15 results for 'judge:"Docherty"'.
J. Docherty denies the pillow magnate and his company's motion to reconsider an order on their earlier motion to compel, partially grants their separate motion to compel, and grants their motion to amend the scheduling order in the voting machine company's suit against them alleging that they made defamatory claims in disputing the results of the 2020 presidential election. The original ruling on the earlier motion to compel was not in error, and the motion for reconsideration is not properly before the court. The motion to compel is timely as to four of its requests for production, but not for two others, and of the four timely-challenged requests, the voting machine company must supplement its disclosures for one.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Docherty, Filed On: April 15, 2024, Case #: 0:22cv98, NOS: Assault, Libel, & Slander - Torts - Personal Injury, Categories: Elections, Defamation, Discovery
J. Docherty grants the insurers' motions to compel discovery and a deposition and denies the driver's motion to compel a deposition in the driver's suit arguing that he was improperly denied a policy for a classic car because he does not own a daily-use car. The driver failed to comply with meet-and-confer requirements and has not fully responded to discovery requests, and the insurers' requests seek relevant information, and are proportional to the needs of the case.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Docherty, Filed On: April 12, 2024, Case #: 0:23cv525, NOS: Other Civil Rights - Civil Rights, Categories: Civil Rights, Insurance, Discovery
J. Docherty partially grants the law firm's motion to compel discovery in its suit against the litigation finance company alleging consumer protection violations, fraud and abuse of process. The finance company must comply with the firm's discovery request, but is not sanctioned for prior failures to do so. J. Docherty, as a magistrate judge, also cannot grant the firm's request to enjoin the allegedly abusive arbitration.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Docherty, Filed On: February 26, 2024, Case #: 0:23cv1271, NOS: Other Contract - Contract, Categories: Discovery, Contract
J. Docherty denies the meat purchasers' joint motions for substitution of plaintiff in their case against the meat producers alleging a price-fixing scheme. Assigning the purchasers' claims to a company created by the entity financing the purchasers' litigation, apparently in an effort to bypass the purchasers while allowing the financier to pursue their claims as it sees fit, is "different from any other case to which the Court's attention has been directed by the parties," and the doctrine of antitrust standing weighs against the substitution.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Docherty, Filed On: February 9, 2024, Case #: 0:18cv1776, NOS: Antitrust - Other Suits, Categories: Antitrust, Jurisdiction
J. Docherty denies the prisoner's motions for a preliminary injunction and to compel discovery in his case arguing that Minnesota prisons' policy regarding sexually suggestive photos violates prisoners' First Amendment rights. The prisoner is unlikely to succeed on the merits of his claims, and he has not established that he will suffer irreparable harm absent an injunction nor that harm to him outweighs the harm the prison system could suffer with an injunction. Overturning the policy would also be contrary to the public interest. Finally, the interrogatory he seeks answers to in his motion to compel, asking for information on the religious beliefs of people charged with inspecting content for nudity, is irrelevant.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Docherty, Filed On: January 9, 2024, Case #: 0:22cv3107, NOS: Civil Rights - Habeas Corpus, Categories: Civil Rights, Injunction, Prisoners' Rights
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J. Docherty grants the employer's motion to amend the scheduling order in a case brought by six employees alleging racial and disability discrimination and harassment, and partially grants its motion to compel production of previously requested material, allow continued depositions, permit third-party discovery and for an award of costs associated with late disclosures. The motion to compel is denied without prejudice as relating to communications with one employee prior to her retaining of representation, since acknowledging the existence of such communications would fall under Fifth Amendment privilege. Production of other requested materials is ordered. A motion for sanctions is granted since, if the employer is correct in stating that the employees intentionally concealed evidence, the employees have inexcusably sought to subvert the legal system.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Docherty, Filed On: December 18, 2023, Case #: 0:22cv1904, NOS: Employment - Civil Rights, Categories: Sanctions, Discovery, Employment Discrimination
J. Docherty adopts a protective order largely as agreed upon by the parties in the automaker's trademark suit against the aftermarket parts seller. Disputes between the parties as to whether an in-house attorney at the automaker's parent company and retained experts and consultants should be able to see discovery material designated "attorneys' eyes only" are resolved largely in favor of the parts seller, with the caveats that the automaker's outside counsel may negotiate with the parts seller's counsel for de-designation should they need to share such information with the in-house counsel, and that the court will be "alert to over-use" of that designation and may order de-designation should it be misused.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Docherty, Filed On: November 15, 2023, Case #: 0:22cv1681, NOS: Trademark - Property Rights, Categories: Trademark, Discovery
J. Docherty grants the voting machine company's motion to compel discovery and partially grants the pillow maker's motion to compel. The voting machine company's motion, which seeks discovery regarding the pillow maker's financial situation to support its theory that he was motivated to defame the company by financial gain and its claim for punitive damages, is based on plausibly pleaded claims and relevant to its claim of actual malice. The pillow maker's motion, meanwhile, is successful as to the company's initial disclosures, and the company shall provide an estimate of its claimed economic and punitive damages. It is also successful as regarding an interrogatory seeking an itemized list of all damages being claimed. It is also ordered to supplement its responses to a number of other interrogatories.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Docherty, Filed On: October 19, 2023, Case #: 0:22cv98, NOS: Assault, Libel, & Slander - Torts - Personal Injury, Categories: Defamation, Discovery
J. Docherty partially grants the father's motion to amend a scheduling order and his complaint and grants the county and its employees' motion to amend the scheduling order, but denies the county and employees' motion for a protective order precluding the father from deposing the assistant county attorney who represented the county in a CHIPS case concerning his now-deceased child. The father may amend his complaint to add a negligence claim, but not a claim alleging civil rights violations since that claim would be rendered futile by precedent regarding state-created danger claims involving children removed from, then returned to, abusive environments. He may also add a claim for punitive damages. The father may depose the assistant county attorney, but may only inquire as to her impressions of a particular meeting and to advice she gave that is at issue here. The county and employees have not shown any extraordinary circumstances warranting their proposed amendments to the scheduling order, whereas the father's is "based on a sea-change in Minnesota law."
