Opinion ID: 532640
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: District Court's Limitations On Discovery

Text: 43 Finally, plaintiff challenges the district court's discovery order of March 29, 1988. In reviewing a district court's discovery order, this Court must consider whether the judge abused his discretion. Borden, Inc. v. Florida East Coast Ry. Co., 772 F.2d 750, 756-57 (11th Cir.1985). Plaintiff moved to compel answers to certain interrogatories on December 21, 1987. The interrogatories asked for algorithms and methods used by ACT to determine whether or not Langston cheated on the ACT exam, and the name of the student from whom plaintiff allegedly cheated. ACT refused to turn over the technical information because it was a trade secret and refused to turn over the student's name because of its contractual obligation to that person not to divulge his or her identity. On March 29, 1988, the trial court ordered ACT to provide the plaintiff at least the raw data considered by ACT in its statistical analysis of plaintiff's test. 44 Plaintiff now argues that by refusing his motion to compel an answer on the methods used by ACT, the trial court abused its discretion. It is not clear how the March 29, 1988 order harmed plaintiff. ACT supplied plaintiff's expert with the raw data underlying its conclusion, and the affidavit of ACT's expert spells out in detail the methodology that the expert used in reaching his conclusion. Moreover, the affidavit of plaintiff's second expert complains only of the failure by ACT to provide information on how much students taking the exam for the second time improve their score from their first exam. Thus the district court's order did not hinder plaintiff's efforts to build his case, see Fed.R.Civ.P. 26 committee notes (the court must be careful not to deprive a party of discovery that is reasonably necessary to afford a fair opportunity to develop and prepare the case), and the district court did not abuse its discretion. See Borden, 772 F.2d at 756-57.