United States v. Under Seal

The under seal appellant ("Company 1"), a foreign company, appealed the district court's denial of its motion to quash the government's grand-jury subpoenas served on the under seal intervenor ("Company 2") where the subpoenas sought documents that Company 1 delivered to Company 2 in response to discovery requests that arose during the course of civil litigation between the two companies in district court. The court affirmed the denial of Company 1's motion to quash the government's subpoenas and held that the district court did not abuse its discretion in determining that the subpoenas passed muster under Rule 17 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure and Company 1 provided no basis for the court to craft a new procedural rule in support of its position. The court also held that there were no clearly erroneous rulings by the district court in resolving the factual issue regarding the nature of Company 2's interaction with the government and Company 1 failed to show that the issue merited any further investigation or an evidentiary hearing. The court rejected Company 1's remaining arguments and affirmed the district court's denial of Company 1's motion to quash.