Case No. 1:03-CV-17000, (MDL Docket No. 1535).
June 1, 2007
KATHLEEN O'MALLEY, District Judge
On April 3, 2007, the Court issued an Order requiring each of the defendants in this case to submit written discovery certifications. See docket no. 2013 (" Discovery Certification Order"). Thereafter, various defendants contacted the Court with questions regarding this requirement. In light of those questions, the Court has reconsidered which defendants must submit the Discovery Certification, the form of the Discovery Certification they must submit, and related issues.
Accordingly, the Court now rules as follows. For the reasons stated in the Discovery Certification Order, the Court now ORDERS each of the following defendants in this MDL to submit a written discovery certification, using the attached revised form, within 21 days of the date of this Order. The Court may later impose this discovery certification requirement on additional defendants.
Lincoln Electric Company BOC Group, Inc. General Electric Company Hobart Brothers Company TDY Industries, Inc. A.O. Smith Corp. ESAB Group, Inc. Caterpillar, Inc. Arcos Industries, LLC Eutectic Corp. Select Arc, Inc. Viacom, Inc. Illinois Tool Works, Inc. Union Carbide Corp. IT IS SO ORDERED. DISCOVERY CERTIFICATION ON BEHALF OF _________________________ _________________________ [ NAME(S) OF DEFENDANT(S)]
In re: Welding Fume Products Liability Litigation Welding Fume MDL Welding Fume MDL Welding Fume MDL. Welding Fume MDL Welding Fume MDL Welding Fume MDL Other Claims Order. Welding Fume MDL Welding Fume MDL CERTIFY Welding Fume MDL. CERTIFY CERTIFY Welding Fume MDL. Name Title Company Signature Date Related Defendant Entities Welding Fume MDL 1. I am an officer or executive employee authorized to speak on behalf of a company that has been named as a defendant (and/or a company that is a parent or successor-in-interest to another company named as a defendant) in one or more of the cases that compose the Multi-District Litigation known as , 03-CV-17000 (MDL Docket no. 1535), assigned to the Honorable Judge Kathleen McDonald O'Malley (" "). 2. I understand that, in connection with the , my company has obligations to discover, and produce to counsel for plaintiffs, certain documents, electronically stored data, and other things (collectively, "Documents"). These obligations, which are continuing, flow from: (1) discovery requests propounded by the plaintiffs; and (2) orders issued by the Judge and the Special Master assigned to the 3. I understand that, to fulfill its discovery obligations in the , my company has been required to conduct diligent searches for Documents that are responsive to discovery requests made by plaintiffs and to Orders issued by the Court, using comprehensive search strategies. This includes reasonable, good faith efforts toward: (a) investigating the location of all potentially responsive Documents within the domain of my company and its agents, and (b) reviewing the contents of those documents to determine whether they are responsive. 4. I understand that, when determining whether a Document should be produced to plaintiffs in the in response to a request for production made pursuant to the FRCP, my company is obligated to produce non-privileged Documents that are "relevant to the claims or defenses of any party." This includes any document tending to show that any current or past employee or agent of the company was told, or had reason to believe, that welding fumes might cause neurological injury. I further understand that the Court has ordered manufacturing companies to search for and produce non-privileged Documents related to claims made "by any individual that the use of welding consumables caused any type of neurological injury." 5. To ensure that my company has fulfilled its obligations in the regarding discovery and production of Documents, I have personally reviewed: (1) the Requests for Production propounded by the plaintiffs upon my company; and (2) the Court's Case Management Orders and other Orders regarding discovery obligations, including the 6. To ensure that my company has fulfilled its obligations in the regarding discovery and production of Documents, I have personally reviewed the scope and depth of the efforts my company undertook to discover and produce responsive Documents, including conferring directly with the persons directly responsible for this discovery and production. 7. I have also conferred with the following legal counsel to ensure that I understand my company's obligations in the regarding discovery and production of Documents, and to ensure my company has taken all reasonable and necessary steps to fulfill those obligations: __________________________________________________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________. (fill in name of legal counsel) 8. I hereby that, as described above, my company has engaged in a thorough, reasonable, good-faith effort to locate all Documents that are responsive to: (a) discovery requests made by plaintiffs, and (b) Orders issued by the Court in the I further that, as to each and every such discovered Document, my company has made a good faith effort to either: (1) produce the Document to plaintiffs; or (2) list the Document in a Privilege Log, submitted the Log to the Special Master, and received a ruling that the Document was properly redacted or withheld; or (3) object to the production of the Document, which objection was not overruled. I further that my company has a good-faith basis to believe that any other documents within the company's domain are not responsive or relevant to any discovery requests made by plaintiffs or to Orders issued by the Court in the 9. I understand that, if the Court subsequently concludes my company did not engage in a thorough, reasonable, good-faith effort to discover and produce all Documents, as described above, the Court may impose sanctions upon my company. _______________________________________ _______________________________________ _______________________________________ _______________________________________ _______________________________________ _____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________ (List all companies named as defendants in the on behalf of which you are providing this Discovery Certification, including predecessors-in-interest and otherwise-related entities).