MS Amlin Marine NV v. Delta Marine Industries Inc

Opinion

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4 5 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT AT SEATTLE 7 MS AMLIN MARINE N.V. t/z Lead Yacht CASE NO. 2:23-cv-14 8 acting on behalf of MS Amlin Insurance SE; SYNDICATE 0457; SYNDICATE 1969;

9 SYNDICATE 2791; SYNDICATE 5000; ORDER DENYING ENTRY OF AND CONVEX INSURANCE U.K. LTD., LONDON Subscribing to Policy B1098M203407, 11 Plaintiffs, 12 v. 13 DELTA MARINE INDUSTRIES, INC., a Washington corporation; MARINE 14 TRAVELIFT, INC., a Wisconsin corporation; KENDRICK EQUIPMENT (USA) LLC, a 15 Washington corporation, and KENDRICK EQUIPMENT, LTD., a Canadian corporation, ARXCIS, INC., a Washington corporation, 16 Defendants. 17

18 This matter comes before the Court on the Parties’ Joint Motion for Entry of Protective 19 Order and Proposed Order. Dkt. No. 33. The Court has considered the motion and proposed order 20 and hereby DENIES the motion without prejudice for the reasons stated below. 21 This Court may issue a protective order upon a showing of good cause. Fed. R. Civ. P. 22 26(c). Although the parties may agree upon confidentiality among themselves, if they request 23 Court involvement, the proposed order must be narrowly drawn, identifying both the type of 24 information that is to be protected and, if not obvious, the reason such protection is warranted. See 1 Jepson, Inc. v. Makita Elec. Works, Ltd., 30 F.3d 854, 858 (7th Cir. 1994) (“[E]ven if the parties 2 agree that a protective order should be entered, they still have the burden of showing that good 3 cause exists for issuance of the order.”).

4 Here, the parties have asked the Court to grant them broad discretion to designate 5 documents as “confidential,” but their definition of “confidential materials” includes blanket 6 protections for documents containing “personal, private, [and] sensitive” records and “protected 7 business information.” These broad categories lack specificity and are in contravention of the 8 Federal and Local Civil Rules. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(c); see also Model Stipulated Protective 9 Order at ¶ 2 (“[D]o not list broad categories of documents such as ‘sensitive business material.’”). 10 Any protective order entered by the Court must be narrowly drawn and clearly identify the 11 document or type of documents subject to the order. 12 Next, the proposed order also strikes Exhibit A to the model order, which is a certification

13 for certain persons viewing confidential information to “acknowledge[ ] and agree[ ] to be bound” 14 by the protective order. The parties offer no explanation for deviating from the model order in this 15 way. 16 Finally, “[t]here is a strong presumption of public access to the court’s files,” but the 17 proposed order would grant the parties unilateral authority to determine which information 18 becomes public by redacting any information, as opposed to “sensitive information,” not necessary 19 for the Court to review as contemplated by the Local Rules. See 5(g)(1)(A)-(B). The Court declines 20 to ratify the language in the proposed order and suggests that the parties revert to the language in 21 the model order. 22 The parties may resubmit a proposed protective order if they remedy the deficiencies

23 identified in this Order. 24 Dated this 6th day of June, 2023. 1 A 2 Jamal N. Whitehead United States District Judge 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24