I’m keeping an eye on the new cert. petition in Kiobel v. Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP. This was the case where a plaintiff had sought to use § 1782 to obtain documents from its opponent’s (Royal Dutch Shell’s) US law firm (Cravath) that had previously been produced, for use in US litigation, subject to a protective order. She sought the documents for use in Dutch litigation. The district court had allowed the application, but the Second Circuit reversed, holding that the lower court had abused its discretion. As I highlighted in my prior post, the key to the Second Circuit’s decision (which I criticized) seems to be that the Dutch court might not treat the documents as confidential and that Shell, Cravath’s client,…

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