EXHIBIT 50 

Case: 1:12-cv-04069 Document #: 239-1 Filed: 07/21/14 Page 1 of 5 PageID #:4775
Transcript of the Testimony of Debra Aron

Date: July 19, 2014 

Case: Grant Birchmeier v. Caribbean Cruise Line, Inc.

Printed On: July 21, 2014

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Phone:773 851-7779

e-mail:cmsreporters@comcast.net

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5 (Pages 11 to 14)

Page 11

1 A. Well, we discussed together. She's

2 also quite experienced in telecommunications

3 data issues. She's been working in the

4 telecommunications area, as have I, for many

5 years.

6 And so we both have had quite a

7 bit of experience working with similar kinds of

8 data questions and analyzing telecommunications

9 databases.

10 So, we discussed the question of

11 what specifically we want to know, we wanted to

12 make sure that if a vendor said that they don't

13 have relevant data, that we probed that; that

14 we followed up to make sure that they may not

15 have some partial data or some relevant data,

16 that we would want to consider it if we were

17 conducting the data exercise being proposed.

18 Q. Does Ms. Danies have notes of who she

19 talked to?

20 A. She may. I don't know the answer to

21 that, and I didn't inquire or see them.

22 Q. Let's look at Footnote 4 on that same

23 page.

24 Do you see, for example, I

Page 12

1 investigated the offerings from Infutor; do you

2 see that?

3 A. I do.

4 Q. Did you personally investigate the

5 offerings?

6 A. I reviewed their online materials.

7 Ms. Danies conducted the interview with them.

8 Q. So, when it says, I was advised by a

9 sales director, it should say Ms. Danies was

10 advised?

11 MR. BACKMAN: Form.

12 THE WITNESS: Well, so let me say as

13 I've said to you today, all of the specific

14 interviews that I'm referring to in this report

15 were conducted by her. And so I think it's

16 fair to say that where I say I, I'm referring

17 to my team.

18 BY MR. RAUSCHER:

19 Q. Do you know which sales director

20 Ms. Danies spoke with?

21 A. I can't give you a name, no.

22 Q. Have you ever worked with -- I may be

23 mispronouncing this -- with Infutor before?

24 A. I have not. This is a company that

Page 13

1 represents itself as having, as I indicate here

2 in this footnote, the industry's largest

3 available database of telephone numbers for

4 forward and reverse phone append.

5 And so it seemed like a

6 worthwhile candidate to probe, to investigate.

7 As I said in my report,

8 throughout my experience in communications

9 industry, and in dealing with the kinds of

10 issues we were talking about today, I have not

11 come across any vendor that purports to be able

12 to provide historical, reliable data for

13 reverse append services.

14 Q. How did you come across Infutor?

15 A. Identifying Infutor was the result of

16 general research that we were conducting to

17 identify vendors that represent themselves as

18 being able to provide the kind of information

19 we were looking for.

20 Q. How did you do that research, just

21 jump online and searched?

22 A. The research would have included

23 online research. It would also have included

24 the knowledge that we've obtained in the course

Page 14

1 of my involvement in other TCPA cases.

2 Q. Which companies -- let's stop there

3 for a second.

4 Which companies did you contact

5 based on your knowledge of them from your other

6 TCPA cases, just the names of the companies?

7 A. Any companies that we contacted in the

8 context of this research is in this report.

9 Since filing my report --

10 Q. Well, can you just try to answer

11 the --

12 MR. BACKMAN: I think she's trying to

13 answer it. Let her finish.

14 BY MR. RAUSCHER:

15 Q. I just want names. I just want the

16 names of companies you contacted based on your

17 knowledge of those companies from other TCPA

18 cases you've worked on.

19 A. I can't say as I sit here which of

20 these companies that I reported on.

21 My knowledge of them was the

22 direct result of other cases I've worked on.

23 Q. Okay.

24 A. What I'm saying is that I incorporated

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7 (Pages 19 to 22)

Page 19

1 with respect to subpoena requests.

2 The associate to which you're

3 referring in that part of Paragraph 20 was the

4 individual at Verizon's legal compliance center

5 for its landline services that Verizon

6 represents as being qualified to speak to

7 Verizon's policies with respect to compliance

8 for subpoenas.

9 Q. What are you basing your opinion on

10 that Verizon represents that person is

11 qualified to speak to its subpoena compliance

12 policies?

13 A. The fact that this is the office to

14 which Verizon directs people who are making

15 inquiries about this very issue.

16 Q. Which very issue?

17 A. What is Verizon's policy with respect

18 to responding to subpoenas for data.

19 Q. You don't know specifically which

20 associate your colleague talked to?

21 A. I can't give you a name as I sit here,

22 no.

23 Q. And do you know if that's the same --

24 the first sentence in this subparagraph refers

Page 20

1 to representatives at Verizon's legal

2 compliance center; do you see that?

3 A. I see that, yes.

4 Q. Do you know if Ms. Danies had multiple

5 conversations with people at Verizon?

6 A. What I recall happened is that when

7 she spoke to the legal compliance center, the

8 initial representative referred her to a

9 supervisor because the initial representative

10 to whom she spoke didn't feel qualified to

11 answer a question about the voluminous request

12 we were asking about.

13 Q. Do you know which staff Ms. Danies

14 spoke to at Verizon Wireless, the next

15 subparagraph?

16 A. This would be the representative of

17 Verizon Wireless at their subpoena and court

18 order processing group.

