Darwin v. Newburgh Operations, LLC

Background

Robin Darwin moved for an order requiring Newburgh Operations, LLC, doing business as Sapphire Nursing at Meadow Hill, and Tzvi Barax to produce electronically stored information (ESI) that matched agreed search terms but was not responsive to Darwin's document requests. Darwin also requested a privilege log, which identifies documents withheld because of attorney-client privilege or another asserted protection.

Rulings

The court granted the motion in part and denied it in part. It denied Darwin's request to compel production of ESI that was nonresponsive to the document requests merely because it matched the search terms. Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 34, the defendants were required to produce only documents sought by a proper document request. The court explained that the search terms identified the universe of documents from which responsive materials would be found; they did not require production of every document containing those terms.

The court granted the request for a privilege log. It held that Local Civil Rule 26.2(b) required a party asserting privilege to provide a privilege log within 30 days of a document request, unless the parties agreed to a different date or the court set one. The court stated that its July 13, 2022 order did not eliminate that requirement. The parties were directed to follow Local Civil Rule 26.2, and the required information had to be provided by September 29, 2022. They were also encouraged to follow Local Civil Rule 26.2(c).

Disposition

Judge Lewis J. Liman ordered that the motion was granted in part and denied in part: the request for nonresponsive search-hit ESI was denied, and the request for a privilege log was granted.