Bailey Industries, Inc. v. CLJP, Inc.

270 F.R.D. 662, 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 108219, 2010 WL 3860742
CourtDistrict Court, N.D. Florida
DecidedSeptember 30, 2010
DocketNo. 3:10mc64/MCR/EMT
StatusPublished
Cited by15 cases

This text of 270 F.R.D. 662 (Bailey Industries, Inc. v. CLJP, Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, N.D. Florida primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Bailey Industries, Inc. v. CLJP, Inc., 270 F.R.D. 662, 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 108219, 2010 WL 3860742 (N.D. Fla. 2010).

Opinion

ORDER

ELIZABETH M. TIMOTHY, United States Magistrate Judge.

On August 18, 2010, Plaintiff Bailey Industries, Inc. (“Bailey”) initiated an action in this district by filing a motion to compel documents responsive to a subpoena it issued to Defendant CLJP, Inc. (“CLJP”) (Doc. 1). The subpoena was issued in connection with a lawsuit between Bailey and Legacy Cabinets, Inc. (“Legacy”), which lawsuit is pending in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Alabama (Case No. 2:09cvl574/VEH). Also before this court are other filings submitted by Bailey, CLJP, and Legacy, all of which relate to the motion to compel (see Docs. 8, 10-12, 14-15, 17-19, 22, 24). As set forth below, the court grants Bailey’s motion.

BACKGROUND1

Legacy, as plaintiff in the underlying lawsuit, filed a complaint against Bailey alleging various claims — including breach of contract, action on open account, and unjust enrichment — based upon Bailey’s alleged termination of certain distribution agreements relating to Legacy’s products (including an agreement regarding Bailey’s distribution of Legacy’s cabinet products in New Orleans, Louisiana), as well as Bailey’s alleged refusal to make payments for Legacy’s products (see, e.g., N.D. Ala. Case No. 2:09cvl574/VEH (doc. 1 at 7-16)). In relevant part, the New Orleans distributor agreement requires that Bailey refrain from distributing, marketing, or selling cabinets made by anyone other than Legacy in the “Sales Area,” unless a cabinet product or style is not offered by Legacy and such sales do not exceed more than 10% of Bailey’s overall cabinet sales in the “Sales Area” (which area is defined in the agreement as “New Orleans, Louisiana”) (see id. at 9-10).2 Bailey then filed counterclaims against Legacy,3 including breach of contract and warranty, fraudulent misrepresentation and/or omission, promissory fraud and/or fraudulent inducement, tortuous interference, and conspiracy claims (id., (doc. 19)). In support of its counterclaims, Bailey alleges in relevant part that it agreed to “take over” operation [665]*665of the Legacy distribution center in New Orleans and in doing so relied on Legacy’s representations as to the center’s prior sales volumes under Legacy management and control, but Legacy’s sales-volume representations were false (id). Bailey further alleges that Legacy’s products were of inferior quality or damaged and that Legacy failed to cure the product defects upon request, in violation of its contractual agreements (id). Moreover, Bailey alleges, Legacy began filling orders directly to Bailey’s customers, solicited customers in the New Orleans area, and licensed or empowered new distributors, such as CLJP,4 to distribute Legacy products in the New Orleans sales areas, thereby competing directly against Bailey in that market in violation of its contractual agreements (see id.).

On or about June 24, 2010, Bailey issued to CLJP a subpoena from this court which commanded production of three categories of documents (see Doc. 1, Ex. A at 3). Two of the three categories are in dispute here and are as follows:

—Any and all correspondence, including, but not limited to, written correspondence and e-mail correspondence with Legacy Cabinets, Inc. from March 1, 2008 to the present that address or relates, in any way, to Bailey Industries, Inc. or Legacy’s contraets/dealings with Bailey Industries, Inc. [hereafter referred to as the “email request”]; and,
—Any and all documents including, but not limited to, invoices, purchase orders, billing statements, pertaining to purchases of cabinets from Legacy Cabinets, Debut Cabinetry and/or Alliant Cabinets Direct between March 1, 2008 and August 13, 2009 in the state of Louisiana [hereafter referred to as the “invoice request”].

(Doc. 1, Ex. A).

In initially responding to Bailey’s email request, CLJP produced two emails; and in initially responding to Bailey’s invoice request, CLJP produced approximately 115 pages of invoices. Bailey contends, in essence, that CJLP’s response to the email request is incomplete (in part because additional emails — responsive to the email request and known by Bailey to exist — were not produced), and the response to the invoice request is inadequate because it provides no useful information to Bailey due to CLJP’s extensive redaction of the invoices (see, e.g., Doc. 1). In an effort to resolve the instant disputes, however, Bailey indicated to CLJP that issues related to the email request may be rendered moot if CLJP’s information technology (“IT”) expert provided an amended affidavit, explaining in greater detail the computer search he conducted when he first searched CLJP’s computers for emails responsive to Bailey’s request5 (see, e.g., Doc. 14 at 2). Although CLJP declined to provide an amended affidavit as Bailey suggested, the undersigned directed that CLJP do so, and an amended affidavit has now been filed with the court (see Docs. 16, 19, 22). Similarly, Bailey indicated to CLJP that issues related to the invoice request may be resolved if CLJP provided unredaeted invoices (or invoices with far less redaction than those initially produced), and further, Bailey agreed to narrow the scope of the invoice request to require the production of information relating to sales in the New Orleans area only (instead of the entire state of Louisiana) (see Doc. 14 at 3, 7). CLJP then provided redacted spreadsheets, on which additional sales information was provided (see, e.g., Doc. 12 at 4; Doc. 14 at 6-7), but Bailey maintains that the information remains of little or no use to Bailey due to the extent of the redaction on the spreadsheets.6

CLJP asserts that the invoices and spreadsheets have been redacted to preserve the confidentiality of CLJP’s proprietary infor[666]*666mation, including its pricing structure (which, CLJP contends, is a “trade secret”), and CLJP further asserts that the release of such information to Bailey, “a fierce competitor” of CLJP, would be harmful to CLJP because Bailey could underbid CLJP if it learns of CLJP’s pricing structure (Doc. 8 at 1-2). With regard to the email request, CLJP asserts it has fully complied with Bailey’s request because its IT expert has thoroughly searched the email system and produced all responsive emails he was able to locate (id. at 6). Moreover, CLJP seeks an order requiring Bailey to pay certain costs associated with its production of documents responsive to Bailey’s subpoena (Doe. 11). Bailey opposes the order CLJP seeks regarding costs, noting that Bailey has yet to provide adequate responses to the subpoena (but adding that it will compensate CLJP once CLJP has complied with the subpoena) (see Doc. 14 at 10).

LEGAL STANDARDS

Rule 45(a) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure authorizes the issuance of a subpoena duces tecum seeking the production of documents (or other materials) from a non-party, such as CLJP. See, e.g., Fisher v. Marubeni Cotton Corp., 526 F.2d 1338, 1341 (8th Cir.1975) (subpoena duces tecum is only way to compel a nonparty to produce documents or other materials); Southeastern Mechanical Services, Inc. v. Brody, Case No.

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270 F.R.D. 662, 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 108219, 2010 WL 3860742, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/bailey-industries-inc-v-cljp-inc-flnd-2010.