Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-cand-3_05-cv-01113/USCOURTS-cand-3_05-cv-01113-8/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 890
Nature of Suit: Other Statutory Actions
Cause of Action: 05:552 Right to Privacy Act

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United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

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United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

DONNA STAFFORD, 

Plaintiff,

 v.

SOCIAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION, 

et al.,

Defendants. /

No. C-05-1113 EDL

ORDER GRANTING PLAINTIFF’S

MOTION TO COMPEL, AND DENYING

THIRD PARTY DEPONENTS’ MOTION

TO QUASH

 

Plaintiff Donna Stafford alleges that in the early 1990s, an employee of the Social Security

Administration improperly disclosed information regarding her medical condition to Child

Protective Services Agency (Marin County division). CPS then allegedly used this confidential

information in state court juvenile dependency proceedings pertaining to Plaintiff’s daughter, and

disclosed the information to a number of parties, including the daughter. Plaintiff first learned of the

disclosures in 2003, and sued the Social Security Administration for violation of the Privacy Act. 

See 5 U.S.C. § 552 (2006). Plaintiff alleges that the disclosure damaged her relationship with her

daughter and also caused her other emotional and financial damage. In the course of discovery,

Plaintiff served three deposition subpoenas on Marin County employees: Elizabeth Berg, who was

Plaintiff’s public defender for a part of the juvenile court proceedings; Kim Contreras, a CPS social

worker who removed the daughter from Plaintiff’s home; and Dulce McAllister, who was a Social

Service Unit Supervisor for Marin County CPS. The three witnesses objected to being deposed on

the ground that California law prevented them from testifying about juvenile court records without

Case 3:05-cv-01113-EDL Document 66 Filed 04/03/06 Page 1 of 5
United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

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permission from the juvenile court. See Cal. Welf. & Inst. Code § 827 (2006) (“Section 827”). 

After the Court granted Plaintiff and the third parties’ request to hear the dispute on shortened time,

Plaintiff filed a motion to compel the testimony and the third parties filed a motion to quash the

subpoenas. 

Plaintiff’s sole claim arises under federal law. Therefore, federal privilege law applies. See

Fed. R. Evid. 501; see also United States v. Schoenheinz, 548 F.2d 1389, 1390 (9th Cir. 1977)

(declining to apply Oregon’s employer-stenographer privilege and affirming order enforcing IRS

summons); Hollins v. Powell, 773 F.2d 191, 196 (8th Cir. 1985) (federal privileges apply in § 1983

case); Northwestern Mem’l Hosp. v. Ashcroft, 362 F.3d 923, 925-26 (7th Cir. 2004) (Illinois

privilege for disclosure of medical records does not apply in federal question suit regarding

constitutionality of partial birth abortion ban act); Pearson v. Miller, 211 F.3d 57, 66 (3d Cir. 2000)

(“federal courts are to apply federal law of privilege to all elements of claims except those ‘as to

which State law supplies the rule of decision.’ In general, federal privileges apply to federal law

claims, and state privileges apply to claims arising under state law”) (quoting Fed. R. Evid. 501). 

Thus, the third parties’ reliance on Section 827 is misplaced.

Nor does the California Court of Appeals opinion (In re Gina S., 133 Cal. App. 4th 1074

(2005)) somehow bar this Court from compelling the testimony sought. The question before the

state court was different: whether Plaintiff could show certain documents to her attorneys in order to

determine whether to pursue her Privacy Act claim. The court ruled in favor of Plaintiff on this

issue, and remanded the case to the trial court. In doing so, it recognized that the general policy of

restricting access to juvenile records to protect the minor’s privacy must be balanced against a

plaintiff’s interest in vindicating her rights under federal law: 

We agree that the juvenile court’s order was too restrictive insofar as it prohibited

appellant from disseminating to her attorney any information from the juvenile records

about the alleged violation of privacy. . . . Here, absent the ability to disseminate any

information about the incident to her counsel or to allege it in a complaint, it would be

virtually impossible to determine if there had been any wrongdoing, and if so to prove it. 

Id. at 1086-87 (citing In re Anthony H., 129 Cal. App. 4th 495, 498 (2005)). Moreover, Plaintiff’s

request at issue here – to show documents to deponents and elicit testimony from deponents on the

alleged disclosure and the damages that resulted from it – was not before the state court.

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 The result might have been different if Plaintiff had asked this Court to issue an order allowing

her to keep the documents that the Court of Appeals ordered her to return to the Superior Court, or if

she had argued that Section 827 was unconstitutional. She did neither. 

