| M&T Bank Corp. v Gemstone CDO VII, Ltd. |
| 2010 NY Slip Op 08484 [78 AD3d 1664] |
| November 19, 2010 |
| Appellate Division, Fourth Department |
| M&T Bank Corporation, Respondent, v Gemstone CDO VII,Ltd., et al., Defendants, and Deutsche Bank Securities, Inc., Appellant. |
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Appeal from an order of the Supreme Court, Erie County (John A. Michalek, J.), entered May 5,2010 in a breach of contract action. The order, among other things, granted in part and denied in partplaintiff's motion to compel production of documents.
It is hereby ordered that the order so appealed from is unanimously affirmed without costs.
Memorandum: Plaintiff commenced this action to recover damages for, inter alia, breach ofcontract arising from its purchase of certain mortgage-backed securities from defendants. DefendantDeutsche Bank Securities, Inc. (DBSI) contends on appeal that Supreme Court erred in granting thoseparts of plaintiff's motion to compel DBSI to produce documents concerning certain types of securities,inasmuch as DBSI had previously provided those documents to the New York State Attorney General(AG) in connection with the AG's investigation of possible fraud in the preparation, packaging andmarketing of those types of securities. We affirm. Contrary to the contention of DBSI, the court neitherabused nor improvidently exercised its discretion in directing DBSI to provide plaintiff with copies ofthe documents in question, particularly in view of the fact that CPLR 3101 (a) is to be interpretedliberally in favor of disclosure (see generally Andon v 302-304 Mott St. Assoc., 94 NY2d740, 745-746 [2000]). We conclude in addition that the documents sought were material andnecessary to the prosecution of the action (see generally Allen v Crowell-Collier Publ. Co., 21NY2d 403, 406-407 [1968]). Furthermore, although "the need for discovery must be weighed againstany special burden to be borne by the opposing party" (Andon, 94 NY2d at 747 [internalquotation marks omitted]), DBSI has failed to establish that any special burden arises from providingplaintiff with electronic copies of the documents previously supplied to the AG.Present—Lindley, J.P., Sconiers, Pine and Gorski, JJ.