Court Opinion

ID: 9401844
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-06-14 14:09:17.494314+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:19:55.656608
License: Public Domain

In the
              Court of Appeals
Sixth Appellate District of Texas at Texarkana

                  No. 06-23-00045-CV

           IN RE META PLATFORMS, INC.

             Original Mandamus Proceeding

      Before Stevens, C.J., van Cleef and Rambin, JJ.
        Memorandum Opinion by Justice Rambin
                               MEMORANDUM OPINION

       Relator, Meta Platforms, Inc., f/k/a/ Facebook, Inc. (Meta), has filed a petition for a writ

of mandamus complaining of the trial court’s order denying its motion to disqualify counsel for

the State of Texas. We deny the petition.

I.     Factual and Procedural Background

       Zina Bash is lead outside counsel for the State of Texas in a suit filed in February 2022

against Meta for alleged violations of Texas’s Capture or Use of Biometric Identifier Act. See

TEX. BUS. & COM. CODE ANN. § 503.001. On April 10, 2023, based on Bash’s work at Meta as a

summer intern in 2012, Meta filed a motion to disqualify Bash and her firm, Keller Postman

LLC, from representing the State of Texas.

       Meta claimed that Bash should be disqualified for taking on representation adverse to it

in a substantially related matter. Meta claimed that Bash, though an intern, had a law degree and

was working in Meta’s (then Facebook’s) legal department, making her a lawyer for Meta at a

time when Meta’s legal department was “particularly focused on Tag Suggestions and the

privacy policies surrounding it.” Meta claimed that Bash is adverse to Meta and that her 2012

work was substantially related, therefore, “[n]o more is required to disqualify Ms. Bash,” in other

words, disqualification is “mandatory.”

       The State responded with three core arguments. First, the State claimed that Meta had

waived this issue by waiting so late in the case to raise it, as Bash, however briefly, had been

employed by Meta, and hence Meta itself had knowledge all along of what Bash had done for

Meta and possession of documents related to that work. Second, the State claimed that Meta had

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established neither that the duties of the internship called on Bash to act as Meta’s attorney

during that time nor that, as an attorney, Bash had handled any matter substantially related to the

present case. In this regard, the State noted that Meta had not produced any contract showing the

terms of the internship nor had Meta shown that Bash was licensed to practice law in California

or had registered to act as an in-house counsel in California. Third, the State claimed that Meta

had an erroneous view of the law and that, based on that erroneous view, Meta made no showing

of prejudice and certainly no showing to overcome the prejudice to the State from

disqualification (prejudice which the State supported with affidavit evidence).

        Meta contends here, as Meta contended in the trial court, that the recently unearthed

emails from that internship (the Bash emails) were “nonresponsive” to Meta’s discovery

obligations in this case.1

1
 In a May 16, 2023, letter to this Court regarding the in-camera submission of the Bash emails, Meta stated as
follows:

                Meta has also provided the State with a privilege log covering those documents.
                There is a good reason why [the Bash emails] were not previously listed on
                Meta’s privilege log: They were not collected as part of the agreed-upon
                discovery in this case, were not responsive to the State’s discovery requests, and
                were not withheld on the basis of privilege or otherwise. The parties identified
                twenty-three custodians at Meta whose files would be searched (using agreed-
                upon search terms) for responsive documents. None of the emails to, from, or
                copying Ms. Bash was located in the files of those twenty-three custodians, so
                none of those emails was ever identified as responsive, which is a necessary
                predicate to being withheld on the basis of privilege and included on a privilege
                log.

                Meta did not know these documents existed until after Meta learned of the
                potential conflict in mid-March 2023. At that time, Meta conducted a manual
                search of the files of other Meta lawyers, whose 2012 emails happened to be
                preserved under an unrelated litigation hold. Ms. Bash’s own inbox was deleted
                years ago pursuant to Meta’s document-retention policy.
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       After having considered the motion, the State’s opposition to the motion, the reply in

support of the motion, the arguments of the parties, and “all evidence properly before the Court,”

the trial court denied the motion to disqualify. Meta asks this Court to direct the trial court to

vacate its order denying Meta’s motion to disqualify Bash and Keller Postman.

