining authorization and ordered Lynwood to file a motion to submit unredacted versions of supporting materials under seal, following the applicable local rules. United States Magistrate Judge Sallie Kim signed the order.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.