Porter v. Farmers Insurance Company, Inc., No. 4:2010cv00116 - Document 49 (N.D. Okla. 2011)
Court Description: OPINION AND ORDER by Magistrate Judge Paul J Cleary regarding in camera review of personnel files (kjp, Dpty Clk)
Download PDF
<![CDATA[
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF OKLAHOMA MICHAEL PORTER, ) ) Plaintiff, ) ) v. ) ) FARMERS INSURANCE COMPANY, ) INC., ) ) Defendant. ) Case No. 10-CV-116-GKF-PJC OPINION AND ORDER Defendant Farmers Insurance Company, Inc. ( Farmers ) has submitted to the Court for in camera review, the personnel files of Trisha Gilpin, Joseph Cazpla and James Beins who were involved in the processing the insurance claim of Plaintiff Michael Porter ( Porter ). Farmers has asserted general objections to production of any portion of these files on grounds of confidentiality and relevance. As this Court noted in an earlier Order in this case, Courts have generally permitted discovery of relevant personnel files in insurance bad faith cases. Porter v. Farmers Inc. Co., Inc., 2011 WL 1566018, *1 (N.D. Okla. April 25, 2011). See also, Waters v. Continental General Insurance Co., 2008 WL 2510039, *1 (N.D. Okla. June 19, 2008); Fullbright v. State Farm Mutual Automobile Ins. Co., 2010 WL 300436, *4 (W.D. Okla. Jan. 20, 2010). In such cases, evidence concerning an employee s training and job performance may be relevant. The Court has reviewed the submitted personnel files in camera and finds that the following information from those files should be produced, subject to the extant protective order: information regarding the employee s background and job qualifications, training and job performance. As an example, in reviewing Trisha Gilpin s file, the Court finds that the following pages should be produced: FA721-733; FA738-756; FA761-762; FA771-795. Similar documents in the Czapla and Beins files should also be produced. IT IS SO ORDERED this 10th day of May 2011.
]]>
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You
should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google
Privacy Policy and
Terms of Service apply.