II.    Standard of Review

       “Mandamus is an extraordinary remedy requiring the relator to show that (1) the trial

court abused its discretion and (2) the relator lacks an adequate remedy on appeal.” In re USAA

Gen. Indem. Co., 624 S.W.3d 782, 787 (Tex. 2021) (orig. proceeding) (citing In re Prudential

Ins. Co. of Am., 148 S.W.3d 124, 135–36 (Tex. 2004) (orig. proceeding)). “Mandamus relief is

only appropriate when the relators have established that only one outcome in the trial court was

permissible under the law.” In re Murrin Bros. 1885, Ltd., 603 S.W.3d 53, 56 (Tex. 2019) (orig.

proceeding). “The inappropriate denial of a motion to disqualify is an abuse of discretion for

which there is generally no adequate remedy on appeal.” Id. at 57.

       “When reviewing matters committed to a trial court’s discretion, an appellate court may

not substitute its own judgment for the trial court’s judgment.” In re Nitla S.A. de C.V., 92

S.W.3d 419, 422 (Tex. 2002) (per curiam) (orig. proceeding) (citing Walker v. Packer, 827

S.W.2d 833, 839 (Tex. 1992) (orig. proceeding)). As a result, we may not “set aside the trial

court’s [order] unless it is clear from the record that the trial court could only reach one

decision.” Id.

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III.    Disqualification

        Disqualification is a question of what is in “the interests of justice” given “all the facts

and circumstances” of the case. In re Murrin Bros. 1885, Ltd., 603 S.W.3d at 57 (quoting In re

Meador, 968 S.W.2d 346, 350 (Tex. 1998) (orig. proceeding)). “Disqualification of counsel is a

severe remedy that can result in significant expense to clients, disrupt the orderly progress of

litigation, and deprive a party of the counsel of its choice.” Id. (citing In re Nitla, 92 S.W.3d at

422). It follows that “[c]ourts must adhere to an exacting standard when considering motions to

disqualify so as to discourage their use as a dilatory trial tactic.” Spears v. Fourth Ct. of Appeals,

797 S.W.2d 654, 656 (Tex. 1990) (orig. proceeding).

        The Texas Disciplinary Rules of Professional Conduct provide “helpful guidance,” but of

themselves “do not determine whether counsel is disqualified in litigation.” In re Murrin Bros.

1885, Ltd., 603 S.W.3d at 57 (quoting Nat’l Med. Enters. v. Godbey, 924 S.W.2d 123, 132 (Tex.

1996) (orig. proceeding) and In re Meador, 968 S.W.2d at 350).2

IV.     Conclusion

        It was well within the trial court’s discretion to deny Meta’s disqualification motion.

2
 Further, in a given case, courts may look to multiple rules for guidance. See, e.g., Nat’l Med. Enters. v. Godbey,
924 S.W.2d at 132 (“Rule 1.09 does not define ‘adverse,’ so the district court turned, correctly, we think, to the
dictionary definition of the word, and to the definition of ‘directly adverse’ in Rule 1.06, comment 6.”)

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        The Court, having examined and fully considered the petition for a writ of mandamus, the

response, the reply, the record, and the applicable law, is of the opinion that the mandamus

petition should be denied. Accordingly, we deny the petition.3

                                                     Jeff Rambin
                                                     Justice

Date Submitted:           June 13, 2023
Date Decided:             June 14, 2023

3
 On May 1, 2023, Meta filed a motion to file the mandamus petition, record, and emergency motion for temporary
relief under seal. As a result of this Court’s May 5, 2023, order, Meta advised this Court, by letter dated May 10,
2023, “that the as-filed copies of Meta’s mandamus petition, emergency motion for temporary relief, and reply in
support of that motion [were] suitable for publication on the Court’s website.” Also on May 10, 2023, Meta filed a
redacted mandamus record in accordance with our May 5 order. The redacted materials were subject to a Rule 76a
temporary sealing order issued by the trial court. TEX. R. CIV. P. 76a. On May 11, 2023, the trial court conducted a
hearing to determine whether such materials should be made subject to a permanent Rule 76a sealing order. In our
May 5 order, we reserved ruling on Meta’s motion to seal regarding those aspects of the mandamus record that were
subject to the trial court’s final Rule 76a ruling. Meta has not supplemented the mandamus record with the trial
court’s order regarding the May 11 hearing. As a result, this Court will post the un-redacted mandamus record to its
website unless, within five days of the date of this opinion, the record is supplemented with an order from the trial
court permanently sealing, under Rule 76a, the redacted materials.
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