Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-arwd-5_06-cv-05177/USCOURTS-arwd-5_06-cv-05177-3/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Joey Avance
Movant
Rains-Flo Manufacturing Company
Cross Claimant
The Dupps Company
Cross Defendant
Tyson Foods, Inc.
Plaintiff
Tyson Poultry, Inc.
Plaintiff
Bill Welborn
Movant

Document Text:

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

WESTERN DISTRICT OF ARKANSAS

FAYETTEVILLE DIVISION

TYSON FOODS, INC. and

TYSON POULTRY, INC. PLAINTIFFS

v. Civil No. 06-5177

THE DUPPS COMPANY and

RAINS-FLO MANUFACTURING COMPANY DEFENDANTS

O R D E R

Now on this 4th day of January, 2008, comes on for consideration

Plaintiff's Motion For Temporary Stay (document #74), and from said motion,

the supporting documentation, and the response thereto, the Court finds and

orders as follows:

1. This products liability case was filed on September 22, 2006.

Its subject matter is alleged defects in machines known as Continuous

Hydrolyzers, which plaintiffs Tyson Foods, Inc., and Tyson Poultry, Inc.

("Tyson") purchased from defendant The Dupps Company ("Dupps"). Tyson's

claims against separate defendant Rains-Flo Manufacturing Company have been

dismissed, as have all the claims against Dupps except for one specific

narrow claim that Dupps breached an express warranty that the Continuous

Hydrolyzers would "comply with OSHA requirements." The matter is set for

trial on January 22, 2008.

2. Tyson now moves for a stay of the proceedings, contending that

it is "severely handicapped" in its ability to prosecute its claim against

Dupps because of "an on-going criminal investigation" into the death of one

of its employees, Jason Kelley. The motion makes two contentions:

* First, Tyson contends that it cannot present records related to the

amounts of hydrogen sulfide released by the Continuous Hydrolyzers without

"a likely waiver of its claim of attorney work-product privilege in the

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criminal investigation"; and

* Second, Tyson contends that several of its employees - specifically

Bill Welborn and Joey Avance - are expected to assert their Fifth Amendment

privilege and withhold testimony in the civil trial because of pending

criminal investigations.

Dupps strongly opposes the request for a stay of these proceedings,

characterizing the request as "nothing more than an eleventh hour request

for an indefinite continuance."

3. The background of the issue now presented -- as drawn from facts

which were undisputed during briefings on motions for summary judgment --

is as follows:

(a) On October 10, 2003, Jason Kelley sustained fatal injuries at

Tyson's Texarkana rendering facility "reportedly" as a result of hydrogen

sulfide exposure while adjusting the packing seals on a Continuous

Hydrolyzer. 

(b) There had been another incident involving an employee named

Robert Key who "reportedly" had been overcome with hydrogen sulfide fumes

at the Texarkana facility -- fortunately not with fatal results -- on March

14, 2002.

(c) Bill Welborn was the Plant Manager at the Texarkana facility at

relevant times and, following the Key incident, he sent two e-mails to Tyson

officers and employees. These e-mails are considered important evidence in

the case by all parties.

(d) In a June 23, 2006, letter from attorney John Everett (which

apparently related to a deposition in the underlying wrongful death suit

brought by Kelley's heirs), Mr. Everett said that his client, Welborn, "is

the target of an investigation having the potential of exposing him to a

criminal prosecution," and "will not testify in this case." A similar

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letter dated August 1, 2006, from attorney Gary Nutter was written on behalf

of his client Joey Avance. These letters pre-date the instant lawsuit.

(e) According to the Affidavit of Jay T. Jorgensen, an attorney

representing Tyson in connection with investigations of Kelley's death by

the Occupational Health and Safety Administration ("OSHA") and the United

States Department of Justice ("DOJ"), this investigation -- begun in 2004 --

is still on-going. Jorgensen avers that "[a]s recently as November 2007,

federal government officials interviewed a Tyson employee related to this

incident."

4. The Document Issue:

Jorgensen avers that, in response to a grand jury subpoena, Tyson has

asserted "privileges" (judging from Tyson's brief, Jorgensen refers to the

work-product privilege, and not the attorney-client privilege as argued by

Dupps) regarding records of air quality monitoring in Tyson rendering

facilities which "was ordered at the direction of Tyson's outside counsel

following the fatality accident." 

