Khan v. Amazon Web Services, Inc.
- Jacquelyn Corley
- 3:19-cv-08027
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 2
In Khan v. Amazon Web Services, Inc., Judge Corley granted one motion to compel and denied another in discovery disputes.
Plaintiff Saifullah Khan and Amazon Web Services, Inc. and the other defendants; the order required further document searching for one request and denied access to the requested supervisors’ performance evaluations.
What happened
In Khan v. Amazon Web Services, Inc., the court resolved two disputes about information Plaintiff Saifullah Khan sought from Amazon Web Services, Inc. and the other defendants during discovery.
The court ordered the defendants to conduct a further search and respond to a request for documents about the promotion of Khan’s comparator shortly after Khan was terminated. The court found that information relevant and rejected the defendants’ unsupported claim that searching emails would be too burdensome.
The court denied Khan’s request for his supervisors’ performance evaluations, finding their limited relevance outweighed by other considerations. Judge Jacquelyn Scott Corley stated that the order disposed of both discovery disputes.
The detailed version
- Khan v. Amazon Web Services, Inc. · No. 3:19-cv-08027
- Jacquelyn Corley
- Apr. 5, 2021
Background
The court considered two joint letters concerning discovery disputes. The opinion states that oral argument was unnecessary and resolves Docket Nos. 72 and 73.
Docket No. 72: Comparator-promotion documents
Khan sought information about the promotion of his comparator shortly after Khan was terminated. The court found that information relevant. Although the defendants said they had produced all documents they had located, they did not explain how they searched for responsive documents. The court noted that the defendants apparently had not conducted an electronic search and had provided no support for their assertion that searching relevant email custodians would be too burdensome. The court also rejected the argument that Khan could obtain the information through depositions because he was entitled to contemporaneous documents rather than only after-the-fact testimony.
The court granted Khan’s motion to compel a further search and response to Request No. 25.
Docket No. 73: Supervisors’ performance evaluations
Khan also sought the performance evaluations of his supervisors. The court concluded that any relevance of those evaluations was slight and outweighed by other considerations. The court noted that the defendants represented that they had already produced investigation reports concerning discrimination complaints against one manager and were unaware of complaints against the other.
The court denied the motion to compel the supervisors’ performance evaluations.
Disposition
The order disposed of Docket Nos. 72 and 73. Judge Jacquelyn Scott Corley therefore granted one discovery motion and denied the other.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.