The Jade Farm LLC v. Mirahangiry
- Barbara Moses
- 1:22-cv-03128
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 3
In The Jade Farm LLC v. Mirahangiry, Judge Moses ordered responses to a discovery letter without deciding the requested inspections, sanctions, or added discovery time.
The Jade Farm LLC and the defendants in the pending discovery dispute, including Dara Mirahangiry and the other defendants identified in the case.
What happened
The Jade Farm LLC sued Dara Mirahangiry and others over alleged misconduct involving a competing restaurant, including alleged trade-secret misappropriation and unfair competition. The opinion identifies the plaintiff as the owner and operator of the JUE LAN restaurant and says two defendants were former employees.
The plaintiff asked for a conference and proposed a discovery motion. It sought inspection of defendants’ electronic devices, additional depositions, sanctions, costs, striking defendants’ pleadings, and more time for fact discovery, based on allegedly late-produced emails and text messages and other claimed discovery failures.
Judge Barbara Moses did not decide those requested remedies in this document. Instead, the court set deadlines for the defendants’ response and the plaintiff’s reply to the letter.
The detailed version
- The Jade Farm LLC v. Mirahangiry · No. 1:22-cv-03128
- Barbara Moses
- Feb. 15, 2023
Background
The Jade Farm LLC brought an action seeking injunctive relief and damages concerning the JUE LAN restaurant. The letter says the defendants operated and promoted a competing restaurant and alleges trade-secret theft, deceptive statements suggesting an affiliation between the restaurants, unfair competition under the Lanham Act and common law, false advertising, misappropriation of trade secrets, interference with JUE LAN’s computer and reservation system, breaches of fiduciary duties, and violation of the Faithless Servant Act. The letter also states that two defendants were former employees of the plaintiff.
Discovery dispute
The plaintiff’s counsel requested a pre-motion conference under the court’s local discovery rule and Judge Moses’s individual rules. The plaintiff alleged that defendants had not fully complied with an October 25, 2022 order and an electronic-discovery order requiring searches for electronically stored information. The plaintiff relied on an email disclosed during a December 15, 2022 deposition and two text messages produced on February 15, 2023. According to the letter, the text messages concerned the alleged theft of a JUE LAN OpenTable contact list.
The plaintiff sought an order requiring defendants to produce their electronic devices for physical inspection under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 34. It also requested additional depositions, sanctions and costs under Rule 37, striking defendants’ pleadings, and additional time for fact discovery. The letter cited Rule 37 provisions concerning failures to obey discovery orders and failures to respond to discovery requests.
Court action
The document does not decide whether defendants violated the discovery orders or whether the plaintiff is entitled to any of the requested remedies. Judge Moses endorsed the letter and directed a response to the plaintiff by February 21, 2023, followed by a plaintiff reply later in February. The exact reply deadline is not clear in the provided text.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.