Hall v. American National Property and Casualty Company

Filing 24

STIPULATED PROTECTIVE ORDER Signed by Judge Brian Morris on 7/17/2017. (ELL)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF MONTANA
BUTTE DIVISION
BRETT HALL,

)
)
Plaintiff,
)
)
vs.
)
)
AMERICAN NATIONAL
)
PROPERTY AND CASUALTY CO., )
)
Defendant.
)
______________________________ )

Cause No. CV-17-17-BU-BMM

STIPULATED PROTECTIVE
ORDER

Upon stipulation of the parties, and good cause shown, this Court enters the
following Protective Order, to govern the discovery and protection of confidential
proprietary information, copyrighted and/or commercial information, which may
be and has been subject to discovery in this action:
1.

This Protective Order governs the access to, use, and distribution of

information designated as "Confidential" in this litigation. For purposes of this
Protective Order, "information" or "materials" includes documents, things,
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pleadings, discovery responses, deposition testimony, and all other discovery
materials.
2.

This Protective Order shall also govern all discovery materials and/or

papers filed with the Court in this case which include or make reference to any
information designated as "Confidential" by a party. This Protective Order shall
also govern all information derived from such documents and all copies, excerpts,
or summaries of them.
3.

Information may be deemed "Confidential" if it contains trade secrets

or other non-public, proprietary, or competitively sensitive research, development,
financial, or commercial information, or information that, if publicly disclosed,
could be used to the competitive detriment of a party or would violate the parties'
respective confidentiality and/or privacy policies and/or agreements, including
without limitation policies and/or agreements with employees, customers, or third
parties.
4.

All "Confidential" information shall be treated as confidential during

and throughout the pendency of this action. Confidential information shall be used
by the non-producing party solely for the purposes of this litigation and not for any
other purpose. Control and distribution shall be the responsibility of the attorneys
of record.
5.

The parties shall not disclose information derived from such
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Confidential information to any person except as provided in this Protective Order.
Confidential materials and information derived from them may be inspected and
disclosed by the parties only to the following persons and only for the purposes of
conducting this litigation:
(a)

The parties, their counsel in this lawsuit, and counsel's
employees;

(b)

Any person retained by counsel representing the parties to assist
in the preparation of trial of this litigation, including experts
and paralegals;

(c)

Any employee or representative of American National Property
and Casualty Company (“American National”) whose
deposition is taken or is to be taken in this action during the
course of his or her testimony; and

(d)

Deposition reporters.

Court personnel are not subject to this Protective Order while engaged in the
performance of their official duties.
6.

Each person to whom disclosure of Confidential documents and

information is permitted by the parties pursuant to paragraph 5 above shall be
shown a copy of this Protective Order and shall execute an acknowledgment in
writing that he or she has received a copy of this Protective Order and is familiar
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with the provisions of it, and all such persons shall:
(a)

Be bound thereby;

(b)

Not use any document or information for any purpose other
than in connection with the prosecution of this action;

(c)

Not reveal such document or information to any person other
than a person who has received a copy of this Agreement and is
subject to its provisions; and

(d)

On termination of his or connection with the action, return such
Confidential document or information to the counsel who
disclosed it in the first instance or destroy the Confidential
document or information and certify the documents have been
destroyed.

7.

Before any party files a motion or other document with the Court that

would reveal any portion of the contents of the Confidential information, such
party shall provide at least ten (10) days written notice of such filing, detailing by
Bates range the precise documents or information to be filed. If the party
designating the documents or information as Confidential files a motion to seal
some or all of the documents or information within ten (10) days of such written
notice, the motion or document at issue shall not be filed pending further order of
the Court.
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8.

The admissibility, confidentiality, and use of all Confidential

information at trial shall be subject to the orders of the Court.
9.

A party producing or disclosing information may invoke this

Protective Order's protection by following the procedures set forth below:
(a)

With respect to documents, the copy of the document, when
produced, shall bear the clear and legible designation
"Confidential" on each page as to which the designating party
seeks the protection of this Protective Order. To the extent a
document contains some "Confidential" information and some
non-confidential information, a party may designate the entire
document for treatment as "Confidential" within the scope of
this Protective Order.

(b)

With respect to answers to interrogatories or requests for
admissions, the specific responses containing "Confidential"
information shall be clearly marked.

(c)

With respect to any deposition, such treatment may be invoked
by: (1) declaring the same on the record at the deposition and,
thereafter, by designating the specific portions of testimony as
"Confidential" within thirty (30) days of the receipt of the
transcript of the deposition in which the designations are made;
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or (2) designating specific portions of testimony as
"Confidential" and serving such designations within thirty (30)
days of receipt of the transcript of the deposition in which the
designations are made. The entirety of all deposition transcripts
shall be treated as "Confidential" for the thirty (30) day period
following receipt of the transcript.
(d)

If information deemed "Confidential" is inadvertently produced
without the designation "Confidential," a party may
nevertheless timely assert the confidentiality of the information
upon learning of the inadvertent disclosure by providing written
notice of such to all parties. The parties agree that the same
protocol will apply to the inadvertent production of privileged
documents and/or materials as well, and, upon receiving written
notice from the designating party, all inadvertently produced
privileged material will either be returned or destroyed, as
instructed by the written notice.

10.

If a party or counsel for a party disputes whether a document or other

material should be marked “Confidential,” the challenging party shall notify the
producing party within 30 days of the production of confidential document.
Counsel for the parties shall attempt to resolve any dispute between themselves. If
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they are unsuccessful, the party or counsel challenging the “Confidential”
designation shall do so by filing an appropriate motion with the Court. Any
document so marked as “Confidential” will continue to be treated as such pending
determination by the Court as to its confidential status.
11.

In the event that a party is requested or required (by oral questions,

interrogatories, requests for information or documents in legal proceedings,
subpoena, civil investigative demand or other similar process or by applicable
laws, rules or regulations) to disclose any information designated "Confidential,"
the party shall provide all other parties with prompt written notice of the request or
requirement within fourteen (14) days of receipt of the same, so that the other
parties may seek a protective order or other appropriate remedy and/or waive
compliance with the provisions of this Protective Order. If, in the absence of a
protective order or other remedy or the receipt of a waiver by the other parties, the
party is, upon advice of counsel, nonetheless legally compelled to disclose
"Confidential" information, the party may, without risk of liability hereunder,
disclose that portion of the "Confidential" information that counsel advises must be
disclosed provided that timely written notice of the request or requirement has been
made within fourteen (14) days of receipt of the same to the other parties.
12.

Sanctions may be granted by the Court for improper use or

dissemination of any information produced subject to this Protective Order.
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Sanctions may be imposed by the Court on its own motion or on motion by a party.
13.

Within 90 days of the conclusion of this matter including all appeals

therefrom, each "Confidential" document, including all copies of each document
and all excerpts or summaries of them, shall be either returned to the party
producing or designating the document, or destroyed. If the documents are
destroyed, rather than returned, the party and its counsel destroying the documents
shall provide a written certification that all copies have been destroyed or erased if
stored electronically. Notwithstanding the foregoing, latent data such as deleted
files, and other non-logical data types, such as memory dumps, swap files,
temporary files, printer spool files, and metadata that can only be retrieved by
computer forensics experts and is generally considered inaccessible without the use
of specialized tools and techniques, will not be within the requirements for return
or destruction of Confidential information as set forth by this provision.
DATED this 17th day of July, 2017.

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