Paul Rudolph Foundation, Inc. v. Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation
- Colleen McMahon
- 1:20-cv-08180
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Paul Rudolph Foundation v. Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation, Judge Cave narrowly applied privilege waiver, ordered limited production, and extended discovery.
The plaintiff and defendants in the case, particularly the defendants’ withheld attorney-client communications and the plaintiff’s ability to conduct a limited follow-up deposition.
What happened
In Paul Rudolph Foundation, Inc. v. Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation, the court addressed a discovery dispute about communications withheld as protected by attorney-client confidentiality.
The court found that an email disclosed only a narrow portion of that protection for communications about the email itself. It ordered the defendants to review and produce communications between Mr. Dickinson and Barbara Hoffman about the email, allowed the plaintiff to reopen Mr. Dickinson’s deposition for up to one hour about any newly produced documents, and extended fact discovery to April 21, 2023.
Judge Sarah L. Cave also declined to require an immediate private review of the withheld documents because the defendants said they were not asserting an advice-of-counsel defense. The court ordered the parties to file a discovery-completion letter by April 28, 2023, and stated that further extensions would not be granted absent extraordinary circumstances.
The detailed version
- Paul Rudolph Foundation, Inc. v. Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation · No. 1:20-cv-08180
- Colleen McMahon
- Mar. 29, 2023
Background
The order followed a telephone discovery conference. The dispute concerned documents the defendants had withheld under the attorney-client privilege, which generally protects confidential communications between a client and lawyer made for obtaining or providing legal advice. The court considered statements in Mr. Dickinson’s September 18, 2019 email to Mari Nakahara at the Library of Congress.
Privilege ruling
The court found that Mr. Dickinson’s statements in the email created a very narrow waiver of attorney-client privilege. The waiver covered communications between Mr. Dickinson and Barbara Hoffman, Esq., relating to that email. It did not extend to all advice Hoffman may have given Dickinson about claimed copyright restrictions on Paul Rudolph’s works at the Library of Congress.
The defendants were ordered to review the communications they had withheld as privileged and produce communications between Dickinson and Hoffman concerning the email. After that supplemental production, the plaintiff could reopen Dickinson’s deposition for no more than one hour of on-the-record questioning, limited to any additional documents the defendants produced.
Other discovery rulings
The defendants stated that they were not asserting an advice-of-counsel defense. For that reason, the court determined that a private review by the court of the documents withheld as privileged was not necessary at that time.
The court granted the parties a final extension of the fact-discovery deadline to April 21, 2023. It ordered the parties to file a joint letter by April 28, 2023, certifying that discovery was complete or identifying any remaining issues. The court stated that it would not grant further extensions absent extraordinary circumstances. The parties were also ordered to obtain and file a transcript of the conference.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.