3

The third parties’ other arguments also do not forestall the depositions. The Rooker-Feldman

doctrine the third parties rely on in asking the Court not to hear this “appeal” from the California

state court “judgment” was severely limited by Exxon Mobil Corp. v. Saudi Basic Indus. Corp., 125

S. Ct. 1517, 1521-22 (2005) (“The Rooker-Feldman doctrine, we hold today, is confined to cases of

the kind from which the doctrine acquired its name: cases brought by state-court losers complaining

of injuries caused by state-court judgments rendered before the district court proceedings

commenced and inviting district court review and rejection of those judgments”). Because Plaintiff

did not lose in state court (on the contrary, the Court of Appeals remanded her case on that very

issue), because there is no “judgment” and because Plaintiff filed her district court case before the

Court of Appeals issued its opinion in Gina S., Rooker-Feldman does not apply. 

Nor is the Court required to abstain in this instance. See Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37, 44

(1971). “‘Absent extraordinary circumstances, Younger abstention is required if the state

proceedings are (1) ongoing, (2) implicate important state interests, and (3) provide the plaintiff an

adequate opportunity to litigate federal claims.’” H.C. v. Koppel, 203 F.3d 610, 613 (9th Cir. 2000)

(quoting The San Remo Hotel v. City & County of San Francisco, 145 F.3d 1095, 1103 (9th Cir.

1998)). While the privacy interest of California minors is of paramount concern to the state, the

Younger abstention doctrine is inapplicable. First, as explained above, while there is a state

proceeding that has some relation to this one, the relief Plaintiff seeks in federal court is different

than the relief that she sought in state court, and does not include issuing any orders to the state

court. Second, the state proceedings do not provide an adequate opportunity to litigate her federal

Privacy Act claim. The Court accordingly need not abstain from this discovery dispute.1

Although neither Section 827 nor principles of comity prevent the Court from ordering these

deponents to testify, the Court shares the third parties’ concerns for the privacy of Plaintiff’s

daughter, and applies the qualified right of privacy recognized in federal law. See Soto v. City of

Concord, 162 F.R.D. 603, 616 (N.D. Cal. 1995) (“Federal Courts ordinarily recognize a

constitutionally-based right of privacy that can be raised in response to discovery requests. . . . 

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Resolution of a privacy objection or request for a protective order requires a balancing of the need

for the information sought against the privacy right asserted”) (citations omitted). Plaintiff intends

to disclose documents that contain information regarding the circumstances by which CPS

employees learned about Plaintiff’s medical condition from one of Defendant’s employees, and

intends to elicit testimony about these circumstances and about Plaintiff’s damages. The central

relevance of these documents to Plaintiff’s claim – and accordingly to the United States’ defense – is

undisputed. In addition, testimony regarding whether and how CPS employees used this information

during the juvenile court proceedings is not available from any other source. Moreover, the three

deponents already are aware of the underlying facts and of the juvenile records at issue. For

example, Berg was Plaintiff’s Public Defender during the dependency hearings in juvenile court, and

Plaintiff wishes to depose her concerning, inter alia, a two page declaration that Berg herself wrote. 

Contreras, the social worker who removed Plaintiff’s daughter from her home, is mentioned in a

Jurisdiction Report as the individual at CPS who learned from Defendant about Plaintiff’s medical

condition. McAllister signed the Jurisdiction Report as the Social Services Unit Supervisor. 

Plaintiff intends to refer to the Jurisdiction Report during the depositions of Contreras and

McAlluster. Plaintiff also intends to show deponents a CPS log document that mentions the alleged

disclosure in greater detail. The deponents therefore not only know about the underlying

information, but they have either seen or composed the actual documents. Showing them the

documents will not create new disclosures, so the daughter’s privacy interest vis-a-vis these three

witnesses is implicated minimally if at all. Finally, the protective order in place in this case will

provide another level of protection and prevent information concerning Plaintiff’s daughter from

being disclosed outside a small number of people, many of whom already are aware of the

underlying facts in the documents.

Accordingly, the parties may use the records discussed above in the course of questioning the

deponents, and may question the deponents regarding the alleged disclosure of Plaintiff’s

confidential information by Defendant, the impact of the alleged disclosure on CPS’s decision to

remove the daughter from Plaintiff’s custody, the timing of CPS’s decision to remove the daughter

from Plaintiff’s custody, and the context for Plaintiff’s claims and her damages. That the parties

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may explore these topics and use these documents in discovery does not mean that the documents or

deposition testimony will necessarily be admissible at trial. The Court reminds the parties that they

should use all efforts to safeguard the privacy of Plaintiff’s daughter, including but not limited to

redacting documents to erase her name and any information not related to the claims at issue in

Plaintiff’s Privacy Act case. The Court also reminds the parties to follow the protective order at

issue in this case scrupulously. 

For the reasons set forth above, the Court GRANTS Plaintiff’s motion to compel and

DENIES the third parties’ motion to quash.

IT IS SO ORDERED

Dated: March 31, 2006 

ELIZABETH D. LAPORTE

United States Magistrate Judge

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