Paul Ferrer—Senior Attorney, National Legal Research Group

          We have written frequently in the Lawletter about the revolution in federal pleading practice occasioned by the Supreme Court’s decisions in Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544 (2007), and Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662 (2009). Under the new standard, a claim is sufficient to withstand a motion to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (or a motion for judgment on the pleadings under Rule 12(c)) only when, accepting as true the facts alleged in the complaint but not any legal conclusions, the claim has “facial plausibility,” that is, it allows the court “to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged.” Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678; see also Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570 (the plaintiff must allege enough by way of factual content to “nudge” her claim “across the line from conceivable to plausible”). This standard requires the plaintiff to include more facts in her complaint than were necessary before the dawn of the Twombly/Iqbal era.

     Laches is "'a defense developed by courts of equity' to protect defendants against 'unreasonable, prejudicial delay in commencing suit.'" SCA Hygiene Prods. Aktiebolag v. First Quality Baby Prods., LLC, 137 S. Ct. 954, 960 (2017) (quoting Petrella v. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Inc., 134 S. Ct. 1962, 1967, 1973 (2014)). It is a familiar statement of the law that laches generally does not apply when the statute of limitations applicable to a legal claim has not run. But many state courts continue to indicate that, in some circumstances, "laches may bar a legal claim even if the statutory period of limitations has not yet expired." Tenneco Inc. v. Amerisure Mut. Ins. Co., 281 Mich. App. 429, 456-57, 761 N.W.2d 846, 863-64 (2008); see also Veysey v. Nelson, 2017 UT App 77, ¶ 7, 397 P.3d 846, 848 ("[B]ecause laches may apply in situations where the statute of limitations has not yet run, the existence of a statute of limitations does not … automatically preclude application of the laches doctrine."), cert. denied, 400 P.3d 1046 (Utah 2017); Bldg. & Constr. Trades Council of N. Nev. v. State ex rel. Pub. Works Bd., 108 Nev. 605, 611, 836 P.2d 633, 637 (1992) ("Especially strong circumstances must exist . . . to sustain a defense of laches when the statute of limitations has not run.").  However, that no longer appears to be the case in federal court, at least with respect to a federal claim as to which Congress has expressly supplied a statute of limitations.

            In Petrella, the U.S. Supreme Court held that laches cannot defeat a damages claim brought within the three-year period prescribed by the Copyright Act's statute of limitations. 134 S. Ct. at 1972-75 (applying 17 U.S.C. § 507(b) (requiring a copyright holder claiming infringement to file suit "within three years after the claim accrued")); see also SCA Hygiene, 137 S. Ct. at 961 ("We saw in this language a congressional judgment that a claim filed within three years of accrual cannot be dismissed on timeliness grounds."). In so holding, the Court spoke in very broad terms: "[I]n the face of a statute of limitations enacted by Congress, laches cannot be invoked to bar legal relief." Petrella, 134 S. Ct. at 1974. Petrella's holding rested on both separation-of-powers principles and the traditional role of laches in equity. Since

Paul Ferrer, Senior Attorney, National Legal Research Group

            Rule 4(f) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure establishes three mechanisms for serving an individual in a foreign country. First, service may be had "by any internationally agreed means of service that is reasonably calculated to give notice, such as those authorized by the Hague Convention." Fed. R. Civ. P. 4(f)(1). The Hague Convention is the standard method for serving an individual in a foreign country, but it does not preempt all other methods of service on individuals in another signatory nation. See 4B Charles A. Wright et al., Federal Practice and Procedure § 1134 (4th ed. & Westlaw updated through Apr. 2017). Rather, all three methods of service under Rule 4(f) are "on equal footing," and a plaintiff need not attempt service by any one method before resorting to another. Rio Props., Inc. v. Rio Int'l Interlink, 284 F.3d 1007, 1015-16 (9th Cir. 2002). Second, if there is no internationally agreed means, or if an international agreement allows but does not specify other means, then service may be had "by a method that is reasonably calculated to give notice," including service "as prescribed by the foreign country's law for service in that country in an action in its courts of general jurisdiction," or by delivering a copy of the summons and complaint to the individual personally, unless that method is prohibited by the foreign country's law. Fed. R. Civ. P. 4(f)(2)(A), (C). Third, an individual may be served in a foreign country "by other means not prohibited by international agreement, as the court orders." Id. R. 4(f)(3).

Paul Ferrer, Senior Attorney, National Legal Research Group

            Rule 34 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure permits a party to request the responding party, within the scope of Rule 26(b), to produce for inspection designated documents and electronically stored information. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 34(a)(1). The request for production must, among other things, "describe with reasonable particularity each item or category of items to be inspected." Id. R. 34(b)(1)(A).

            The responding party generally must respond within 30 days after being served with the request for production. Id. R. 34(b)(2)(A). Effective December 1, 2015, Rule 34(b)(2)(B) was amended to require that for each item or category of items requested, "the response must either state that inspection and related activities will be permitted as requested or state with specificity the grounds for objecting to the request, including the reasons." Id. R. 34(b)(2)(B) (emphasis added). The amendment to Rule 34(b)(2)(B) clarifies that general or boilerplate objections, such as that a request is harassing, are improper and result in a waiver of the unsupported objections. See, e.g., Leibovitz v. City of New York, No. 15-CV-546 (LGS) (HBP), 2017 WL 462515, at *2 (S.D.N.Y. Feb. 3, 2017) (collecting cases); see also Fed. R. Civ. P. 34 advisory comm. note to 2015 amend. ("This provision . . . eliminat[es] any doubt that less specific objections might be suitable under Rule 34.").

Paul Ferrer, Senior Attorney, National Legal Research Group

     For many years, trial attorneys were familiar with the broad scope of discovery under Rule 26(b)(1) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, which provided that unless otherwise limited by court order, parties could "obtain discovery regarding any nonprivileged matter that is relevant to any party's claim or defense." As indicated in Rule 26(b)(1), the scope of discovery could be limited by the entry of a protective order if the court determined, among other things, that "the burden or expense of the proposed discovery outweighs its likely benefit, considering the needs of the case, the amount in controversy, the parties' resources, the importance of the issues at stake in the action, and the importance of the discovery in resolving the issues." Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(2)(C)(iii) (amended), quoted in EEOC v. Thompson Contracting, Grading, Paving & Utils., Inc., 499 F. App'x 275, 281 n.5 (4th Cir. 2012). As part of the "Duke Rules" package of amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, which took effect on December 1, 2015, that language was moved out of Rule 26(b)(2)(C)(iii) and into Rule 26(b)(1), which now provides that

[u]nless otherwise limited by court order, [p]arties may obtain discovery regarding any nonprivileged matter that is relevant to any party's claim or defense and proportional to the needs of the case, considering the importance of the issues at stake in the action, the amount in controversy, the parties' relative access to relevant information, the parties' resources, the importance of the discovery in resolving the issues, and whether the burden or expense of the proposed discovery outweighs its likely benefit.