Chea v. Lite Star ESOP Committee

District Court, E.D. California·Decided February 20, 2025·No. 1:23-cv-00647·Unknown

Opinion

8 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 9 EASTERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 10

11 LINNA CHEA, Case No. 1:23-cv-00647-JLT-SAB

12 Plaintiff, ORDER RE: STIPULATED PROTECTIVE ORDER 13 v. (ECF No. 70) 14 LITE STAR ESOP COMMITTEE, et al., 15 Defendants.

16 17 / / / 18 / / / 19 / / / 20 / / / 21 / / / 22 / / / 23 / / / 24 / / / 25 / / / 26 / / / 27 / / / / / / 1 Pursuant to Local Rule 141.1 and Rule 26(c) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, 2 Plaintiff Linna Chea and Defendants Lite Star ESOP Committee, B-K Lighting Inc., Nathan 3 Sloan, Kathleen A. Hagen, Kathleen A. Hagen, as legal successor to Douglas W. Hagen, Estate 4 of Douglas W. Hagen, Miguel Paredes, and Prudent Fiduciary Services, LLC, through counsel 5 undersigned, jointly submit this Stipulated Protective Order to govern the handling of 6 information and materials produced in the course of discovery or filed with the Court in advance 7 of trial in this action. 8 GOOD CAUSE STATEMENT PURSUANT TO L.R. 141.1(c) and F.R.C.P. 26(c) 9 Disclosure and discovery activity in this action are likely to involve production of 10 confidential, proprietary, or private information for which special protection from public 11 disclosure and from use for any purpose other than prosecuting this litigation may be warranted. 12 Accordingly, the parties hereby stipulate to and petition the Court to enter the following 13 Stipulated Protective Order. The parties acknowledge that this Order does not confer blanket 14 protections on all disclosures or responses to discovery, and that the protection it affords from 15 public disclosure and use extends only to the limited information or items that are entitled to 16 confidential treatment under applicable legal principles. It is the intent of the parties and the 17 Court that information will not be designated as confidential for tactical reasons in this case, and 18 that nothing will be so designated without a good faith belief that there is good cause as to why 19 information should not be part of the public record. 20 Statement Under L.R. 141.1(c)(1): Examples of confidential information that the 21 parties may seek to protect from unrestricted or unprotected disclosure include: 22 a) Information that is the subject of a non-disclosure or confidentiality agreement or 23 obligation; 24 b) Agreements with third-parties; 25 c) Research and development information; 26 d) Information related to budgets, sales, profits, costs, margins, product pricing, or 27 other internal financial/accounting information, including non-public information related to 1 e) Information showing the price or other information related to the terms of sale or 2 purchase of products and materials relevant to this case; 3 f) Information related to internal operations, including personnel information; 4 g) Information related to past, current, and future market analyses and business and 5 marketing development, including plans, strategies, forecasts and competition; 6 h) personal identifying information such as social security numbers; 7 i) personal financial information such as income tax returns (including attached 8 schedules and forms), W-2 forms and 1099 forms; 9 j) Communications protected by the attorney-client privilege but subject to the “fiduciary 10 exception”; and 11 k) Trade secrets (as defined by the jurisdiction in which the information is located). 12 Statement Under L.R. 141.1(c)(2): Generally speaking, information and documents 13 shall only be designated under this protective order because the Designating Party believes the 14 information or documents are proprietary, confidential, privileged, and/or trade secret 15 information that the Designating Party would not release publicly. Unrestricted or unprotected 16 disclosure of such confidential, technical, commercial, or personal information may result in 17 prejudice or harm to the Producing Party by revealing the Producing Party’s competitive 18 confidential information. Accordingly, the parties respectfully submit that there is good cause for 19 the entry of this Protective Order. 20 Statement Under L.R. 141.1(c)(3): The parties submit that protecting the confidential 21 nature of information in this way will be most efficient for the parties and the Court. That is 22 because the liability issues in this case will involve the mutual exchange of documents and other 23 information that a party may consider to be its proprietary, confidential, and trade secret 24 information. Remedies issues in this case are likely to involve the mutual exchange of business- 25 and personal-sensitive financial and related information. The parties have met and conferred on 26 this issue and agree that any private agreement between the parties to safeguard this information 27 will only need to be replicated through orders of this Court at the time of filing dispositive or 1 PROTECTIVE ORDER 2 1. DEFINITIONS. 3 (a) The term “Challenging Party” shall mean a Party or Non-Party that challenges the 4 designation of information or items under this Order. 5 (b) The term “Confidential” shall mean information (regardless of how it is 6 generated, stored, or maintained) or tangible things that the Designating Party in good faith 7 reasonably believes will disclose confidential, proprietary and/or nonpublic financial, 8 commercial personal, business, or privileged information eligible for protection under the 9 Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. “Confidential” information shall not include information that 10 either: (a) is in the public domain at the time of disclosure; (b) lawfully becomes part of the 11 public domain through no fault of the recipient, or (c) was lawfully in the procession of the 12 Receiving Party at the time of disclosure. 13 (c) The term “Counsel” shall mean the attorneys of record for any party in this action, 14 their associates, and their staff. If any party seeks to add counsel of record or substitute counsel 15 of record, then no “Confidential” Documents and information shall be disclosed to such 16 additional or substitute counsel until they have agreed to this stipulation by executing the 17 attached Exhibit A. 18 (d) The term “Designating Party” shall mean a Party or Non-Party that designates 19 information or items that it produces in disclosures or in responses to discovery as 20 “Confidential.” 21 (e) The term “Documents” shall have the same meaning as the terms “documents and 22 electronically stored information” as used in Rule 34 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. 23 (f) The term “Expert” shall mean a person with specialized knowledge or experience 24 in a matter pertinent to this litigation who has been retained by a Party to serve as an expert 25 witness or as a consultant in this litigation and who, at the time of retention, is not anticipated to 26 become an officer, director, or employee of a Party. Nothing in this Protective Order purports to 27 alter in any way the requirements for offering testimony under Fed. R. Evid. 703, or to define the 1 (g) The term “Non-Party” shall mean any natural person, partnership, corporation, 2 association, or other legal entity not named as a Party to this action.

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