Named Plaintiffs Don’t Have to Respond to Discovery

In the Qwest securities litigation case, Defendant Arthur Andersen determined that it needed the named plaintiffs’ trading records and investment strategies in order to properly evaluate reliance, loss causation, and statute of limitations issues. Plaintiffs refused, arguing that only the proposed class representatives should have to respond to discovery, and that the named plaintiffs’ information was irrelevant. U.S. Magistrate Judge Shaffer (D. Colo.) stepped in and sided with Plaintiffs on this one. Relying on In re Lucent, 2002 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 24973 (D.N.J. 2002), the Court accepted Plaintiffs’ position that “[A]ndersen shows no reason why the sample of seven [named plaintiffs] – which happens to comprise less than one hundredth of one percent of the class – represents a cross section of the class in this case.” Andersen also wanted discovery from a proposed non-party class representative who withdrew its request to serve after being hit with a Fed.R.Civ.P. 26(a) & (b) initial disclosure request. Based on the same reasoning, Judge Shaffer denied that discovery as well. Milberg Weiss is lead counsel for Plaintiffs and Arnold & Porter represents Andersen. The decision, filed June 7, 2005, is available at 22005 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 11618.