Suzuki concerned the “apex doctrine”—a doctrine that traditionally protects high-ranking employees and officials from burdensome and harassing discovery. Here, the plaintiff claimed that the brakes on his Suzuki motorcycle failed, causing him to crash. Four months after the accident, Suzuki Motor Corp. issued a recall on the brakes at issue. The plaintiff filed a products liability suit against Suzuki. In the course of discovery, the plaintiff sought a “letter rogatory”—essentially, a request to take a foreign deposition—from the trial court in order to take the deposition of the Chairman of the Board of Suzuki in Japan, on the claimed basis that the Chairman “possesses unique knowledge about specific facts relevant to [the] allegations.” Suzuki pushed back, arguing that under the apex doctrine, its top-level corporate manager should not be subject to examination on such issues. The First District Court of Appeal held that the apex doctrine did not apply, as the doctrine is only clearly established as applying in the government context to high-ranking government officials.
On review to the Florida Supreme Court, the Institute and the Chamber of Commerce of the United States of America authored an amicus brief in support of Suzuki, arguing that the failure to extend the apex doctrine to high-level corporate managers authorizes the use of discovery to harass defendants and force them into settling meritless cases.
On August 26, 2021, the Court agreed that the apex doctrine should extend to the corporate context, and addressed the problem outlined in Suzuki through a change to the Florida Rules of Civil Procedure themselves—so that the Court would not be “constrained by the limited scope of . . . review” afforded in Suzuki and could adopt clear guidelines for the apex doctrine. The change takes place immediately and applies in pending cases. See In re: Amend. to Fla. R. Civ. P., No. SC21-929 (Fla. Aug. 26, 2021).
The Institute was represented by William W. Large and Jason Gonzalez and Amber Stoner Nunnally of Shutts & Bowen LLP.