Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-cand-5_04-cv-01026/USCOURTS-cand-5_04-cv-01026-10/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 720
Nature of Suit: Labor Management Relations Act
Cause of Action: 28:1331 Fed. Question

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United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

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NOT FOR CITATION

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

SAN JOSE DIVISION

ROBERT SCHMIDT and THOMAS WALSH,

Plaintiffs,

 v.

LEVI STRAUSS & CO., LAURA LIANG and

DOES 1-50,

Defendants. /

RELATED COUNTER-ACTION

 /

No. C04-01026 RMW (HRL)

ORDER GRANTING IN PART AND

DENYING IN PART PLAINTIFFS’

MOTION TO COMPEL DOCUMENTS

AND A PRIVILEGE LOG

[Re: Docket No. 166]

Plaintiffs Robert Schmidt and Thomas Walsh move to compel further production of

documents and a privilege log. Defendant Levi Strauss & Co. (“LS&Co.”) opposed the motion. 

Having considered the moving and responding papers, as well as the arguments presented at the

September 4, 2007 motion hearing, this court grants the motion in part and denies the motion in

part.

This is an action brought under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, 18 U.S.C. § 1541A. Plaintiffs

are former employees of defendant LS&Co. who worked under the supervision of defendant

Laura Liang. They claim that they were terminated in retaliation for filing complaints about

defendants’ alleged tax fraud and other accounting irregularities. They also allege that

defendants defamed them. Defendants contend that plaintiffs were fired for insubordination and

*E-FILED: 9.10.2007*

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for work performance issues. LS&Co. has filed counterclaims against plaintiffs, alleging that

they wrongfully took confidential company documents when they were terminated.

In the instant motion, plaintiffs seek an order compelling LS&Co. to (a) reproduce its

entire document production in native electronic format; (b) produce certain documents which

Schmidt returned to the company; and (c) provide a privilege log of all withheld and redacted

documents. The court addresses each of these issues in turn.

A. Electronic Copies of All Documents Defendants Previously Produced

Plaintiffs move to compel LS&Co. to reproduce, in native electronic format, all

documents which defendants produced in the course of this litigation. However, the precise

documents plaintiffs seek, and the reasons why electronic versions are now being sought, have

been somewhat of a moving target in their papers. Initially, plaintiffs indicated that LS&Co.’s

entire document production must be reproduced in electronic form because, plaintiffs suggested,

certain (unidentified) documents had been edited or altered by LS&Co. or by its attorneys. 

There is no indication in the record presently before the court that defendants’ documents have

been altered in any way – except to the extent that defense counsel added document production

numbers, confidentiality labels and, in some instances, indicated that certain information had

been redacted. (See Schwing Decl., ¶ 7).

In their reply papers, plaintiffs now say that they need the electronic versions of

(unidentified) emails and attachments as well as all documents which contain information that

does not fit on a standard 8.5”x11” page. They claim that they have been unable to track which

attachments were sent with any given email. Additionally, they argue that they have been

unable to properly analyze hard-copy spreadsheets (some of which reportedly are hundreds of

pages long) that contain financial information that runs over the margins of a standard page.

Plaintiffs have provided no basis for compelling LS&Co. to now reproduce its entire

document production in native, electronic format. There is no dispute that plaintiffs’ document

requests, which were served well before the December 2006 amendments to Fed.R.Civ.P. 34

took effect, did not specify the form in which documents were to be produced. Moreover, all

fact discovery in this case (with very limited exceptions) closed on September 15, 2006; and,

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plaintiffs reportedly never objected at any time during discovery to defendants’ production of

hard-copy documents. Indeed, plaintiffs acknowledge that they did not seek electronic versions

of LS&Co.’s documents until some six months after discovery closed.

