Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-cand-4_17-cv-06545/USCOURTS-cand-4_17-cv-06545-3/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 840
Nature of Suit: Trademark
Cause of Action: 15:44 Trademark Infringement

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ORDER – No. 17-cv-06545-PJH (LB)

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United States District Court

Northern District of California

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

San Francisco Division

GO DADDY OPERATING COMPANY, 

LLC,

Plaintiff,

v.

USMAN GHAZNAVI, et al.,

Defendants.

Case No. 17-cv-06545-PJH (LB)

ORDER ADJUDICATING DISCOVERY 

DISPUTES

Re: ECF No. 76

INTRODUCTION

Judge Hamilton referred all discovery matters to the undersigned.1 Currently pending is a joint 

letter brief from the parties regarding plaintiff Go Daddy Operating Company, LLC

(“GoDaddy”)’s jurisdictional discovery of defendant Salman Ghaznavi.

This litigation centers around allegations that the defendants are registering and operating 

internet domains that are identical to or confusingly similar of GoDaddy’s website and 

trademarks, in order to siphon off traffic from GoDaddy’s sites and to send out spam 

advertisements to consumers.

2 Mr. Ghaznavi moved to quash service of the summons and dismiss 

 

1 Order of Reference – ECF No. 77. Citations refer to material in the Electronic Case File (“ECF”); 

pinpoint citations are to the ECF-generated page numbers at the top of documents.

2 The defendants are allegedly registering and operating sites such as “g0daddydesigns.com,” 

“godaddydesigns.com,” “go-daddydesigns.com,” and so forth.

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ORDER – No. 17-cv-06545-PJH (LB) 2

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the complaint for lack of personal jurisdiction.

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Judge Hamilton held that “a more satisfactory 

showing of the facts is necessary to determine whether the court has personal jurisdiction over 

Salman Ghaznavi — including Salman Ghaznavi’s place of residence, the extent of his ownership 

of and control over the various entities in plaintiff’s complaint, and whether he personally 

conducted or directed any of the actions alleged in the complaint.” Go Daddy Operating Co., LLC 

v. Ghaznavi, No. 17-cv-06545-PJH, 2018 WL 1091257, at *5 (N.D. Cal. Feb. 28, 2018).4Judge 

Hamilton deferred judgment on Mr. Ghaznavi’s motion to dismiss and allowed GoDaddy to take 

jurisdictional discovery. Id. at *5–6.

The parties raise four discovery disputes in their joint letter brief. The undersigned can 

adjudicate the disputes without a hearing, N.D. Cal. Civil L.R. 7-1(b), and rules as follows.

ANALYSIS

1. Temporal Scope of Jurisdictional Discovery

GoDaddy’s compromise position is to limit its discovery requests to the time period from 

January 1, 2012 to the present.5 Mr. Ghaznavi’s compromise position is to limit his responses to 

GoDaddy’s discovery requests to the time period from January 1, 2015 to the present.6

Most courts look back between three and seven years from the date that the litigation was filed 

to assess whether there is general jurisdiction over a defendant. See Kormylo v. Forever Resorts, 

LLC, No. 13-cv-511 JM (WVG), 2015 WL 106379, at *10 (S.D. Cal. Jan. 6, 2015) (citing 4 

Wright & Miller, Federal Practice & Procedure § 1067.5 & n.1175 (3d ed. 2002 & Supp. 2014); 

Metro. Life Ins. Co. v. Robertson-Ceco Corp., 84 F.3d 560, 569–70 (2d Cir. 1996)); Calix

Networks, Inc. v. Wi-Lan, Inc., No. C-09-06038-CRB (DMR), 2010 WL 3515759, at *4 (N.D. Cal. 

Sept. 8, 2010) (citing Metro. Life, 84 F.3d at 569). Considering GoDaddy’s allegations and Judge 

 

3 Ghaznavi Mot. to Quash – ECF No. 32. The other defendants also moved to dismiss the complaint. 

Anis and Silicon Valley Graphic Mot. to Dismiss – ECF No. 30.

4 ECF No. 60.

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Joint Letter Br. – ECF No. 76 at 4 n.1.

6

Id. at 5 n.2.

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ORDER – No. 17-cv-06545-PJH (LB) 3

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Hamilton’s order, the undersigned finds that discovery from January 1, 2012 to the present — a 

period that begins a little less than six years before this litigation was filed — is appropriate here. 

Among other things, Judge Hamilton permitted discovery to determine the extent of Mr. 

Ghaznavi’s ownership of and control over the various entities that GoDaddy identifies in its 

complaint (“Entities”); these have operated since before 2015 and (so GoDaddy alleges) have been 

part of Mr. Ghaznavi’s alleged scheme since before 2015.7The fact that Mr. Ghaznavi is 

purportedly has been a citizen and resident of Pakistan and has only traveled to the United States 

twice since 20158does not address whether discovery should be extended through 2012 (as Mr. 

Ghaznavi says nothing about his residency or other forum contacts during that time).

2. Mr. Ghaznavi’s Business Dealings

Judge Hamilton permitted discovery to determine the extent of Mr. Ghaznavi’s ownership of 

and control over the Entities. GoDaddy may properly take discovery of Mr. Ghaznavi’s business 

dealings, including what Mr. Ghaznavi’s successors-in-interest, predecessors-in-interest, agents, 

representatives, or others acting on his behalf might have done to exercise ownership or control for 

Mr. Ghaznavi over the Entities. GoDaddy’s requests, which are (by definition) limited to 

documents and information in Mr. Ghaznavi’s possession, custody, and control, and which call for 

documents and information about what Mr. Ghaznavi or others acting on his behalf did vis-à-vis 

the Entities, are not overbroad. Mr. Ghaznavi’s objection to these requests are overruled.

