Issue: Under the Federal Rules, may a party property object to a discovery request by arguing that the requesting party already possesses the documents sought in the request?
| Area of Law: | Litigation & Procedure |
| Keywords: | Request documents from a defendant; Information is in requesting party's possession; Obtainable from another source |
| Jurisdiction: | Federal, Florida |
| Cited Cases: | None |
| Cited Statutes: | None |
| Date: | 06/01/2013 |
There may be many legitimate reasons to request documents from a defendant even though the same information may already be in the requesting party’s possession or obtainable from another source. See e.g., Weiner v. Bache Halsey Stuart, Inc., 76 F.R.D. 624, 625 (S.D. Fla. 1977) (“Here, defendant has noted that the records sought will shed light on questions such as which records plaintiffs elected to retain, why they elected to retain them, and where they were maintained. Further, there may be handwritten notations on plaintiffs’ records. In a suit wherein the sophistication of the purchaser is an important matter for consideration, this court cannot find that defendant’s request is incompatible with the scope of discovery permitted under the Federal Rules.”).
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