Highmore Financing Co. I, LLC v. The Greig Companies, Inc.
- Analisa Torres
- 1:21-cv-11021
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 4
In Highmore Financing v. The Greig Companies, Judge Willis granted Euler Hermes’s motion to quash subpoenas because no knowledgeable employee lived or worked within 100 miles of New York City.
Non-party Euler Hermes North America, which was relieved from complying with the subpoenas requiring it to appear and produce documents in New York City; the Storbyte Defendants’ subpoenas were quashed.
What happened
Highmore Financing Co. I, LLC sued The Greig Companies, Inc. and others over an alleged scheme involving supplier credit used to fund technology-equipment purchases. The plaintiff’s amended complaint referred to Euler Hermes North America’s evaluation of financial information and approval of insurance coverage. The defendants later served subpoenas on Euler Hermes, which was not a party to the case.
Euler Hermes asked the court to cancel the subpoenas, arguing that they required compliance outside the geographic limits of the federal subpoena rules and were unduly burdensome. The subpoenas required Euler Hermes to appear and produce documents in New York City. Euler Hermes submitted a sworn statement that all employees who might know about the requested discovery lived and worked in or around Owings Mills, Maryland, more than 100 miles from New York City.
The court granted the motion to quash, meaning it canceled the subpoenas, because the federal rules limit subpoenas to locations within 100 miles of the relevant person’s residence, workplace, or regular in-person business location. Judge Jennifer E. Willis did not decide Euler Hermes’s other arguments about burden or the defendants’ jurisdictional defenses because the geographic issue was enough to resolve the motion.
The detailed version
- Highmore Financing Co. I, LLC v. The Greig Companies, Inc. · No. 1:21-cv-11021
- Analisa Torres
- June 5, 2023
Background
Highmore Financing Co. I, LLC sued The Greig Companies, Inc. and other defendants, alleging, among other things, a scheme to defraud Highmore out of supplier credit extended to fund the purchase of technological equipment. In its amended complaint, Highmore stated that it had more confidence in the transactions partly because non-party Euler Hermes North America had evaluated the same financial information and approved coverage.
The Storbyte Defendants—Storbyte, Inc., Joseph Drissel, and Steven Groenke—served subpoenas on Euler Hermes seeking testimony and documents. An earlier set of subpoenas was sent by email to an attorney identified as Euler Hermes’s contact, but that attorney declined to accept service. The subpoenas at issue were properly served on April 25, 2023, and required Euler Hermes to appear and produce documents in New York City.
Euler Hermes’s Motion
Euler Hermes moved to quash, or cancel, the subpoenas. It argued that the subpoenas exceeded the geographic limits in Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 45, were unduly burdensome, and should not be enforced while the Storbyte Defendants maintained a pending challenge to the court’s personal jurisdiction.
Court’s Analysis
Rule 45 requires a court to quash or modify a subpoena that requires compliance beyond the rule’s geographic limits. A subpoena seeking a person’s attendance or document production generally may command compliance only within 100 miles of where that person lives, works, or regularly conducts business in person. The court explained that this limit applies to the actual individuals who would be required to travel, rather than to a business as a whole.
The Storbyte Defendants argued that Euler Hermes had an office where it regularly conducted business in New York City. Euler Hermes submitted a sworn affidavit stating that all employees who might have knowledge of the requested matters lived and worked in or around Owings Mills, Maryland. The court found that Owings Mills was more than 100 miles from New York City and that no individual with relevant information lived or worked within the applicable 100-mile limit. The court therefore concluded that Euler Hermes had shown that the subpoenas had to be modified or quashed.
The court did not address Euler Hermes’s arguments that the subpoenas were unduly burdensome or that the Storbyte Defendants had to waive their personal-jurisdiction defenses or withdraw the subpoenas. It stated that the geographic defect was clear and determinative.
Disposition
The motion to quash the subpoenas was GRANTED. The clerk was requested to close the motion at docket entry 188.
Read the full 4-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.