Haynes v. City Of New York

Background

Faustina E. Haynes served a document subpoena dated November 24, 2020, on the New York City Department of Investigation (DOI). The subpoena sought transcripts of interviews of Haynes, Julie Faber, Tia Waddy, David Hansell, Jill Krauss, or certain commissioner-level employees concerning DOI’s 2018 investigation of the New York City Administration for Children’s Services’ handling of employment and criminal-background checks, including the investigation involving Jacques Edwards.

Fact discovery was scheduled to close on November 30, 2020. The defendants moved to quash the subpoena, arguing that Haynes should have requested the documents from the City through a document request rather than subpoenaing DOI. They also argued that the subpoena was served too close to the discovery deadline, was overly broad, and imposed an undue burden because the defendants could provide the documents.

Haynes argued that DOI was an independent City agency and that the subpoena was a narrowly tailored request for transcripts related to the Edwards incident and the resulting DOI investigation. She also argued that the defendants had not followed the required procedures for challenging a document request. Haynes said her counsel did not understand until her October 29, 2020 deposition that the DOI interviews were conducted under oath.

Legal standard

Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 45 requires a court to quash or modify a subpoena that, among other things, imposes an undue burden. A party generally lacks standing—that is, the legal right to object—to a subpoena directed to a nonparty based only on relevance or undue burden, unless the party claims a privilege or personal right affected by the subpoena.

Court’s analysis

The court found that the defendants described DOI inconsistently, treating it both as a City agency and as a nonparty. If DOI was a nonparty, the defendants had not claimed privilege and lacked standing to object based on undue burden. If DOI was a City agency and the documents should have been requested from the City, the defendants’ position undermined their argument that Haynes improperly sought the documents from a nonparty.

The court also noted that DOI was not a suable entity and that the defendants cited no binding authority prohibiting service of a subpoena on DOI or requiring Haynes to direct the request to the City through the document-request procedure. The court rejected Haynes’s argument that the motion should be denied for failure to follow pre-motion procedures because those procedures applied to document requests, not to the motion to quash this subpoena.

The court rejected the defendants’ undue-burden and overbreadth arguments. The defendants did not explain the nature or extent of the burden and provided no supporting evidence. The court found that the subpoena was narrowly tailored, specific, and relevant to the DOI investigation concerning Jacques Edwards. It also described as meritless and frivolous Haynes’s explanation that her counsel did not know the interviews were under oath until after the deposition, because DOI’s public website stated that the agency had authority to take testimony under oath.

Disposition

The court overruled the defendants’ objections and denied the defendants’ motion to quash the subpoena, Docket Entry No. 39.