FLORIDA PATIENT'S COMPENSATION FUND, PETITIONER,
v.
GEORGE REYKA, AS PERSONAL REPRESENTATIVE OF THE ESTATE OF MARY A. REYKA, DECEASED, AND THE SURVIVORS THEREOF, RESPONDENTS
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The Florida appellate court reviewed an order denying a motion to quash a deposition duces tecum. The court held that the Florida Patient's Compensation Fund's financial records were not subject to discovery through civil procedure rules when the public already had statutory access to them.
The court held that the Florida Rules of Civil Procedure were not intended to be used to obtain information for settlement purposes when statutory provisions already grant the public access to the requested records. Therefore, the trial court erred in denying the motion to quash.
[1] A trial court order denying a motion to quash a notice of taking deposition duces tecum is reviewable by writ of certiorari.
[2] A party in a lawsuit cannot use discovery rules to obtain financial records when statutory provisions already allow the general public access to such records without a ju…
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“The notice to produce requested almost every conceivable financial record of petitioner, notwithstanding the lack of necessity for using a judicial proceeding to effect what section 768.-54(3)(d)(2) expressly permits every member of the public.”
Establishes the broad scope of the discovery request and the petitioner's argument regarding statutory access.
Previewing 1 of 3 key quotes on this case — the court’s exact language, pinpointed for members.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceThe Florida Patient's Compensation Fund (petitioner) was served with a notice of deposition duces tecum and a notice to produce requesting extensive f…
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GLICKSTEIN, Judge.
This is a petition for writ of certiorari addressed to an order of the trial court which denied petitioner’s motion to quash the notice of taking deposition duces tecum served upon it. The motion was primarily directed to the notice to produce served simultaneously with the notice of taking deposition in the wrongful death action, filed in 1980, in which petitioner had been joined pursuant to section 768.54(3)(e)(l), Florida Statutes. The notice to produce requested almost every conceivable financial record of petitioner, notwithstanding the lack of necessity for using a judicial proceeding to effect what section 768.-54(3)(d)(2) expressly permits every member of the public.1 Respondents clearly made no showing as to a compelling reason for them to be in any more favored position than the public because a law suit was in progress. No judgment had been effected that might justify involving the judiciary and subjecting petitioner to sanctions, particularly when members of the public have remedies to enforce their right to obtain information expressly available to them by statute. We are ever mindful of respondents’ concern for their ability to recover; but to use the Florida Rules of Civil Procedure to obtain information for settlement or related purposes was not, in our view, the intent of Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.280(b)(1). Accordingly, we grant the petition and quash the order as to the production of those records contemplated by the notice duces tecum and notice to produce.
ANSTEAD and HERSEY, JJ., concur. . Section 768.54(3)(d)(2), Florida Statutes (Supp.1982), provides:
All books, records, and audits of the fund shall be open for reasonable inspection to the general public, except that a claim file in possession of the fund, fund members, and their insurers shall not be available for review during processing of that claim. Any book, record, document, audit, or asset acquired by, prepared for, or paid for by the fund is subject to the authority of the board of governors, which shall be responsible therefor.