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Docherty, Filed On: September 11, 2023, Case #: 0:22cv2035, NOS: Other Personal Injury - Torts - Personal Injury, Categories: Civil Procedure, Civil Rights, Wrongful Death
J. Docherty partially grants the employee's motion to compel national-level discovery about the employer's companywide diversity initiatives, which the employee alleges were the motivating factor behind his termination, and specifically about his own termination. The employee's requests for company-wide information about diversity initiatives and organization charts are not relevant or proportional to the needs of the case, but his request for the search terms the employer used to identify electronically stored information is granted. A request for attorney fees and costs is not granted.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Docherty, Filed On: August 7, 2023, Case #: 0:22cv50, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: Discovery, Employment Discrimination
J. Docherty partially grants the voting machine company's motion to compel and denies the pillow magnate and his company's motion to compel in a defamation suit brought by the voting machine company alleging that the magnate made a number of false public statements about the company's conduct in the 2020 election. The pillowmakers shall disclose electronic copies of all the programs in which the allegedly defamatory statements are alleged to have been distributed, along with information as to when and how the programs were released and republished. They need not create a log of communications between the pillowmakers and Donald Trump or a number of affiliated organizations, but any preexisting logs must be disclosed. The identities of any pillow-company employees involved in "creating and developing," but not using, promotional codes the magnate offered to the public alongside his statements, must be disclosed, along with revenue amounts from the promotional codes and deals identified by the voting machine company. They shall also explain the magnate's role as his company's CEO and chairman of its board, and shall supplement disclosures to clarify whether they are withholding documents based on an objection. Finally, they are not obligated to produce documents from a parallel lawsuit by a different voting-machine maker that relate only to that competitor, and the voting-machine company need not produce its election technology for the pillowmakers' inspection.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Docherty, Filed On: August 1, 2023, Case #: 0:22cv98, NOS: Assault, Libel, & Slander - Torts - Personal Injury, Categories: Elections, Defamation, Discovery
J. Docherty grants the disability benefit claimant's motion to compel the disability insurer to produce privilege log documents, but denies his motion to conduct additional discovery. The claimant has not demonstrated that additional discovery is necessary for adequate review of his claims, but the privilege log documents fall under the fiduciary exception to attorney-client privilege since they are communications between a fiduciary and an attorney, and there was not sufficient threat of imminent litigation at the time they were sent to invoke a liability exception to that exception.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Docherty, Filed On: July 28, 2023, Case #: 0:23cv563, NOS: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) - Labor, Categories: Erisa, Discovery, Privilege
J. Docherty partially grants the former meat conglomerate employees' motions to quash subpoenas issued to them as part of ongoing multidistrict litigation premised on allegations of price-fixing. The plaintiffs in that litigation have sufficiently shown that the employees likely have relevant information on their phones, though discovery for two of the employees' phones is limited to periods starting at the dates they entered the positions they were in at the time of filing. A request for documents concerning communications regarding beef markets is narrowed to exclude text messages about meetings and communications without a clear purpose.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Docherty, Filed On: July 17, 2023, Case #: 0:23mc42, NOS: Other Statutory Actions - Other Suits, Categories: Antitrust, Discovery
J. Docherty partially grants the copyright claimant's motion for leave to amend its complaint alleging that the licensee continued using licensed materials after the termination of its license. The motion is not untimely, and four of its proposed amended claims for copyright infringement, unauthorized distribution and contributory copyright infringement are not futile. Five other claims are futile, and the motion is denied as to those claims.
Court: USDC Minnesota, Judge: Docherty, Filed On: June 9, 2023, Case #: 0:22cv343, NOS: Copyrights - Property Rights, Categories: Copyright, Contract