American Airlines Inc v. Travelport Limited et al

Filing 399

RESPONSE filed by Sabre Holdings Corporation, Sabre Inc, Sabre Travel International Ltd re: #394 Joint MOTION to Stay the Case and Extend Current Deadlines Pending Mediation and Request for Expedited Treatment (Addy, Sundeep)

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS
FORT WORTH DIVISION
AMERICAN AIRLINES, INC.
VS.
TRAVELPORT LIMITED, et al.

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CIVIL ACTION NO. 4:11 -CV-244-Y

SABRE DEFENDANTS’ OPPOSITION TO THE JOINT MOTION TO STAY THE
CASE AND EXTEND CURRENT DEADLINES PENDING MEDIATION
American, Travelport, and Orbitz ask the Court to stay this case indefinitely. As a
justification for its request, American claims it wants to avoid “being forced to continue
spending [its] resources on discovery.” (Mot. at 3) Nobody, especially Sabre, is forcing
American to spend resources on discovery. American sued Sabre. American brought
substantively identical claims against Sabre in both federal court and state court in June and July,
2011. And while American may now want to avoid the cost of prosecuting both claims in
different courts at the same time, granting the requested stay would severely prejudice Sabre by
(1) prolonging Sabre’s ability to put an end to this litigation entirely, and (2) eliminating Sabre’s
ability to have its own claims against American resolved by the Court.
American’s claimed reason for a stay does not survive scrutiny. American contends that
the entire case should be delayed while American, Travelport, and Orbitz—but not Sabre—
pursue mediation at some unspecified point in the future. Following this as-yet-unscheduled
mediation, American, Travelport, and Orbitz—but not Sabre—would advise the Court whether
the case should proceed, or whether those parties should receive even more time to avoid
litigating this case while Sabre is forced to wait. Such an approach is plainly unfair to Sabre.
Notably, the moving parties fail to tell the Court when their proposed mediation will take
place. Nor do they explain why they cannot conduct discovery and prepare for mediation at the
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same time. If the moving parties really had scheduled a mediation that would interfere with the
fact discovery cutoff of September 14 and the expert disclosure deadline of September 26, then
they surely would have advised the Court of the conflict. The reality, however, is that American
is using the mediation as an excuse to avoid the expense of prosecuting claims in different
jurisdictions at the same time. American chose this strategic course, and it should live with the
consequences of its decision, including the cost. Sabre already has to litigate the same case twice
as a result of American’s procedural games.1 It should not have to do so on American’s
preferred timeline.
American’s real motivation is clear. American has used its dual-track antitrust lawsuits
to exert leverage over Sabre in the parties’ commercial negotiations. The longer this litigation
lasts, the longer American can use the threat of an antitrust lawsuit to force Sabre to accept
contract terms and implement a product that Sabre’s customers have overwhelmingly rejected.
American should not be permitted to start and stop its two lawsuits to suit its own needs at the
expense of Sabre’s right to have the case resolved in an expeditious manner.
American’s request for a stay prejudices Sabre in another way. Sabre recently filed
antitrust counterclaims against American in this Court. The proposed stay would delay
resolution of Sabre’s claims against American. Sabre is entitled to proceed with its
counterclaims, and Sabre should not be forced to accept a stay of its affirmative claims simply
because American now wants to push its state court action while putting this case on ice.
Finally, it is easy to see why Travelport and Orbitz favor the stay. They would prefer to
watch the state court litigation between Sabre and American—based on identical claims and
allegations—run its course first. By doing so, Sabre’s co-defendants could avoid the expense of
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Jury selection in American’s state court case against Sabre is scheduled to begin on October 9.
American disregarded several Court-imposed deadlines in that case and, as a result, Sabre asked for a 90day continuance of all pre-trial deadlines. American opposed, and the state Court denied Sabre’s motion.

