Handloser v. HCL America, Inc.

Background

Plaintiffs Gregory Handloser and Cerafin Castillo are unsuccessful applicants for employment with HCL America, Inc. and HCL Technologies Ltd. They allege that HCL engaged in a pattern or practice of racial discrimination in violation of 42 U.S.C. § 1981 and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. They sought to represent a class of people who were not South Asian, of Indian national origin, or visa holders, applied for positions with HCL in the United States, and were not hired. HCL denies the discrimination allegations and objects to class treatment.

Plaintiffs served a Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 45 subpoena on non-party VDart, Inc., one of the companies HCL used to recruit applicants for its United States workforce. The subpoena sought documents concerning VDart’s contracts and communications with HCL, VDart’s recruiting efforts for HCL, and the race, national origin, or citizenship status of people VDart proposed to HCL or selected to work for HCL.

VDart objected to producing some of the requested materials. Plaintiffs then proposed procedures to reduce the burden and protect sensitive information: VDart would collect its emails with HCL, apply plaintiffs’ search terms, screen for privilege, use a court order protecting against waiver of privilege, and designate the production highly confidential under the case’s protective order. VDart agreed to those terms.

HCL had advance notice of the subpoena but did not move to quash or modify it, and did not seek a protective order, before the subpoena’s compliance deadline. Instead, VDart provided its collected documents to HCL. Plaintiffs later requested those documents from HCL. HCL objected, and after VDart briefly provided plaintiffs with a download link, HCL asked VDart to stop plaintiffs from accessing the documents. VDart disabled the link.

Legal standard

Rule 45 requires the party issuing a subpoena to take reasonable steps to avoid imposing undue burden or expense on the subpoena recipient. Discovery under a subpoena generally has the same scope as party discovery under Rule 26(b)(1): it may seek nonprivileged information relevant to a claim or defense and proportional to the needs of the case.

The court explained that a party whose interests are affected by a subpoena to a non-party generally must move to quash or modify the subpoena in the court where compliance is required, or seek a protective order in the court handling the case. HCL did neither before the compliance deadline. A protective order could still be available on a showing of good cause, but the court found that HCL had not shown the substantial and particularized harm required for that relief.

Court’s analysis

The court agreed with HCL that portions of the subpoena were too broad. For example, the subpoena sought all communications with HCL, without limiting them to matters at issue in the case. The court therefore recognized that the subpoena was objectionable at least in part. But the court also found that plaintiffs had taken reasonable steps to address VDart’s burden, privilege, and confidentiality concerns, and that VDart had agreed to produce the documents on those terms.

Because HCL did not timely use the procedures available to protect its interests, the court held that HCL was not entitled to prevent VDart from complying after VDart and plaintiffs reached their agreement. The court did not decide whether HCL had instructed VDart not to comply or otherwise obstructed plaintiffs’ discovery efforts, stating that issue was not fully presented in the discovery dispute.

Disposition

The court restored approximately the position that existed before HCL obtained VDart’s documents. HCL was ordered to:

Unless the parties stipulated otherwise, HCL was required to produce the VDart documents by August 31, 2020. The court entered the discovery order on August 13, 2020.