Court Denies Motion for Protective Order or Cost-Shifting Related to Request to Utilize Sixty-Seven Search Terms
Juster Acquisition Co., LLC v. N. Hudson Sewerage Auth., No. 12-3427 (JLL), 2013 WL 541972 (D.N.J. Feb. 11, 2013)
In this case, the court denied Defendant’s motion for a protective order “regarding the sixty-seven (67) electronic word searches” demanded by the plaintiff. It also denied Defendant’s request that the cost of running those searches be shifted to the plaintiff.
Plaintiff’s first Request for Production included a list of 67 proposed search terms to be run against Defendant’s ESI. In response, Defendant sought a protective order or, alternatively, an order shifting the costs associated with the search, arguing it was “entitled” to a protective order because it had already produced 8000 pages of responsive documents (in hard copy) and because, in its view, the requested search terms were “quite broad and vague.”