Smith v. Apple, Inc.
- Haywood Gilliam
- 4:21-cv-09527
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 23
In Chris Smith v. Apple Inc., Judge Gilliam entered an agreed protective order governing confidential discovery materials.
The named plaintiffs, the proposed similarly situated group, Apple Inc., their counsel, approved experts and consultants, and other people authorized to receive protected discovery materials.
What happened
Chris Smith, Cheryl Smith, Karen Smithson, Jason Roush, Corey Pomroy, Frank Ortega, Alberto Cornea, Michelle Rogers, Joshua Bays, Deborah Class, Amber Jones, and a proposed group of similarly situated individuals sued Apple Inc.
The parties anticipated that discovery would include confidential, proprietary, trade-secret, and commercially sensitive information. They agreed to rules limiting how such material could be used, who could receive it, how it could be challenged or filed, and what would happen after the case ended.
Judge Haywood S. Gilliam, Jr. found good cause and entered the agreed protective order on October 21, 2022. The order did not decide the parties’ underlying claims.
The detailed version
- Smith v. Apple, Inc. · No. 4:21-cv-09527
- Haywood Gilliam
- Oct. 21, 2022
Background
The plaintiffs are Chris Smith, Cheryl Smith, Karen Smithson, Jason Roush, Corey Pomroy, Frank Ortega, Alberto Cornea, Michelle Rogers, Joshua Bays, Deborah Class, and Amber Jones, individually and on behalf of all other similarly situated individuals. Apple Inc. is the defendant. The parties asked the court to enter an agreed protective order because discovery was likely to involve confidential, proprietary, trade-secret, and commercially sensitive information.
Order
The court entered the protective order under Rule 26(c) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure after finding good cause. The order allows producing parties to designate discovery material as either “CONFIDENTIAL” or “CONFIDENTIAL – ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY.” Protected material may generally be used only for this lawsuit and related appellate proceedings, not for other litigation, patent activities, business purposes, or competitive purposes.
Material marked “CONFIDENTIAL” may be shared with specified outside counsel, up to three appropriate party representatives, approved outside experts and consultants, court personnel, certain litigation-support personnel, mock jurors, mediators, and others with the producing party’s written consent. Material marked “CONFIDENTIAL – ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY” is subject to narrower access rules, including restrictions on competitive decision-making and certain patent-prosecution activities. The order also requires protected material to be stored securely in the United States and not exported or made available to foreign nationals.
The order establishes procedures for giving notice before disclosing attorneys’-eyes-only material to an expert, challenging confidentiality designations, responding to subpoenas, and filing protected material with the court. It provides that inadvertent production of privileged material generally does not waive the privilege if the producing party promptly requests its return, and it addresses inadvertent failures to apply a confidentiality designation.
Duration and Disposition
The confidentiality obligations continue after the litigation ends until the designating party agrees otherwise in writing or a court orders otherwise. Within 60 days after final disposition, receiving parties must generally return or destroy protected material and certify that they have done so, although counsel may retain archival copies of specified litigation records subject to the order. The court retains jurisdiction to resolve disputes about the protective order.
Ruling
Judge Haywood S. Gilliam, Jr. entered the agreed protective order. This order governed discovery and confidentiality; it did not resolve the merits of the plaintiffs’ claims against Apple Inc.
Read the full 23-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.