A recent discovery ruling from an Ohio federal magistrate judge offers a helpful primer on how corporate representatives should prepare for depositions. The ruling, In re FirstEnergy Corp. Securities Litig., No. 2:20-cv-3785...more
Previously, I wrote about a proposed amendment to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 30(b)(6) that would create a meet and confer requirement among counsel concerning the topics for examining a corporate representative in a...more
In a 63-page decision issued on Jan. 13, 2020, in Lebanon County Employees’ Retirement Fund v. AmerisourceBergen Corporation, Vice Chancellor J. Travis Laster of the Delaware Court of Chancery found that stockholders of...more
Under Fed. R. Civ. P. 30(b)(6), corporations must designate and educate one or more witnesses to answer deposition questions based on the corporation's collective knowledge. Such depositions raise obvious privilege issues,...more
On November 9, 2016, United States Magistrate Judge Paul D. Stickney (N.D. Tex.) entered an Order that serves as a reminder to corporate litigants and their counsel that the demands of Rule 30(b)(6) should not be disregarded...more
A corporate entity is regarded by the law as a “person” for purposes of standing to sue and be sued, but an organization, whether corporation, partnership, governmental organization, or other entity, can act only through its...more
SUCCESSOR CORPORATION - Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 30(b)(6) allows a party to take the deposition of an organization by identifying the topics about which the party seeks information from the corporation. In...more
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 30(b)(6) permits a corporate representative to testify during deposition about matters within the corporation’s knowledge. This testimony does not require the corporate representative to have...more
Under Fed. R. Civ. P. 30(b)(6), corporations must designate a witness to testify about the corporation's knowledge. Surprisingly few courts have reconciled this requirement with the common if not universal role that lawyers...more
Failing to adequately prepare a corporate witness for his or her 30(b)(6) deposition can have serious consequences. In fact, courts treat an unprepared 30(b)(6) witness as a witness who simply never bothered to show up for...more
When we prepare 30(b)(6) corporate representatives and executives for their depositions, they are often fearful that the questioning attorney will try to trick them into admitting something that is not entirely accurate. They...more
In an order recently issued in EEOC v J.R. Baker Farms, LLC, et al., Case No. 7:14-CV-136 (M.D. Ga. Sept. 9, 2015), Senior Judge Hugh Lawson of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Georgia compelled the EEOC to...more
Rule 30(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure allows corporations' adversaries to insist that the corporation select a spokesman to provide binding testimony about designated topics. These depositions almost...more
This portion of the materials will focus on the use and effect of 30(b)(6) deposition testimony. ...more