Plaintiffs contend that it is “black-letter law” that LS&Co. is obliged to now re-produce

its entire document production in electronic form. However, the cases they cite merely

acknowledge the principle that electronically stored information falls within the definition of

“document” under Fed.R.Civ.P. 34. See, e.g., Crown Life Ins. Co. v. Craig, 995 F.2d 1376,

1382-83 (7th Cir. 1993) (“[T]he Advisory Committee notes to the 1970 amendment of Federal

Rule of Civil Procedure 34 make clear that computer data is included in Rule 34’s description

of documents.”); Rowe Entertainment, Inc. v. The William Morris Agency, Inc., 205 F.R.D. 421,

428 (S.D.N.Y. 2002) (“Electronic documents are no less subject to disclosure than paper

records.”); Playboy Enterprises, Inc. v. Welles, 60 F. Supp.2d 1050, 1053 (S.D. Cal. 1999)

(“The Court finds that by requesting ‘documents’ under Fed.R.Civ.P. 34, Plaintiff also

effectively requested production of information stored in electronic form.”).

LS&Co. has cited some authority (albeit, one case is unpublished) indicating that, under

the former version of Fed.R.Civ.P. 34, it was not obliged to produce its documents in electronic

and hard copy form. See India Brewing, Inc. v. Miller Brewing Co., 237 F.R.D. 190, 194 (E.D.

Wis. 2006) (“A party may request information in a specific electronic format, but if it instead

simply asks for ‘documents,’ adopting the definition in Rule 34(a), production in electronic

format is not required.”); Northern Crossarm Co., Inc. v. Chemical Specialties, Inc., No. 03-C415-C, 2004 WL 635606 *1 (W.D. Wis., Mar. 3, 2004) (“If a party produces its electronic

information in a hard copy format that mimics the manner in which that information is stored

electronically, then that party has not disobeyed Rule 34.”).

Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 34, as amended, now allows a party to “specify the form

or forms in which electronically stored information is to be produced.” FED.R.CIV.P. 34(b).

However, plaintiffs do not seem to contend that those amendments apply here. At any rate, the

amended Fed.R.Civ.P. 34 provides that where, as here, “a request does not specify the form or

forms for producing electronically stored information,” then “a responding party must produce

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the information in a form or forms in which it is ordinarily maintained or in a form or forms that

are reasonably usable.” FED.R.CIV.P. 34(b)(ii) (emphasis added). Further, unless the parties

agree or the court otherwise orders, “a party need not produce the same electronically stored

information in more than one form.” FED.R.CIV.P. 34(b)(iii).

Thus, this court is unpersuaded that LS&Co. should now be made to reproduce its entire

document production in electronic form. The apparent burden and expense of such an

undertaking (see Declaration of David A. Burdine, LS&Co.’s Director of Global Data Center

Operations) would appear to dwarf any benefit to plaintiffs. See FED.R.CIV.P. 26(b)(2)(C). 

Accordingly, plaintiffs’ motion as to this issue is denied. However, the denial is without

prejudice to plaintiffs to specifically identify for defendant (on a document-by-document basis)

those documents which they assert are unusable or unreadable in hard copy format. The court is

hopeful that defendant will then provide plaintiffs with electronic versions of those identified

documents and that the matter will be resolved. Nevertheless, the court will entertain a further

motion as to any specific documents as to which the parties are unable to agree.

B. Documents Returned by Plaintiff Schmidt

As noted above, LS&Co. has filed a counterclaim against plaintiffs, alleging that they

wrongfully took confidential company documents when they were terminated. With respect to

Walsh, plaintiffs claim that there is no evidence that he had any company documents in his

possession. Schmidt, however, reportedly did have several thousand documents on his hard

drive. After discovery began, LS&Co. requested the return of all of those documents. After

preparing a log of the documents, plaintiffs did so. They then requested that LS&Co. reproduce

copies of those documents in discovery. They now claim that LS&Co. produced only portions

of the documents and withheld hundreds of others.

Because LS&Co. has expressly abandoned all claims against plaintiffs as to the

documents that it has not reproduced in this case (see Schwing Decl., ¶ 9, Ex. C), plaintiffs have

not convincingly demonstrated how they will be prejudiced (if at all) in preparing a defense

against LS&Co.’s counterclaims.

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Plaintiffs nonetheless insist that the withheld documents are relevant to the parties’

claims and defenses. LS&Co. maintains that they are completely irrelevant. However,

plaintiffs have identified categories of withheld documents which they believe are relevant,

including:

• organizational charts showing LS&Co.’s operations by region;

• a memo from Georgiana Scodel to plaintiff Schmidt re “problems over the years

with FinServe”;

• materials concerning advance royalties; and

• documents (directly and indirectly) discussing foreign tax credit issues.