Tyson contends that, if it produces those records in the instant

litigation, it will have waived the work-product privilege in connection

with the criminal investigation.

The Eighth Circuit recognizes two categories of attorney work-product,

with correspondingly different levels of protection: 

Ordinary work product includes raw factual information. Opinion

work product includes counsel's mental impressions, conclusions,

opinions or legal theories. Ordinary work product is not

discoverable unless the party seeking discovery has a

substantial need for the materials and the party cannot obtain

the substantial equivalent of the materials by other means. In

contrast, opinion work product enjoys almost absolute immunity

and can be discovered only in very rare and extraordinary

circumstances, such as when the material demonstrates that an

attorney engaged in illegal conduct or fraud.

Baker v. General Motors Corp., 209 F.3d 1051 (8th Cir. 2000).

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It is clear from the context of the motion that what is at issue here

is not opinion work-product -- but, rather, ordinary work-product, i.e., the

raw factual data amassed by the air quality monitoring system installed

after the Kelley incident. Such data or its equivalent might well be

impossible for Dupps to obtain from any source other than Tyson, and might

well bear on the performance of the Continuous Hydrolyzers. 

The Court need not decide these issues at this time, but will simply

note that, given the lesser protection afforded ordinary work-product,

Tyson's argument boils down to this: it wants to postpone this litigation

for (at least) some ten more months to prevent the government from obtaining

in the criminal investigation certain information that might well be

discoverable by its opponent in the civil litigation.

When the issue is couched in these terms, the Court does not find it

a compelling, or even a very strong, reason to postpone the trial of this

case. 

5. The Witness Issue:

Tyson contends that Welborn and Avance will invoke the Fifth Amendment

if called to testify, and that such invocation will unfairly prejudice it

by "implying that Tyson or its employees have engaged in criminal activity."

It argues that both the parties and the public have an interest in resolving

a pending criminal case, and that its rights in civil litigation should not

be impaired by recognition of those rights.

The Court is not persuaded by these arguments since, when the narrow

liability issue which remains in this case is made the focus of the

analysis, it is entirely possible that neither Welborn nor Avance will be

asked any questions which would require (or permit) them to invoke their

Fifth Amendment rights not to incriminate themselves. The issue here is not

who or what caused Kelley's death but, rather, the quality of performance

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of the Continuous Hydrolyzers and what it allegedly cost to bring them up

to what had been represented. Moreover, even if questions at trial might

trigger invocations of Fifth Amendment protections, the Court cannot

determine in advance whether they could or should be honored. Such

determinations can only be made in context.

 The Court notes that Tyson failed to put the Court on notice of the

potential problem posed by the investigation status of these witnesses for

over a year during the pendency of this suit. Indeed, it waited until three

weeks before trial to do so. The delay in bringing this situation to the

Court's attention does not comport with Tyson's position regarding its

importance -- notwithstanding Tyson's protestations that it "hoped that the

criminal investigation would be completed by the scheduled January 22, 2008

trial date." While attorneys and litigants might reasonably hope their case

will settle before trial, that would not justify waiting until the threshold

of trial to inform the Court of the unavailability of a key witness.

The Court further notes that Dupps has been faced with potential civil

liability in this matter for over a year, and that the basis for that

liability has been a factor in its corporate existence since at least March,

2005, when the first of three Tolling Agreements was signed between Dupps

and Tyson. 

Finally, the Court is not persuaded that Tyson would necessarily

suffer unfair prejudice by the invocation of the Fifth Amendment by any

witness, inasmuch as such matters could be dealt with by appropriate pretrial motions in limine and, if necessary, hearings out of the presence of

the jury.

6. As the Supreme Court said in Landis v. North American Co., 299

U.S. 248, 254-55 (1936), "the power to stay proceedings is incidental to the

power inherent in every court to control the disposition of the causes on

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its docket with economy of time and effort for itself, for counsel, and for

litigants. How this can best be done calls for the exercise of judgment

which must weigh competing interests and maintain an even balance." In the

case at bar, when these competing interests are weighed -- both as to the

document issue and the witness issue -- the Court concludes that the motion

should be denied.

IT IS THEREFORE ORDERED that Plaintiff's Motion For Temporary Stay

(document #74) is denied.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

 /s/ Jimm Larry Hendren 

JIMM LARRY HENDREN

UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

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