Opinion ID: 219821
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Alexander’s Motion to Compel Discovery

Text: Alexander claims that the district court erred in failing to rule on his motion to compel the “mirror imaging” of the dean’s hard drives. By declaring the motion “moot,” the court effectively denied it. We review a district court’s ruling on a discovery matter for abuse of discretion, Audi AG v. D’Amato, 469 F.3d 534, 541 (6th Cir. 2006), reversing only if the court committed “a clear error of judgment, such as applying the incorrect legal standard, misapplying the correct legal standard, or relying upon clearly erroneous findings of fact.” Jones v. Ill. Cent. R.R. Co., 617 F.3d 843, 850 (6th Cir. 2010). Here, the district court made no clear error of judgment. A party may move for an order compelling discovery if the opposing party fails to make a disclosure required by Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(a). Fed. R. Civ. P. 37(a)(3)(B). In response to Alexander’s discovery request, the dean searched his email account and produced numerous emails. The district court ordered Alexander to produce evidence, in support of his motion, that relevant emails were missing and could be recovered by cloning the dean’s hard drives. Alexander responded by contending that the -6- No. 10-3358 Alexander v. Ohio State University College of Social Work, et al. dean did not write down the specific search terms used and admitted deleting emails, and that Defendants failed to produce an email the dean sent to him. Defendants countered that any deleted emails were spam or mass mailings, and that if the allegedly-missing email in fact existed, Alexander would have a copy of it. We conclude that the district court did not rely on clearly erroneous findings of fact in holding that Defendants complied with Rule 26(a), and that it did not abuse its discretion by denying Alexander’s motion to compel.