Lewis v. Hale and Hearty Soups, LLC
- Vernon Broderick
- 1:20-cv-08449
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 19
In Lewis v. Hale and Hearty Soups, LLC, Judge Broderick canceled the initial conference and ordered joint case-planning submissions.
Terrelle Lewis and the defendants, including Hale and Hearty Soups, LLC, are required to provide the ordered joint letter and proposed case-management plan.
What happened
Lewis v. Hale and Hearty Soups, LLC is a case in which the court assigned the matter to Judge Vernon S. Broderick for all purposes. The opinion does not describe the claims or defenses.
Because of the public health crisis, the court said it would not hold the initial pretrial conference. It ordered the parties to file a joint letter by January 26, 2021, addressing the action, jurisdiction and venue, motions, discovery, settlement discussions, trial length, and other information useful for moving the case toward settlement or trial. The parties also had to submit a proposed case-management and scheduling order.
Judge Vernon S. Broderick entered the order on January 12, 2021. The opinion also includes employment-case discovery protocols and related model documents, but it does not state additional case-specific rulings adopting or applying them.
The detailed version
- Lewis v. Hale and Hearty Soups, LLC · No. 1:20-cv-08449
- Vernon Broderick
- Jan. 12, 2021
Background
The case was assigned to Judge Vernon S. Broderick for all purposes. The opinion text identifies Terrelle Lewis as the plaintiff and Hale and Hearty Soups, LLC, et al. as the defendants, but it does not describe the claims, defenses, or factual allegations.
Order
The court ordered that it would not hold the initial pretrial conference because of the public health crisis. Instead, by January 26, 2021, the parties had to submit a joint letter of no more than three pages. The letter had to address:
- the nature of the action and the principal defenses; - why federal jurisdiction and venue were proper, including specified entity-citizenship information; - contemplated or outstanding motions; - discovery already completed and discovery needed for meaningful settlement discussions; - prior settlement discussions and the prospects for settlement, without disclosing offers or settlement positions; - the estimated trial length; and - other information that could help the court move the case toward settlement or trial, including any dispositive or novel issues.
The parties also had to jointly submit a proposed case-management plan and scheduling order through the court’s electronic filing system.
Attached Discovery Materials
The opinion text includes the Initial Discovery Protocols for Employment Cases Alleging Adverse Action, a proposed standing order, and a model protective order. The protocols describe early exchanges of documents and information in certain employment cases, generally within 30 days after the defendant files a responsive pleading or motion. They also describe categories of information that plaintiffs and defendants may be required to exchange, certification and supplementation requirements, limits on objections, and procedures for handling confidential information. The order itself does not describe the claims in this case or state a separate case-specific ruling adopting or applying those materials.
Disposition
Judge Vernon S. Broderick ordered that no initial pretrial conference would be held, required the joint status letter and proposed case-management plan, and otherwise issued the order and notice of initial conference. This was a case-management and discovery-related procedural order, not a ruling on the underlying claims.
Read the full 19-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.