Penske Media Corporation v. Shutterstock, Inc.
- Vyskocil
- 1:20-cv-04583
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 3
In Penske Media v. Shutterstock, Judge Vyskocil denied untimely discovery requests and referred one timely dispute to a magistrate judge.
Penske Media Corporation and Shutterstock, Inc., whose requests and dispute letters concerned discovery in the case.
What happened
Penske Media Corporation v. Shutterstock, Inc. involved several letters about discovery disputes. The court had repeatedly extended the fact-discovery deadline and instructed the parties to raise disputes early enough for the court to rule and for any approved discovery to be completed before the deadline.
After fact discovery closed on February 28, 2022, the parties filed letters about a designated witness, confidentiality labels on documents, and a request to recall another witness. The court also received a timely dispute about Penske’s document production.
Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil denied the untimely requests for further discovery. The court referred the timely document-production dispute to the assigned magistrate judge, postponed the upcoming conference indefinitely, and said it would set a schedule for the parties’ planned summary-judgment motions after that dispute was resolved.
The detailed version
- Penske Media Corporation v. Shutterstock, Inc. · No. 1:20-cv-04583
- Vyskocil
- Apr. 8, 2022
Background
The court received multiple letters describing discovery disputes between Penske Media Corporation and Shutterstock, Inc. The court had set and repeatedly extended the deadline for completing fact discovery. Its scheduling orders instructed the parties to raise any discovery dispute requiring court intervention early enough for a ruling and for any authorized discovery to be completed before the deadline.
The court also warned the parties to act as civil and responsible professionals and stated that further abuse of the discovery process, including violations of discovery orders and deadlines, could expose the parties to sanctions. Before the final discovery deadline, the parties jointly asked to adjourn a conference so they could present information covering the full discovery record, but they did not raise the disputes later described in their letters.
Discovery Disputes
Fact discovery closed on February 28, 2022. Almost a month later, the parties filed letters concerning a Penske-designated witness under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 30(b)(6) and Shutterstock’s “Attorneys’ Eyes Only” designations for documents it had produced. Another letter, filed more than a month after discovery closed, described Penske’s request to recall a Shutterstock-designated Rule 30(b)(6) witness.
The parties also timely raised a discovery dispute concerning certain issues with Penske’s document production.
Ruling
The court denied the untimely requests for further discovery. It concluded that the parties were on notice that discovery disputes had to be raised early enough for the court to rule and for any authorized discovery to occur before discovery closed. The court stated that the parties’ failure to follow those instructions made the disputes untimely.
By separate order, the court referred the timely dispute about Penske’s document production to the assigned magistrate judge. After that dispute is resolved, the court will set a briefing schedule for the parties’ contemplated cross-motions for summary judgment. The court adjourned the April 20, 2022 conference indefinitely and requested that the clerk terminate the letter at ECF No. 123.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.