Extract from Riley Brennan’s article “Judge Shuts Down Access to Documents That Were Inadvertently Emailed to Opposing Counsel in Patent Dispute”
A defendant in a patent dispute will not need to turn over documents it accidentally shared to opposing counsel, a Massachusetts federal judge has ruled, wading into a muddled area of law regarding the disclosure of expert witness documents and communications with counsel.
On Friday, U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani for the District of Massachusetts denied Sonate Corp., doing business as Vegadelphia Foods’ motion to compel a trio of internal emails that the defendant, Beyond Meat, had accidentally shared with Vegadelphia in March 2024.
Although Beyond Meat had successfully clawed the emails back, the company also shared the information with Beyond Meat’s expert, John Plumpe, which led to Vegedelphia’s most recent effort to compel its opponent to turn over the information.
Beyond Meat, however, argued its disclosure to the expert was inadvertent and that it had meant to share redacted versions with Plumpe, but confusion with the labeling of the documents resulted in the wrong ones being shared.
The court ultimately concluded that the disclosure of the documents to Plumpe was accidental and didn’t constitute an implied waiver of attorney-client privilege. Further, the court said disclosure wasn’t required because Plumpe didn’t review or consider the documents in forming his opinion.
