Amendment privilege is actually implicated by all of AT&T’s discovery requests. We thus
return to defendants’ request to unfreeze $20,000 in assets. In view of Corona’s at-present
unjustified blanket refusal to disclose his assets, we are unwilling at this time to lift the TRO-
imposed freeze beyond what we have already done. If Corona can make a showing as to how the
requests implicate his Fifth Amendment privilege, we will revisit the issue and will at that time
entertain the possibility of requiring in camera disclosure of assets, as is sometimes done in the
roughly analogous situation in which a person charged with a crime seeks appointment of
counsel but has Fifth Amendment concerns about filling out the asset-disclosure form required in

such matters. See, e.g., United States v. Salemme, 985 F. Supp. 197, 202 (D. Mass. 1997).

MATTHEW F. KENNELL’
United States District Judg;
Date: May 3, 2002


totally, or in part, in the activities complained of by the Plaintiff.” Dfdt. Submission, p. 5. But
Corona has not even tried to explain how disclosure regarding the first three of these four
subjects would tend to incriminate them, and we are unwilling simply to assume that that would
occur. If the fourth subject — that particular assets came from sale of decoder boxes — were
implicated by one or more of AT&T’s discovery requests, then a response certainly could
implicate the Fifth Amendment, and Corona could assert the privilege and decline to answer that
particular question or questions (though understanding that in a civil proceeding like this one, an
inference adverse to him can be drawn from his assertion of the privilege). But because Corona
has given us no reason to believe that all of AT&T’s requests are within that category, he has not
justified his blanket refusal to respond.

This determination is in no way contrary to this Court’s ruling in Suppressed v.
Suppressed. The proposed TRO provision that we declined to enter in that case primarily
involved a court-ordered disclosure of the proceeds of decoder sales, and thus ordering a
response would have directly infringed the privilege against self-incrimination. Though we also
declined to include in the TRO a court-ordered disclosure of assets, the plaintiff in that case had
not distinguished that request from its more pointed “proceeds” inquiry, and furthermore the
order was sought on an ex parte basis without the defendant having the chance to object before
being required to answer. Those circumstances, which led the Court to decline to include asset
disclosure as part of an ex parte TRO, have no bearing on the present case, which involves a
discovery request (not a court order), proceedings which are no longer ex parte, and a represented
defendant.

In sum, based on the current record, we have no basis to conclude that Corona’s Fifth


‘Minute Order Form (06/97)

United States District Court, Northern District of Illinois

Name of Assigned Judy Sitting Judge if Oth
pr Magistrate Judge Matthew F. Kennelly than Assigned Judge
CASE NUMBER 02 C 2338 DATE 5/3/2002
CASE AT&T Broadband vs. Private Cable Systems, Inc.
TITLE

[In the following box (a) indicate the party filing the motion, e.g., plaintiff, defendant, 3rd party plaintiff, and (b) state briefly the nature
of the motion being presented.]

MOTION:

DOCKET ENTRY:

(1) Q Filed motion of [ use listing in “Motion” box above.]

(2) im Brief in support of motion due

@) o Answer brief to motion due___. Reply to answer brief due.

(4) im) Ruling/Hearingon___—_setfor att

(5) oO Status hearing[held/continued to] [set for/re-set for]on__——sset fort

(6) oO Pretrial conference[held/continued to] [set for/re-set for]on__—setfor__—at__

(7) Oo Trial[set for/re-set for] on__at

(8) Oo [Bench/Jury trial] [Hearing] held/continued to at

(9) Oo This case is dismissed [with/without] prejudice and without costs[by/agreement/pursuant to]
CIFRCP4(m) (CGeneralRule21 CIFRCP4i(a)(1) CM FRCP41(a)(2).

ao [Other docket entry} | Enter Memorandum Opinion and Order. For the reasons set forth in the

attached order, defendant’s request for further modification of the temporary restraining order is denied.

dal @ [For further detail see order attached to the original minute order.]

No notices required, advised in open court. Document

Number

|

No notices required.

umber of notices

Notices mailed by judge's staff.
Notified counsel by telephone. MAY 0. 7.2002

date

¥ | Docketing to mail notices.

Mail AO 450 form.

docketing deputy initials

Mashy'sn

Copy to judge/magistrate judge.

ado date maited notice
courtroom Ook ig

OR deputy’s

initials

“Dajedtime received in
~ central Clerk's Office mailing deputy initiats



IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS

EASTERN DIVISION

AT&T BROADBAND, )
)

Plaintiff, )

)

vs. y Case No. 02 C 2338

)

PRIVATE CABLE SYSTEMS, INC. )
and LUIS CORONA, )
)

Defendants. )

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER MAY 0.7 2002

MATTHEW F. KENNELLY, District Judge:

The plaintiff in this case, AT&T Broadband, is a cable television provider who has sued
the defendants, Private Cable Systems, Inc. and Luis Corona, under a federal statute that bars
persons from receiving, or assisting others to receive, cable television services without
authorization from the provider. 47 U.S.C. §553. AT&T alleges that the defendants are selling
cable decoder boxes which enable non-subscribers of AT&T’s services to obtain service
illegally. On April 3, 2002, the Court issued an ex parte temporary restraining order which,
among other things, restrained defendants from offering or selling such devices, precluded them
from destroying or removing a variety of records, and froze their assets pending a hearing on a
motion for preliminary injunction. The order also permitted AT&T to serve expedited discovery
requests on defendants. See generally Suppressed v. Suppressed, 109 F. Supp. 2d 902 (N.D. Ill.
2000).

Defendants, both represented by the same attorney, have requested release of certain


funds to pay for counsel and for Corona’s living expenses. The Court granted this request in
part, agreeing to modify the TRO to permit Corona to use freely any funds that he eared from
employment unrelated to the sale of decoders. Defendants also requested permission to use
$20,000 from the frozen assets, to be drawn from equity in unidentified real estate. AT&T
objected because defendants had declined, citing the Fifth Amendment, to respond to AT&T’s
discovery requests seeking identification of defendants’ assets. The Court asked the parties to
address whether the information sought by AT&T would tend to incriminate defendants, and they
have now done so.

PCS, a corporation, has no Fifth Amendment privilege, Braswell v. United States, 487
U.S. 99, 106-07 (1988), so it is not entitled to decline to answer discovery requests on that basis.
The rest of our discussion thus will concern Corona. Unfortunately, his written submission
largely misses the point. He spends most of it arguing that requests to identify assets and
produce documents seek testimonial disclosures (and thus the Fifth Amendment applies), a
proposition with which the Court has no quarrel. But our question was how, in this particular
case, disclosure of Corona’s assets would disclose or lead to incriminating evidence or would
provide a link in the chain of evidence needed to prosecute him — the predicate for the assertion
of the Fifth Amendment privilege. See, e.g., Doe v. United States, 487 U.S. 201, 208-09 n.6
(1988); Hoffman v. United States, 341 U.S. 479, 486 (1951). Corona essentially sidesteps this
question, saying only that “[c]Jompelling the individual Defendants [sic] to disclose all assets
would tacitly attribute testimony to the individual Defendants [1] that such assets exist, [2] that
the Defendants have dominion and control over those assets, [3] that those assets are within the

category of assets frozen by this Court and further, [4] that those assets have their genesis either