Syntel Sterling Best Shores Mauritius Limited v. The Trizetto Group, Inc.
- Lorna Schofield
- 1:15-cv-00211
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Syntel v. TriZetto, Judge Schofield allowed a limited deposition and set an objection deadline concerning a termination letter’s admissibility.
Syntel Sterling Best Shores Mauritius Limited and Syntel, Inc., whose termination letter and appendix were at issue, and The TriZetto Group, Inc. and Cognizant Technology Solutions Corp., which were given an optional, time-limited deposition opportunity and an objection deadline.
What happened
Syntel Sterling Best Shores Mauritius Limited and Syntel, Inc. sued The TriZetto Group, Inc. and Cognizant Technology Solutions Corp. The defendants asked the court to bar Syntel from introducing its termination letter as evidence supporting Syntel’s claims.
Syntel submitted additional declarations to establish that the termination letter and its appendix qualified as business records, including information about transition rebates TriZetto received. The court stated that the documents appeared admissible and that the rebate information appeared reliably determined.
Judge Lorna G. Schofield ordered that the defendants may, but need not, depose Syntel’s foundational witness, Anil Agrawal, for no more than three hours before October 16, 2020. The defendants had to file any objections to the documents’ admissibility by noon on October 16, 2020.
The detailed version
- Syntel Sterling Best Shores Mauritius Limited v. The Trizetto Group, Inc. · No. 1:15-cv-00211
- Lorna Schofield
- Oct. 8, 2020
Background
The defendants and counterclaim-plaintiffs, The TriZetto Group, Inc. and Cognizant Technology Solutions Corp., filed a motion in limine seeking to prevent the plaintiffs and counterclaim-defendants, Syntel Sterling Best Shores Mauritius Limited and Syntel, Inc., from introducing Syntel’s termination letter as evidence of Syntel’s claims.
In an earlier order, the court gave Syntel an opportunity to file a certification under Federal Rule of Evidence 803(6)(D) establishing the foundation for documents showing the amount of transition rebates received by TriZetto. Syntel then filed a supplemental declaration from Daniel Moore and a declaration from Anil Agrawal.
Court’s Analysis
The court stated that, based on the foundation Syntel had recently provided, the termination letter and its appendix appeared admissible as business records under Rule 803(6)(D). The court also stated that the information about the amount of transition rebates appeared to have been reliably determined. It noted the preference for resolving disputes on their merits rather than excluding relevant evidence because of a procedural technicality.
Order
Judge Lorna G. Schofield ordered that the defendants may, but need not, depose Anil Agrawal because he had not previously been deposed. The deposition could last no more than three hours and had to occur before October 16, 2020. The defendants were required to file any objections to admissibility by noon on October 16, 2020. The order does not expressly state that the motion in limine was granted or denied.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.