Jessee v. Farmers Insurance Exchange
Insurance bad faith case, challenging defendant’s overbroad protective order that applied to and limited the disclosure and use of documents obtained by plaintiffs’ counsel from outside the litigation.
In this insurance bad faith case, we helped plaintiffs’ counsel fight an overbroad protective order that applied to and limited the disclosure and use of documents obtained by plaintiffs’ counsel from outside the litigation. Our brief argued, among other things, that the protective order was an unconstitutional prior restraint on speech. The Colorado Supreme Court ruled in our favor and vacated the protective order. Public Justice Attorneys Leslie Brueckner and Leslie Bailey are co-counsel with Denver, Colorado’s Randall Kelly.
Case Documents
Colorado Supreme Court decision
Colorado Supreme Court decision striking down protective order that would have made key evidence in an insurance bad faith case secret, even though the documents were already in the public domain and an injury victim's attorney obtained them without a protective order in a prior case against Farmers Insurance Exchange. The court held – as we had urged – that such a sweeping order was not permitted by Colorado discovery rules.
Colorado Supreme Court
Docket: 2004CV1073Amicus Brief
Amici brief of the Impact Fund, Public Justice, et al.
Petitioner's reply brief
Petitioner's reply brief in support of petition for order to show cause. The Colorado Supreme Court agreed to hear our challenge to a sweeping protective order that would make key evidence in an insurance bad faith case secret, even though the documents were already in the public domain and an injury victim's attorney obtained them without a protective order in a prior case against Farmers Insurance Exchange.
Colorado Supreme Court
Docket: 2004CV1073