3. Mr. Ghaznavi’s Numerosity Objection

“Unless otherwise stipulated or ordered by the court, a party may serve on any other party no 

more than 25 written interrogatories, including all discrete subparts.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 33(a)(1).

“Although the rule does not define the term ‘discrete subparts,’ a number of courts have construed 

the term to mean that ‘interrogatory subparts are to be counted as one interrogatory if they are 

 

7

See, e.g., Compl. – ECF No. 1 at 3 (¶ 7).

8

Joint Letter Br. – ECF No. 76 at 4–5.

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ORDER – No. 17-cv-06545-PJH (LB) 4

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logically or factually subsumed within and necessarily related to the primary question.’” In re 

Lithium Ion Batteries Antitrust Litig., No. 13-md-02420-YGR (DMR), 2015 WL 1221924, at *2 

(N.D. Cal. Mar. 17, 2015) (internal ellipsis omitted) (citing cases).

Mr. Ghaznavi objects to interrogatories number 3, 4, 5, 8, and 10 as being comprised of 

discrete subparts. Mr. Ghaznavi’s objections to interrogatories 4, 5, 8, and 10 are unavailing. 

Interrogatories 4 and 5 ask about activities by Mr. Ghaznavi or businesses in which Mr. Ghaznavi 

has an investment, ownership, or supervisory interest. These are logically and factually subsumed

and related, and Mr. Ghaznavi’s attempt to split them into separate interrogatories about himself, 

on the one hand, and the businesses in which he has an investments, ownership, or supervisory 

interest, on the other, is not well taken. Likewise, interrogatories 8 and 10 ask about websites Mr. 

Ghaznavi owns, operates, populates, etc., and his attempt to split them (e.g., website hits versus 

website visits versus website downloads) into separate interrogatories is not well taken.

Interrogatory 3 presents a closer case: it asks about Mr. Ghaznavi’s relationship with 11 different 

Entities. The main thrust of the interrogatory, however, is about Mr. Ghaznavi, not the 11 different 

Entities. GoDaddy’s citation to Lithium Ion and to Erfindergemeinschaft Uropep GbR v. Eli Lilly 

& Co., 315 F.R.D. 191 (E.D. Tex. 2016) is therefore more persuasive than Mr. Ghaznavi’s citation 

to Collaboration Properties v. Polycom, Inc., 224 F.R.D. 473 (N.D. Cal. 2004). Collaboration was 

a patent-infringement case and the interrogatories there asked about 26 different allegedly 

infringing products: the focus of the interrogatory was on the products, and the court there held 

that the interrogatory therefore had 26 discrete subparts. Collaboration, 224 F.R.D. at 475. Here, 

by contrast, the focus of the interrogatory (and of the jurisdictional discovery as a whole) is not on 

the Entities. It is on Mr. Ghaznavi and his connections with this forum; the Entities are only the 

(alleged) channels through which Mr. Ghaznavi made contacts with the forum. GoDaddy could 

have phrased the interrogatory to ask Mr. Ghaznavi to detail his relationships with entities in the 

forum generally; the fact that GoDaddy listed named Entities with specificity does not convert its 

interrogatory into 11 different interrogatories. Cf. Erfindergemeinschaft, 315 F.R.D. at 198 

(interrogatory that could have asked about chemical compounds generally does not become 11 

separate interrogatories merely because the party propounding interrogatory listed out the 

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compounds, as “adding specificity in interrogatories is desirable and should not ‘be counted as a 

separate interrogatory’”) (quoting Ginn v. Gemini Inc., 137 F.R.D. 320, 321–22 (D. Nev. 1991)).

Mr. Ghaznavi’s numerosity objection is overruled.

4. Requests Relating to the Telephone Records

Judge Hamilton indicated that phone records might be an area of dispute appropriate for 

jurisdictional discovery. GoDaddy, 2018 WL 1091257, at *5 (noting that the parties disagree 

about whether Mr. Ghaznavi “sent or directed the sending of text messages, phone calls, and 

advertisements to California citizens”). Mr. Ghaznavi objects on the grounds of overbreadth and 

burden as a conclusion, but he does not support that conclusion with an explanation of what the 

burden would be in responding to this request. Mr. Ghaznavi also states that it is difficult to see 

how GoDaddy would be able to establish personal jurisdiction through these phone records, but 

that is not a basis for objecting to their discovery. Mr. Ghaznavi is ordered to respond to these 

requests.

CONCLUSION

Going forward, if any other discovery disputes arise, the parties must comply with the dispute 

procedures in the undersigned’s standing order (attached). The procedures in it require, among 

other things, that if a meet and confer by other means does not resolve the parties’ dispute, lead 

counsel for the parties must meet and confer in person (if counsel are local) and then submit a joint 

letter brief with information about any unresolved disputes. The letter brief must be filed under the 

Civil Events category of “Motions and Related Filings > Motions – General > Discovery Letter 

Brief.” After reviewing the joint letter brief, the court will evaluate whether future proceedings are 

necessary, including any further briefing or argument.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

Dated: June 13, 2018 ______________________________________

LAUREL BEELER

United States Magistrate Judge

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