19 Q. Do you know how many people she spoke

20 with?

21 A. I believe at Verizon Wireless she

22 spoke to one person.

23 Q. So it says "they", do you know what

24 the "they" refers to there?

Page 21

1 A. I think she's referring to the

2 individual she spoke to as a representative of

3 Verizon Wireless. So, they would be Verizon

4 Wireless.

5 Q. The next page is AT&T?

6 A. Yes.

7 Q. Do you know who Ms. Danies spoke with

8 at AT&T?

9 A. AT&T has a single subpoena center that

10 handles wireless and wireline data requests.

11 And when I say single, I mean that the same

12 National Compliance Center handles both

13 wireless and wireline requests.

14 What happens at AT&T is that AT&T

15 has subpoena centers. She contacted the

16 subpoena center and was told you have to talk

17 to the National Compliance Center for a request

18 of this magnitude.

19 She then contacted the National

20 Compliance Center and spoke to the

21 representative there who answered our questions

22 as represented in this paragraph.

23 Q. Okay. Who are the people she spoke

24 with at the National Compliance Center?

Page 22

1 A. I can't give you a name.

2 Q. Okay. How many conversations did she

3 have with them?

4 A. Once she reached the National

5 Compliance Center, I believe she had one

6 conversation.

7 Q. What about Sprint, who did she speak

8 with at Sprint?

9 A. She spoke to the individual identified

10 here as Sprint's Corporate Security

11 representative.

12 Q. It says "representatives", do you know

13 how many people she talked to?

14 A. She spoke to one person that provided

15 the information here. I believe she may have

16 been referred to that person in light of the

17 nature of the request.

18 Q. Do you know how many people she

19 said -- it says here, Sprint's Corporate

20 Security representatives handling subpoena

21 compliance and historic records requests stated

22 that a voluminous request of around 900,000

23 phone numbers would be quote, unquote

24 burdensome, but that's Sprint has the ability

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8 (Pages 23 to 26)

Page 23

1 to process that information, and it keeps

2 going.

3 So, it says representatives told

4 her that, is it just one person?

5 A. I believe it's one person.

6 Q. So, it's not accurate to say that

7 representatives told her that, correct?

8 MR. BACKMAN: Form.

9 THE WITNESS: I can't say it's not

10 accurate. My recollection is that the

11 information represented here was provided by

12 one person.

13 BY MR. RAUSCHER:

14 Q. So, why can you not say it's

15 inaccurate?

16 A. Because I would have to verify with

17 her that she didn't speak to more than one

18 person who gave the same information.

19 Q. Assuming that you're correct, that

20 your memory is correct that it was one person,

21 that's not an accurate sentence then, right?

22 MR. BACKMAN: Form.

23 THE WITNESS: I think that's fair.

24

Page 24

1 BY MR. RAUSCHER:

2 Q. CenturyLink. It looks like nobody was

3 contacted there; is that correct?

4 A. It's not that nobody was contacted.

5 It's that no one responded to us.

6 Q. Okay. So, who did you try to contact

7 there?

8 A. At CenturyLink one is directed to an

9 outside vendor or provider that handles

10 subpoena requests for CenturyLink.

11 We spoke to them, and they said

12 that they only process subpoena requests, but

13 that to know what data CenturyLink would be

14 willing to provide or has or can provide or the

15 timeframe, we would have to speak to

16 CenturyLink directly.

17 They were not willing or able to

18 provide a phone number or person to whom we

19 could speak. We conducted our own search to

20 identify such a person.

21 But in the end, in the timeframe

22 we had, we were not able to identify someone at

23 CenturyLink who could or would speak to us

24 about this topic.

Page 25

1 What I've reported here is what

2 CenturyLink identifies on its website as its

3 policy for responding to subpoena requests for

4 data.

5 Q. Who is that outside vendor you were

6 talking about?

7 A. I believe they're called

8 CT Corporation. It's identified on their

9 website.

10 Q. And Ms. Danies called them?

11 A. She did.

12 Q. Do you know who she talked to at

13 CT Corporation?

14 A. No.

15 Q. Did anybody speak with anybody at

16 Comcast?

17 A. No. We attempted to reach Comcast.

18 At Comcast, they don't have a

19 person that answers the phone at their subpoena

20 compliance area.

21 And we left messages with Comcast

22 to which they did not respond.

23 So, we reported here what Comcast

24 reports on its website as its policy for

Page 26

1 responding to requests for subscriber data.

2 Q. Have you ever been involved in the

3 notice process in a TCPA case?

4 A. Well, what do you mean by been

5 involved with?

6 Q. In helping designing a notice plan for

7 a TCPA case?

8 A. I have not participated in designing a

9 notice plan for a TCPA case, no.

10 Q. How many TCPA cases have you provided

11 expert opinions in?

12 A. Well, by expert opinion, do you mean

13 an expert report?

14 Q. Sure. We can start with that.

15 A. In addition to this one, one other.

16 Q. Which case was that?

17 A. That was Warnick v. Dish.

18 Q. Have you provided expert testimony

19 other than reports in other TCPA cases?

20 A. Well, in the Dish case, I gave a

21 deposition, and I testified in federal court.

22 Q. Have you been involved in TCPA cases

23 other than providing expert reports or

24 testimony?

Case: 1:12-cv-04069 Document #: 239-1 Filed: 07/21/14 Page 5 of 5 PageID #:4779