La Chemise Lacoste v. Alligator Co.

60 F.R.D. 164, 178 U.S.P.Q. (BNA) 393, 1973 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13357
District Court, D. Delaware·Decided June 4, 1973·No. Civ. A. No. 3876·Published·Cited by 40 cases

Opinion

OPINION

LATCHUM, District Judge.

In this trademark litigation1 brought by La Chemise Lacoste ("LCL”) against The Alligator Company, Inc. (“Alligator”), the Court is required to decide eight separate motions which were filed shortly before the trial on the merits was scheduled to commence. These motions will be considered seriatim.

1. Alligator’s Motion For A Protective Order With Respect to LCL’s Notice To Take The Deposition Of Louis Kunin, Esquire and LCL’s Request To Alligator To Produce Documents.

LCL noticed Alligator on March 29. 1973 that it would take the deposition upon oral examination on April 5, 1973 of Louis Kunin, Esquire, a member of a New York law firm which had been Alligator’s counsel from 1965 to 1970. The notice also listed three broad categories of documents which Mr. Kunin would be required to produce at his deposition under a subpoena duces tecum to be issued pursuant to Rule 45(d)(1), F.R.Civ.P.2 LCL also served upon Alligator a request to produce the same three categories of documents sought from Mr. Kunin.3 Alligator then moved for a protective or[167]*167der vacating the Kunin deposition4 and objected to LCL’s request to it for the production of documents.5

The documents sought from Mr. Kunin 6 are:

“1. All documents, files, memoranda, correspondence, law memoranda, opinions, or communications of any kind or description of the Alligator Company, Inc., (Alligator) or B.V.D. Company, Inc. (B.V.D.) within his law firm’s custody or control which in any way refer to or relate to or comment upon La Chemise Lacoste (Lacoste), David Crystal, Inc., (Crystal), its predecessors, successors, or affiliated companies, including, but not limited to, Izod, Ltd. (Izod) and General Mills, Inc. (Mills), or the use as a trademark of a pictorial representation of any lizard-like reptile. This list is intended to include all communications between Mr. Kunin and/or his law firm and B.V.D. and Alligator and all internal and external law memoranda and legal opinions rendered by Mr. Kunin or his law firm concerning the trademark rights of Alligator and/or B.V.D. vis-a-vis Lacoste, Crystal, Mills or Izod.
2. All files in Mr. Kunin’s, or his law firm’s, custody or control relating to meetings held in New York in December, 1967 between representatives of Alligator, B.V.D. and Lacoste.
3. All of Alligator’s trademark files throughout the world relating to the words ‘alligator,’ ‘crocodile’ or any other lizard-like reptile or any pictorial representation of an ‘alligator,’ ‘crocodile’ or any other lizard-like reptile.”

Alligator’s objection to the deposition and the production of documents set forth in Categories 1 and 2 is based on the contention that the information sought is protected from disclosure by the attorney-client privilege.7 Alligator objects to producing its files relating to its trademarks “throughout the world, outside the United States” set forth in Category 3 as entirely irrelevant to the issues of the pending litigation and as unlikely to lead to admissible evidence.8 Alligator also objects to the deposition and production requests because they are in violation of the Court’s order of October 19, 1972 requiring all discovery to be completed by April 2,1973.9

Both parties in briefing and arguing the present motion have agreed that the primary purpose of Mr. Kunin’s deposition and the production of documents is to obtain information which Alligator contends is covered by the attorney-client privilege but which LCL regards as information to which the privilege has been waived. LCL agrees that it seeks the documents primarily to enable it to cross-examine Horst von Maltitz (“von Maltitz”). Mr. von Maltitz is a New York lawyer who ceased the active practice of law in 1967. Formerly, he was a member of the law firm of von Maltitz, Derenberg, Kunin & Janssen, which firm had acted as trademark counsel to Alligator’s predecessor from 1967 to December 3, 1970.10 On March 28, 1973 Alligator took Mr. von Maltitz’s deposition in this case to inquire into a conversation that he had had in December 1967 with Robert Abdesselam, LCL’s French attorney. Mr. Abdesselam’s deposition had been taken earlier on January 11, 1973 and at that deposition Mr. [168]*168Abdesselam had testified that he had met with Mr. von Maltitz in December 1967 who told him that LCL “had common law rights in the crocodile emblem.” 11 Mr. von Maltitz at his deposition admitted that he had met with Mr. Abdesselam12 but categorically denied that he ever told Mr. Abdesselam in words or substance that LCL had any rights in the crocodile emblem on apparel in the United States except for rights granted to David Crystal, Inc.13 by Alligator’s license agreement.14 Mr. von Maltitz when asked: “What is the basis of your recollection that you did not tell Mr. Abdesselam that La Chemise Lacoste had any rights to the crocodile emblem on apparel in the United States?”, answered:

“A. Well, I have lately reviewed our file in the matter: I find no indication in the file whatsoever that I made such a statement.
“But above all, the statement, the contention that La Chemise Lacoste owned common law rights in this mark for apparel would have been totally inconsistent with the entire position which we took throughout our dealings with Lacoste and it would have been totally inconsistent also with the license agreement itself.
“Q. The license agreement you are referring to is a license agreement between the Alligator Company and David Crystal, Inc.; is that correct?
A. That’s correct, yes.” 15

Upon cross-examination by LCL’s counsel as to what records Mr. von Maltitz consulted in preparation for the deposition, he testified:

“A. Well, most of the files relating to the Alligator Company which my firm originally had were transferred, I think, several years ago after my time to a Mr. Seidel in Philadelphia.
“A few files remain and among these few files was a file or is a file concerning these meetings with Mr. Abdesselam and correspondence preparatory to the meeting.”16

He then statéd that the documents that he reviewed in preparation of his deposition were in the custody of his former law partner, Mr. Kunin.

Based on this testimony and relying upon Bailey v. Meister Brau, Inc., 57 F.R.D. 11 (N.D.Ill.1972), LCL argues that it has the absolute right to inspect all documents, whether privileged or not, that Mr. von Maltitz consulted prior to his deposition. But this was not the holding of Bailey. Bailey stands for the proposition that counsel is entitled to inspect even a privileged document which is used by a witness to refresh his recollection when testifying at his deposition; it does not hold that privileged documents may be inspected which were reviewed prior thereto in preparation of testifying. Thus, Bailey

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La Chemise Lacoste v. Alligator Co., 60 F.R.D. 164, 178 U.S.P.Q. (BNA) 393, 1973 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13357 (D. Del. 1973).

60 F.R.D. 164 (La Chemise Lacoste v. Alligator Co.) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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