Lucente v. Sterling Infosystems, Inc.
- Gregory Woods
- 1:22-cv-04591
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 9
In Lucente v. Sterling Infosystems, Judge Lehrburger entered a stipulated protective order governing confidential discovery materials and their use.
Marie Lucente, Sterling Infosystems, Inc., and the parties, attorneys, witnesses, experts, vendors, and other people covered by the protective order.
What happened
Lucente v. Sterling Infosystems, Inc. concerns the parties’ jointly requested protective order for nonpublic and competitively sensitive information that could be exchanged during discovery.
The order limits who may receive information marked confidential and permits its use only for this lawsuit and related appeals. It also sets procedures for marking materials, challenging confidentiality designations, filing confidential materials with the court, responding to subpoenas, and returning or destroying the materials after the litigation ends.
Judge Robert W. Lehrburger found good cause and ordered the parties and other covered people to follow the agreement, with violations potentially punishable as contempt. The order does not itself decide whether any discovery material is actually confidential or admissible at trial.
The detailed version
- Lucente v. Sterling Infosystems, Inc. · No. 1:22-cv-04591
- Gregory Woods
- Dec. 7, 2022
Background
The parties, through counsel, jointly requested a protective order under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(c). They sought protection for nonpublic and competitively sensitive information that might be disclosed during discovery. The court found good cause for an appropriately tailored confidentiality order governing the pretrial phase of the action.
Terms of the Order
The order allows a producing party to mark material confidential when it reasonably and in good faith believes the material includes previously undisclosed financial information, ownership or control information concerning a nonpublic company, business or marketing plans, trade secrets, confidential research or development, sensitive commercial information, personal or intimate information, or information protected from disclosure by law. The order also permits the court to give other categories confidential status later.
People covered by the order generally may disclose confidential discovery material only to specified recipients, including the parties, certain counsel and litigation support personnel, outside vendors working on the case, mediators or arbitrators, certain document recipients, potential witnesses, experts, stenographers, and the court. Witnesses, experts, mediators, and arbitrators must first sign a nondisclosure agreement in the form attached to the order. Covered recipients may use the material only to prosecute or defend this action and related appeals, not for another purpose or proceeding.
The order establishes procedures for designating documents and deposition testimony as confidential, correcting an earlier failure to designate material, and objecting to a confidentiality designation. A party seeking to file confidential material with the court must publicly file a redacted version and seek permission to file the unredacted version under seal, supported by a particularized justification. The order warns that the court may not keep material confidential once it is introduced into evidence at trial.
Within 60 days after final disposition of the action, including appeals, recipients generally must return or destroy confidential material and certify that they have not kept copies or other reproductions. Counsel specifically retained for the action may keep archival copies of specified case materials, but those copies remain subject to the order. The order continues after the litigation ends, and the court retains jurisdiction to enforce it and impose contempt sanctions.
Ruling
The court entered the stipulated confidentiality and protective order. It did not make a finding that any particular discovery material was confidential, did not waive objections or privileges, and did not decide whether any document, testimony, or other evidence would be admissible at trial. Judge Robert W. Lehrburger signed the order on December 7, 2022.
Read the full 9-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.