Although Schmidt’s declaration as to the purported relevance of these documents is unsigned,

plaintiffs have made some effort to articulate and explain how the withheld documents fall

within the broad standard of relevance under Fed.R.Civ.P. 26(b)(1). (See Schmidt Reply Decl.,

¶¶ 2-7).

In its opposition papers, LS&Co. unequivocally stated that the documents were not

being withheld as privileged, but rather on the ground that they are irrelevant. It was not until

oral argument that LS&Co. broadly asserted, for the first time, that the documents might also be

privileged because Schmidt was a licensed attorney during his employment at LS&Co. There is

nothing in the record presented to substantiate LS&Co.’s belated assertion that some or all of

the withheld documents are privileged – or that any privilege will be waived if the documents

are reproduced to plaintiffs, who evidently have seen all of the documents at some point in time.

Accordingly, plaintiffs’ motion to compel the withheld documents is GRANTED. 

LS&Co. shall produce those documents to plaintiffs no later than September 21, 2007.

C. Redacted Documents

The parties seem to hold radically different views as to the universe (and volume) of

documents at issue. Nevertheless, plaintiffs appear to seek a privilege log as to two general

groups of documents: (1) documents which were returned by plaintiffs but not re-produced by

LS&Co.; and (2) documents which have been produced in redacted form by LS&Co.

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In view of the court’s ruling that documents in the first group are to be produced (see

Section B, above), plaintiffs’ motion to compel a privilege log of those documents is moot.

As for the second group, it is not clear precisely what documents are in question. 

Plaintiffs assert that there are hundreds of redacted documents which have not been logged. 

According to defendant, there are only five redacted documents at issue. (See Schwing Decl., ¶

17, Ex. J). Moreover, in an August 14, 2007 letter to plaintiffs’ counsel, defense counsel

provided a log that identifies each of these five documents, briefly describes the redacted

information and states why it was redacted (e.g., not responsive to any request, private,

protected by the attorney-client privilege and the work product doctrine). (See id., Ex. J). 

Based on the record presently before it, the court is unable to ascertain precisely what (if any)

documents remain in dispute; and, the parties offered no clarification at the motion hearing.

However, at oral argument, plaintiffs advised that they have prepared a list (by Bates

production number) of the documents in dispute, and the parties have agreed to meet-and-confer

as to those documents. The court is confident that the parties ought to be able to resolve this

matter between themselves without further judicial intervention. Accordingly, plaintiffs’

motion as to this issue is denied. However, the denial is without prejudice to plaintiffs to bring

a more focused motion identifying specific documents over which the parties are unable to

agree.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

Dated:

 

HOWARD R. LLOYD

UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE

September 10, 2007

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United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

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5:04-cv-1026 Notice will be electronically mailed to:

Joseph Heathcliff Ainley JAinley@popelka.com, gsimmons@popelka.com 

Franklin Edward Bondonno fbondonno@popelka.com, dlee@popelka.com 

Adi Herzberg aherzberg@gibsondunn.com, bhonniball@gibsondunn.com,

mjanky@gibsondunn.com 

Philip Edward Kay phil@nosexualharassment.com 

Rebecca Justice Lazarus rjustice@gibsondunn.com, rmcbain@gibsondunn.com 

Jeffrey Alan Leon jleon@leonandleon.com, leonandleon@leonandleon.com 

Jeffry William Lochner jlochner@popelka.com, jlochner@verizon.net,

kanderson@popelka.com 

Sheila Marie Pierce sheila.pierce@bingham.com 

Gabriel Neil Rubin grubin@stblaw.com, hlelaind@stblaw.com, jlaw@stblaw.com 

Erin E. Schneider eschneider@gibsondunn.com 

Austin Van Schwing aschwing@gibsondunn.com 

Counsel are responsible for distributing copies of this document to co-counsel who have

not registered for e-filing under the court’s CM/ECF program.

Case 5:04-cv-01026-RMW Document 176 Filed 09/10/07 Page 7 of 7