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defending against American’s sweeping claims. Sabre understands the significant resources
needed to defend this lawsuit, but it is unfair to Sabre to delay resolution of this case to facilitate
the other defendants’ preference to take a “wait and see” approach.2
Fact discovery is nearing the finish line. While American contends that whatever
remains is too expensive to interfere with its potential mediation, such self-serving assertions are
insufficient to demonstrate the “good cause” required to stay discovery. See Moreno v. Marvin
Windows, Inc., EP-07-CA-091-PRM, 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 51957, at *2-3 (W.D. Tex. Jun. 14,
2007) (moving party failed “to show why all discovery should be stayed because some discovery
may be difficult or expensive for the parties”); M.D. v. Perry, Civil Action No. C-11-84, 2011
U.S. Dist. LEXIS 152121, at *6-7 (S.D. Tex. Jul. 21, 2011) (the “prospect of burdensome or
expensive discovery alone is not sufficient to” warrant a stay when doing so “would appear to be
at least equally injurious to [opposing parties], who seek a timely resolution to their” claims);
United States ex rel. Gonzalez v. Fresenius Med. Care N. America, 571 F. Supp. 2d 766, 768
(W.D. Tex. 2008) (“the Court finds that [the moving parties] have failed to satisfy their burden to
show that ‘good cause’ exists to stay discovery”). In this case, American’s, Travelport’s, and
Orbitz’s self-serving assertion that discovery is too expensive is insufficient to establish the
“good cause” needed to stay discovery.
CONCLUSION
For each of the foregoing reasons, Sabre respectfully requests that the Court deny the
moving parties’ request to stay this case indefinitely.
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American claims that Sabre is not spending resources in this case because it has attended depositions
without asking questions. But American fails to tell the Court that it and Sabre have conducted more than
70 depositions in the state case on identical issues. By not questioning American’s witnesses a second
time in their depositions in this case, Sabre is trying to respect its long-standing position that the parties
should not conduct duplicative and unnecessary discovery. The fact that American is now trying to create
unnecessary expense by re-deposing Sabre’s witnesses (an effort Sabre opposes) does not support
American’s request for a stay.

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Dated: August 29, 2012

Respectfully submitted,
/s/ Sundeep K. (Rob) Addy
Ralph H. Duggins
Texas Bar No. 06183700
([e-mail])
Scott A. Fredricks
Texas Bar No. 24012657
([e-mail])
Philip A. Vickers
Texas Bar No. 24051699
([e-mail])
C ANTEY H ANGER LLP
Cantey Hanger Plaza
600 West 6th Street, Suite 300
Fort Worth, TX 76102-3685
Telephone: [phone]
Facsimile: [phone]
Chris Lind
Illinois Bar No. 6225464,
Colorado Bar No 27719
([e-mail])
Andrew K. Polovin
Illinois Bar No. 6275707
([e-mail])
B ARTLIT B ECK H ERMAN P ALENCHAR
& S COTT LLP
54 West Hubbard Street, Suite 300
Chicago, IL 60610
Telephone: [phone]
Facsimile: [phone]
Donald E. Scott
Colorado Bar No. 21219, Illinois Bar No.
2531321
([e-mail])
Karma M. Giulianelli
Colorado Bar No. 30919, California Bar No.
184175
([e-mail])
Sean C. Grimsley
Colorado Bar No. 36422,
California Bar No. 216741
([e-mail])

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Sundeep K. (Rob) Addy
Colorado Bar No. 38754
([e-mail])
B ARTLIT B ECK H ERMAN P ALENCHAR
& S COTT LLP
1899 Wynkoop Street, 8th Floor
Denver, Colorado 80202
Telephone: [phone]
Facsimile: [phone]
George S. Cary
([e-mail])
Steven J. Kaiser
([e-mail])
C LEARY G OTTLIEB S TEEN &
H AMILTON LLP
2000 Pennsylvania Ave., N.W.
Washington, DC 20006
Telephone: [phone]
Facsimile: [phone]
Attorneys for Sabre Inc., Sabre Holdings
Corporation, and Sabre Travel International
Limited

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CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE
I hereby certify that all counsel of record who are deemed to have consented to electronic
service are being served with a copy of the foregoing document via the Court’s CM/ECF system
pursuant to the Court’s Local Rule 5.1(d) on August 29, 2012.
/s/ Sundeep K. (Rob) Addy
B ARTLIT B ECK H ERMAN
PALENCHAR & S COTT LLP
1899 Wynkoop St., 8th Fl.
Denver, CO 80202
Phone: [phone]
Fax: [phone]
[e-mail]
Counsel for Defendants Sabre Inc., Sabre Holdings
Corp, and Sabre Travel Int’l Ltd. d/b/a Sabre Travel
Network

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