Opinion ID: 965
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Appellate Jurisdiction under the Collateral-Order Doctrine

Text: Before proceeding to the merits of Sidley's arguments, we pause to address a recent development in the caselaw governing the collateral-order doctrine, which supplied our jurisdiction to hear an immediate appeal of the district court's disclosure order. In Mohawk Industries, Inc. v. Carpenter, ___ U.S. ___, 130 S.Ct. 599, 603, ___ L.Ed.2d ___ (2009), the Supreme Court held that discovery disclosure orders adverse to the attorney-client privilege do not qualify for immediate appeal under the collateral-order doctrine of Cohen v. Beneficial Industrial Loan Corp., 337 U.S. 541, 546, 69 S.Ct. 1221, 93 L.Ed. 1528 (1949). Resolving a circuit split, the Court held that [p]ostjudgment appeals, together with other review mechanisms, suffice to protect the rights of litigants and preserve the vitality of the attorney-client privilege. Mohawk Industries, 130 S.Ct. at 603. Mohawk Industries, however, concerned the question whether a party may immediately appeal a disclosure order adverse to its claim of attorney-client privilege. The order at issue here was against a nonparty to the litigation; we have previously held that unlike a party, a nonparty subject to a discovery order has no remedy at the end of the litigation and so may obtain immediate review of a discovery order rejecting a privilege claim. See Burden-Meeks v. Welch, 319 F.3d 897, 900-01 (7th Cir.2003). Burden-Meeks adhered to an existing line of circuit cases, the most recent of which was Dellwood Farms, Inc. v. Cargill, Inc., 128 F.3d 1122, 1125 (7th Cir.1997); the opinion, however, noted a division in the circuits on the question of a nonparty's right to immediately appeal a discovery order. Burden-Meeks, 319 F.3d at 900-01. It is unclear whether our circuit's approach to this questionaffirmed but questioned in Burden-Meeks survives the holding and rationale of Mohawk Industries. But because our expedited order issued before Mohawk Industries was decided and at a time when our circuit law permitted an immediate appeal, we simply note the issue for the future but need not resolve it here.