Aggressive litigation adversaries sometimes try to make a discovery sideshow into the main event. A party’s search for responsive documents occasionally triggers such an effort.
In Fleeman v. County of Kern, the court explained that “a deponent generally cannot refuse to describe what documents he searched for and how he searched for them.” Case No. 1:20-cv-00321-JLT-CDB, 2025 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 52835, at *10 (C.D. Cal. Mar. 21, 2025). But the court then quoted an earlier opinion in acknowledging an exception — “if the answer to why they searched in a certain manner implicates attorney-client privilege, they are not required to answer.” Id. (citation omitted).
Although the court didn’t describe it this succinctly, its ruling correctly highlighted a basic axiom that generally applies to permissible document discovery and depositions. An adversary can ask who, what, when and where — but not why.
