The Deontay Wilder versus World of Boxing/Alexander Povetkin case has not ended. Despite a Court ruling which denied World of Boxing and Povetkin’s (collectively WOB”) motions for new trial and/or motion for a judgment notwithstanding the verdict, the parties continue with the other elements of the causes of action.
In September, the Court denied motion to overturn the February jury verdict which determined that Povetkin took Meldonium after January 1, 2016. Meldonium was a banned substance post-January 1, 2016. He claimed that the detection of the Meldonium stemmed from taking it sometime in 2015.
A Joint Status Report filed with the Court mapped out further happenings in this lawsuit. There is scheduling for the potential of a Motion for Summary Judgment and WOB has filed a Motion to Compel documents.
At this point, the attorneys for WOB filed a motion to compel certain documents from a string of emails from May 25, 2016. This came to light during a deposition in which a WOB lawyer attempted to question a witness about the email string. The lawyers for Wilder requested to “clawback” the document. A “clawback” is a provision which allows the return of documents that were erroneously provided to the other side. The reason for the “clawback” is that they are protected by a certain privilege or confidentiality. This occurs in high-volume electronic discovery cases.
Wilder asserts that the emails were confidential communications protected by attorney-client privilege. The Wilder privilege log which lists the documents that have not been produced to the other side states that they are protected by the Attorney-Client Privilege. WOB claims that these exceptions do not apply. The gist here is that the documents that are being withheld are said to be confidential because they include attorneys in the string of emails. However, WOB claims that these emails are not protected because they were provided to third parties.
Payout Perspective:
Just when you thought that this case might be over, it continues. It appears that the parties are moving forward with the Breach of Contract cause of action. This motion to compel was held until the finish of the post-trial briefing per Court order. At this point, we don’t know the substance of the emails that are being withheld, only that they relate to Meldonium. Wilder’s attorneys will likely argue that the substance of the emails is protected by attorney-client privilege or were provided to others maintaining privilege. WOB argues that the substance of the emails is not legal in nature and do not uphold the privilege. Even if the emails are proven not to be attorney-client privilege and handed over to WOB, the question is whether the substance of those emails will have any impact on the case. A jury did find that Povetkin took Meldonium post-January 1, 2016. Any information from the Wilder emails must provide something more to prove elements of WOB’s theory of the case.
MMA Payout will keep you posted.
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