Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca10-90-03336/USCOURTS-ca10-90-03336-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 890
Nature of Suit: Other Statutory Actions
Cause of Action: 

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PUBLISH 

FI LED 

Uflited States Court of Appeals 

Tenth Circuit 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS AUG 8 1991 

ROBERT L. HOECKER 

Clerk 

TENTH CIRCUIT 

MILTON PETERSEN, III, 

Plaintiff-Appellee, 

v. 

) 

) 

) 

) 

) 

) 

DOUGLAS COUNTY BANK & TRUST COMPANY, ) 

a banking corporation; TIMOTHY M. ) 

BRENNAN; DALE B. HEIMANN; AMIL CHILESE; ) 

DOUGLAS COUNTY BANK & TRUST COMPANY, ) 

acting in a fiduciary capacity as ) 

Trustee of the MILTON PETERSEN, III ) 

REVOCABLE TRUST, ) 

Defendants, 

and 

KANSAS BANKERS SURETY COMPANY, a 

nonparty witness, 

Appellant. 

) 

) 

) 

) 

) 

) 

) 

) 

) 

No. 90-3336 

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF KANSAS 

(D.C. No. 90-4004A-S) 

Keith Miller, Michael McGill, and Kevin M. Keegan, of McGill, 

Gotsdiner, Workman & Lepp, P.C., Omaha, Nebraska, for PlaintiffAppellee. 

Alan V. Johnson and Martha A. Peterson, of Sloan, Listrom, 

Eisenbarth, Sloan & Glassman, Topeka, Kansas, for Appellant Kansas 

Bankers Surety Company. 

Appellate Case: 90-3336 Document: 01019648831 Date Filed: 08/08/1991 Page: 1 
Before ANDERSON, BARRETT, and BRORBY, Circuit Judges. 

ANDERSON, Circuit Judge. 

This is an appeal by a nonparty witness, Kansas Bankers 

Surety Company (KBSC), seeking review of two separate but related 

orders involving discovery. The first is an order of the United 

States magistrate for the District of Kansas, transferring to the 

district court for the District of Nebraska the motion of KBSC for 

a protective order or, in the alternative, for an order quashing a 

deposition subpoena duces tecum served by the plaintiff, Milton 

Petersen, III, and issued out of the Kansas District Court. The 

second is an order of the district court for the District of 

Nebraska compelling KBSC to produce certain documents subpoenaed 

by the plaintiff. Because we have determined that we have no 

jurisdiction over this matter, 1 

we dismiss the appeal. 2 

The lawsuit underlying this matter was filed in the district 

court for the District of Nebraska. Because the plaintiff wished 

to depose KBSC, a nonparty Kansas resident, he properly applied to 

the Kansas district court for the issuance of a subpoena pursuant 

to Rule 45 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. KBSC, arguing 

that the subpoenaed documents were privileged, moved the Kansas 

1 This court has a duty to inquire into its own jurisdiction. 

McGeorge v. Continental Airlines, Inc., 871 F.2d 952, 953 

(10th Cir. 1989). 

2 This opinion directly responds to Appellee Petersen's motion 

to dismiss the appeal. Tenth Circuit Rule 34.1.8 provides that 

there will be no oral argument on petitions or motions except as 

ordered by the court. The panel determined unanimously not to 

order oral argument on this motion. See 10th Cir. R. 34.1.8. 

2 

Appellate Case: 90-3336 Document: 01019648831 Date Filed: 08/08/1991 Page: 2 
district court to quash the subpoena under Rule 45(d) or, in the 

alternative, for a protective order under Rule 26(c). 

On April 11, 1990, the Kansas magistrate, without notice to 

KBSC or a hearing, determined that the Nebraska court more 

properly understood the issues of the case and could therefore 

rule more intelligently on a motion to quash or for a protective 

order. The magistrate, therefore, sua sponte, ordered that the 

motion be transferred to the Nebraska district court. The Kansas 

court file was physically transferred to Nebraska the following 

day. The record does not indicate when the matter was docketed in 

the Nebraska court, but it was presumably done well before KBSC 

filed its notice of appeal to this court in November, 1990. 

KBSC did not object to the transfer, nor did it then attempt 

to appeal the magistrate's transfer order to the Kansas district 

court, allegedly because it did not receive notice of the transfer 

until after the file had been physically transferred to Nebraska. 

KBSC's Memorandum Brief in Opposition to Summary Dismissal at 18. 

Upon receipt of the transferred matter, a Nebraska magistrate 

eventually designated ninety-one documents for production. After 

this order was affirmed by the Nebraska district court, KBSC 

appealed both this production order and the earlier transfer order 

to the Tenth Circuit. 

This matter is controlled by Chrysler Credit Corp. v. Country 

Chrysler, Inc., 928 F.2d 1509 (10th Cir. 1991), which involved a 

transfer pursuant to 28 u.s.c. § 1404(a) but whose reasoning 

applies to this case as well. In Chrysler Credit we held that 

"[o]nce the files in a case are transferred physically to the 

3 

Appellate Case: 90-3336 Document: 01019648831 Date Filed: 08/08/1991 Page: 3 
court in the transferee district, the transferor court loses all 

jurisdiction over the case, including the power to review the 

transfer." Id. at 1516-17 (footnote omitted). This loss of 

jurisdiction becomes effective when the papers in the transferred 

case are docketed in the transferee court. Id. at 1517. This 

date also marks the termination of appellate jurisdiction in the 

transferor circuit. Unless the district court has 

transferred the case without proper authority, or the transferee 

court lacks jurisdiction over the case, the transfer order is 

unreviewable by the transferor circuit. Id. at 1517 n.6. 

