International Depositions

What Are International Depositions?

Federal Rule of Civil Procedure Rule 28 allows deposition of a third party to be taken in a foreign country “on appropriate terms after application and notice of it.”1 Fed. R. Civ. P. 28(b)(2)(A). The court can request letters of interrogatory in order to formally request a court in another country to lend its judicial assistance in obtaining evidence or performing some other judicial act. The party that is seeking the deposition bears the burden of demonstrating the relevance and that the information is relevant and reasonably calculated enough to be added into evidence.

In Blagman v. Apple we saw that this request was granted, even though plaintiff requested twice to seek discovery of customers outside the United States and was denied.2 The ones he requested in this motion were distinguishable, as the plaintiff sought to depose certain entities concerning digital recordings.3 The testimony may also support plaintiff’s claims of commonality.4

  1. Blagman v. Apple, Inc., 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 45401 (S.D.N.Y. Mar. 31, 2014).

 

  • Blagman v. Apple, Inc., 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 45401 (S.D.N.Y. Mar. 31, 2014).

Blagman had filed a motion to depose third parties from the U.K. and France. Amazon contended that the court had already ruled that extraterritorial evidence was not admissible in this case. The court disagreed and granted the motion to depose the third parties located internationally.