Lamorak Insurance Company v. Prudential Reinsurance Company of America

Filing 68

Magistrate Judge Donald L. Cabell: ORDER entered. ORDER ON DEFENDANT EVEREST'S MOTION TO COMPEL PRODUCTION granting in part and denying in part 44 Motion to Compel. See attached order for full details. (Russo, Noreen)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS

LAMORAK INSURANCE COMPANY,
as successor to Commercial Union
Insurance Company,
Plaintiff,

Docket No. 15-cv-13425-IT

v.
EVEREST REINSURANCE CO. f/k/a
Prudential Reinsurance Company,
Defendant.

ORDER ON DEFENDANT EVEREST’S MOTION TO COMPEL PRODUCTION
(DKT. 44)
CABELL, U.S.M.J.:
Now pending is the defendant’s motion to compel responses to
discovery (Dkt. No. 44).

The Court has considered the parties’

papers and the information adduced at a hearing on May 25, 2017.
Some matters were fully resolved at the hearing. 1

Regarding the

matters that were not fully resolved, the Court now orders as
follows:

1 In particular, Lamorak represented that it searched for but could not locate
any documents responsive to Everest’s request for documents maintained in
Lamorak’s Special Risks Office that relate to the facultative certificates.
There appeared to be agreement that Everest should and could seek additional
discovery through deposition if it wished to explore why Lamorak was unable to
locate any responsive information. The Court therefore denied this request.
With respect to another request seeking additional information to assess
Lamorak’s assertion of privilege with respect to two items on Lamorak’s
redaction log, the Court and Everest accepted Lamorak’s representation in court
that the communications at issue were from counsel to counsel, and related to
the present litigation.

The defendant’s request for documents relating to Lamorak’s
allocation of Alcoa asbestos losses to its reinsurers is ALLOWED
in part and DENIED in part.

Lamorak shall produce the facultative

certificates for the few similarly situated reinsurers within the
same block as Everest.

To the extent Everest seeks documents

relating to Lamorak’s many other unrelated reinsurance agreements
outside of the block, the request is DENIED.
that

discovery

of

these

agreements

could

Everest contends
yield

potentially

relevant information but could not otherwise articulate what this
information might be.

In addition, Lamorak has represented to the

Court’s satisfaction that the effort required to locate and produce
this information would be unduly time consuming and burdensome.
Finally, Everest’s request that Lamorak produce unredacted
copies of documents that Lamorak previously produced in redacted
form

to

conceal

information

related

to

other

reinsurance

agreements, which Lamorak contends is not relevant to this lawsuit,
is DENIED where the parties agree that the information sought via
this request is the same sort of information referenced in the
preceding paragraph.
SO ORDERED.
/s/ Donald L. Cabell
DONALD L. CABELL
United States Magistrate Judge
DATED:

May 26, 2017
2