KBSC argues that, because its motion to the Kansas magistrate 

was a motion to quash pursuant to Rule 45(d), it was improper for 

the Kansas magistrate to transfer the case. If successful, this 

argument would bring this case within the unauthorized transfer 

exception noted above. 

Rule 45(d)(l) provides in pertinent part: 

The person to whom the subpoena is directed may 

• . . serve upon the attorney designated in the 

subpoena written objection to inspection or copying of 

any or all of the designated materials. If objection is 

made, the party serving the subpoena shall not be 

entitled to inspect and copy the materials except 

pursuant to an order of the court from which the 

subpoena was issued. (emphasis added). 

Nothing in Rule 45 or the commentary thereto and no case cited to 

us, however, compels us to conclude that only the Kansas 

magistrate had the authority to rule on a motion to quash, 

effectively prohibiting him from transferring the motion to 

Nebraska. Accordingly, the transfer was not improper simply 

because the transferred matter involved a motion to quash under 

Rule 45. 

4 

Appellate Case: 90-3336 Document: 01019648831 Date Filed: 08/08/1991 Page: 4 
The motion filed by KBSC was also styled as a motion for a 

protective order pursuant to Rule 26(c). The commentary to the 

1970 Amendment to that Rule notes that "[t]he court in the 

district where the deposition is being taken may, and frequently 

will, remit the deponent or party to the court where the action is 

pending." Fed R. Civ. P. 26, Notes of Advisory Committee on 

Rules, 1970 Amendment, Subdivision c (emphasis added). Because 

the commentary refers to both "deponent" and "party," it is clear 

that even nonparty deponents can be required to litigate motions 

for protective orders in the court supervising the underlying 

action. The absence of any language in Rule 45(d) prohibiting 

transfer of a motion to quash, coupled with this permissive 

language regarding transfer of motions for protective orders which 

refers to Rule 45 deponents as well as to parties, see id., is 

enough to validate the action of the Kansas magistrate. Thus the 

unauthorized transfer exception noted in Chrysler Credit does not 

apply since the Kansas magistrate was authorized under Rule 26(c) 

to transfer this matter to Nebraska. See also Socialist Workers 

Party v. Attorney General, 73 F.R.D. 699, 700-01 (D. Md. 1977); 

Bank of Texas v. Computer Statistics, Inc., 60 F.R.D. 43, 45 (S.D. 

Tex. 1973). The second part of the Chrysler Credit exception is 

similarly unavailing for KBSC because the Nebraska court clearly 

has jurisdiction over the case. 

Under the holding of Chrysler Credit, therefore, this court 

has no jurisdiction over either the transfer order entered by the 

Kansas magistrate or the subsequent orders of the Nebraska 

5 

Appellate Case: 90-3336 Document: 01019648831 Date Filed: 08/08/1991 Page: 5 
district court. 3 There is one additional issue, however, that 

deserves mention. In Chrysler Credit this court noted: 

Technically, the district court should have allowed 

the parties time to seek certification or file a 

mandamus petition before physically transferring the 

record and divesting this court of jurisdiction over the 

appeal. See Wm. A. Smith Contracting Co. v. Travelers 

Indem. Co., 467 F.2d 662, 664 (10th Cir. 1974). 

However, because the record does not indicate that such 

a petition would have been filed this oversight proved 

harmless. 

Chrysler Credit, 928 F.2d at 1520 n.9. This statement causes some 

potential difficulty here because in this case, unlike Chrysler 

Credit, there is nothing in the record to indicate that KBSC would 

not have acted to preserve its right to appeal the magistrate's 

transfer order. As mentioned above, the order of the magistrate 

transferring the case was entered sua sponte without notice to 

KBSC and without hearing. The case file was physically 

transferred the next day and docketed in Nebraska before KBSC had 

any notice of the transfer whatsoever. 

Based on these facts, KBSC argues that it is entitled to a 

writ of mandamus from this court. To be entitled to a writ of 

mandamus, KBSC must show, inter alia, that "it has no other 

adequate means to obtain the relief desired. . . [and that it] 

will be damaged or prejudiced in a way not correctable on appeal." 

Dalton v. United States (In re Dalton), 733 F.2d 710, 717 (10th 

Cir. 1984). In this case, KBSC has an alternative means of 

obtaining relief: it can move in the Nebraska district court for 

3 Contrary to KBSC's analogy, this case is not one governed by 

the rules applicable to multidistrict litigation. See 

28 U.S.C. § 1407; Rules of the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict 

Litigation. 

6 

Appellate Case: 90-3336 Document: 01019648831 Date Filed: 08/08/1991 Page: 6 
retransfer. The Eighth Circuit can then review the transfer 

order. See Linnell v. Sloan, 636 F.2d 65, 67 (4th Cir. 1980) 

(transferee appellate court has jurisdiction to review transfer 

order once party moves for retransfer in transferee district 

court); cf. Purex Corp. v. St. Louis Nat'l Stockyards Co., 374 

F.2d 998, 1000 (7th Cir.) (transferee circuit lacks power to 

adjudicate allegedly erroneous transfer absent motion to 

retransfer made in transferee district court), cert. denied, 389 

U.S. 824 (1967). KBSC, therefore, has practical means of relief 

other than mandamus and will suffer no damage not correctable on 

appeal, albeit not by this appellate court, if we deny mandamus 

relief. Thus, the haste with which the Kansas magistrate disposed 

of this matter can be characterized as harmless because, given 

KBSC's alternate remedies, this court would have denied KBSC's 

petition for mandamus. 

Appellee's motion to dismiss is therefore GRANTED. 

7 

Appellate Case: 90-3336 Document: 01019648831 Date Filed: 08/08/1991 Page: 7