Kitchen Winners NY Inc. v. Rock Fintek LLC
- Paul Engelmayer
- 1:22-cv-05276
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 3
Kitchen Winners v. Rock Fintek: Judge Engelmayer denied a request to preclude damages evidence, without prejudice to a later application.
Rock Fintek was warned that it needed to provide specific damages calculations and supporting materials. JNS Capital Holdings LLC, Joel Stern, Kitchen Winners NY Inc., Adorama, Inc., and Joseph Mendlowitz were not granted immediate exclusion of the damages evidence, but remained able to seek that relief later.
What happened
In Kitchen Winners NY Inc. v. Rock Fintek LLC, JNS Capital Holdings LLC and Joel Stern asked the court to prevent Rock Fintek from introducing damages calculations, and other parties joined that request.
The court said Rock Fintek appeared not to have provided the specific damages calculations required by the federal discovery rules. But because discovery was still ongoing, the court found it premature to decide whether excluding the damages evidence was appropriate.
Judge Engelmayer denied the request under Rule 37.2, without prejudice to a later application. He warned Rock Fintek that continuing not to provide the required calculations could later lead to exclusion of its damages theories or damages evidence.
The detailed version
- Kitchen Winners NY Inc. v. Rock Fintek LLC · No. 1:22-cv-05276
- Paul Engelmayer
- Sept. 1, 2023
Background
JNS Capital Holdings LLC and Joel Stern, third-party defendants, requested a pre-motion conference under Local Rule 37.2 concerning a possible motion to preclude, or bar, Rock Fintek LLC from introducing damages calculations. Kitchen Winners NY Inc., Adorama, Inc., and Joseph Mendlowitz later joined that request. Rock Fintek was the third-party plaintiff and counterclaimant.
Rule 26 Disclosures
The court explained that Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(a)(1) requires a party to provide a computation of each category of damages claimed, along with the documents or other evidence supporting each computation. The court said Rule 26 requires disclosure of the formula used to calculate alleged damages so the other parties can test and verify the damages theory.
The court stated that all indications, including Rock Fintek’s own letter, showed that Rock Fintek had not complied with this requirement. It also warned that merely offering a representative for a deposition under Rule 30(b)(6) would not satisfy the separate Rule 26 disclosure obligation, and that the required disclosures had to be made well before a damages deposition.
Ruling
The court declined to definitively decide whether to preclude damages evidence because discovery was still ongoing and the specific damages theories Rock Fintek would pursue were not yet clear. It explained that a later decision under Rule 37 would consider the reason for the failure to comply, the importance of the evidence, prejudice to the opposing parties, and whether a continuance was possible.
Judge Engelmayer therefore denied the motion for relief under Rule 37.2, without prejudice to a later application. He warned that if Rock Fintek continued violating Rule 26, the court could later preclude it from pursuing some or all of its damages theories.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.