Third District Court of Appeal
State of Florida
Opinion filed September 9, 2026.
Not final until disposition of timely filed motion for rehearing.
No. 3D26-1281
Lower Tribunal No. 25-2111-FC-04
Sarah Wishnek Metalonis,
Petitioner,
vs.
David Christopher Metalonis,
Respondent.
A Writ of Certiorari to the Circuit Court for Miami-Dade County, George A. Sarduy, Judge.
Koltun & Lazar, P.A., and Scott Alan Lazar, for petitioner.
Rafool, PLLC, and Raymond J. Rafool, and Patricia Montes de Oca, for respondent.
Before SCALES, C.J., and FERNANDEZ and BOKOR, JJ.
BOKOR, J.
Sarah Wishnek Metalonis petitions this court for certiorari review of two
discovery orders entered upon the motion of David Christopher Metalonis in
the family court below. The orders compel Sarah to produce “[a]ny and all
text messages” between herself and her mother from January 1, 2024,
through at least June 18, 2026. For the reasons below, we grant the petition
and quash the orders on review.
I.
This petition stems from a dissolution of marriage proceeding and
Sarah’s related request to relocate with the parties’ two children. On July 3,
2025, David served Sarah a request for production seeking “[a]ny and all text
messages” between Sarah and her mother “from October 2021 to the
present.” This request was based on David’s theory that Sarah and her
mother were engaged in a “long, drawn out [conspiracy] and collusion” to
reunite in Ohio, which David intended to argue was proof that the move
would not be in the children’s best interests. Sarah objected on the grounds
that the orders invaded her privacy (and her non-party mother’s) and were
overbroad, noting the lack of any limitation on the messages produced during
the time frame required and that David already had the opportunity to
question the mother at her deposition regarding any involvement in the
relocation decision.
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On April 23, 2026, David served Sarah’s mother with a subpoena
duces tecum for “[a]ny and all text messages” between her and Sarah “from
January 1, 2024, through the date of production.” Sarah again objected on
grounds of privacy and overbreadth, and she moved for a protective order.
On June 4, 2026, the court heard arguments on the motion for protective
order. On June 10, 2026, the court entered twin orders denying the protective
order and ordering Sarah and her mother to produce all the messages David
had requested.
II.
A.
To demonstrate entitlement to certiorari relief, a petitioner must show
that an order (1) departs from the essential requirements of law and causes
irreparable harm that (2) results in material injury for the remainder of the
case and (3) cannot be remedied on direct appeal. See Williams v. Oken, 62
So. 3d 1129, 1132 (Fla. 2011). We first analyze “irreparable harm” as a
jurisdictional requirement. See Saints 120, LLC v. Moore, 292 So. 3d 1209,
1212 (Fla. 1st DCA 2020).
B.
“Every natural person has the right to be let alone and free from
governmental intrusion into the person’s private life except as otherwise
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provided herein.” Art. I, § 23, Fla. Const. This right applies with equal force
to private electronic communications, and court orders that “compel[]
discovery constitute state action that may impinge on constitutional rights,
including the constitutional right of privacy.” Roque v. Swezy, 390 So. 3d
193, 196 n.1 (Fla. 3d DCA 2024) (quotation omitted). Of course, nonprivileged information, including electronically stored information, is
generally discoverable in family proceedings if it is relevant and either
admissible or reasonably calculated to lead to the discovery of admissible
evidence. See Fla. Fam. L. R. P. 12.280(c)(1), (3). But “[t]he other side of
the equation—the countervailing privacy interest involved with the discovery
of data on a cellphone—is also very important.” Antico v. Sindt Trucking, Inc.,
148 So. 3d 163, 167 (Fla. 1st DCA 2014).
Because of the tension between the right to discover relevant
information and the freedom from unnecessary intrusion into one’s private
life, a party seeking to discover private, electronically stored information such
as private text messages “must make a showing of necessity which
outweighs the countervailing interest” in keeping it private. Josifov v. KamalHashmat, 217 So. 3d 1085, 1087 (Fla. 3d DCA 2017) (quotation omitted).
Otherwise, irreparable harm is presumed. See Antico, 148 So. 3d at 165
(citing Rasmussen v. S. Fla. Blood Serv., Inc., 500 So. 2d 533, 536–37 (Fla.
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1987)). The trial court must “balanc[e] the need for discovery with affected
privacy interests.” Talley v. Consol. Respondents, 350 So. 3d 415, 419 (Fla.
1st DCA 2022).
Appellate courts, including this court, therefore point to adequate
balancing when explaining why a broad discovery order does not depart from
the essential requirements of law. See, e.g., De Armas v. De Armas, 432 So.
3d 592, 592 (Fla. 3d DCA 2025) (allowing access to all of a mobile device’s
contents in light of petitioner’s prior attempts to evade discovery by producing
“limited cropped screenshots . . . lacking timestamps or any sender or
recipient information”); Talley, 350 So. 3d at 420 (allowing access to
thousands of pages of messages because discovery was “narrowly tailored”
to relevance and court went to “great lengths” to address petitioner’s privacy
concerns); Antico, 148 So. 3d at 167–68 (allowing inspection of “all of the
cellphone’s applications” because discovery was limited by nine-hour
timeframe of relevance and noting petitioner’s failure to present an
alternative when “given the opportunity”).
On the other hand, the appellate courts point to a trial court’s failure to
balance privacy interests when holding that a discovery order departs from
the essential requirements of law. See, e.g., Saints 120, 292 at 1213
(quashing discovery order where “trial court failed to balance the competing
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interests of [respondent’s] need to obtain information relevant to the case
with . . . [implicated] privacy interests”); Holland v. Barfield, 35 So. 3d 953,
954, 955–56 (Fla. 5th DCA 2010) (quashing grant of access to “any and all”
digital data “from 24 hours preceding February 27, 2009 to present” because
it “did not protect” private information); Menke v. Broward Cnty. Sch. Bd.,
916 So. 2d 8, 10–12 (Fla. 4th DCA 2005) (quashing grant of “unfettered
access” to computer that would “expose confidential communications and
matters entirely extraneous to the present litigation” without “proof that there
is no less intrusive method of obtaining the information”).
The orders before us grant access to over two years of text messages
between mother and daughter. They are all but certain to sweep in a large
amount of private family dialogue, and reveal no balancing of privacy
interests with the reason the discovery is sought. Despite Sarah’s
straightforward suggestion to the trial court that relevant keywords be used,
or additional temporal restrictions be added, the orders do not do this or
attempt any tailoring. Producing years of irrelevant and private text
messages between mother and daughter fails to satisfy the notion of
balancing legitimate discovery with privacy interests.
Instead, the orders simply suggest that, once produced, the text
messages “shall only be used for litigation purposes,” that they “shall not be
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disclosed to third parties outside of this litigation unless needed to advance
the case,” and that after the case ends, “the text messages shall be disposed
of.” The fact that the orders purport to limit the text messages to the instant
litigation offers no salve. Once used in litigation, they are on the docket or in
a court record or transcript for anyone to see. And in any event, even if they
are not published or highlighted, the privacy cat is out of the bag. David, his
legal team, and the nebulous “third parties outside of this
litigation . . . needed to advance the case” would all have access to years of
private communications between mother and daughter, untethered to any
relevant issue between the parties or impacting the minor children.
III.
Because the orders on review and the record reveal the absence of
any balancing of the need (or relevance) of the requested information relating
to the children’s relocation with the privacy interests of Sarah and her mother,
we grant the petition and quash the orders on review.
Petition granted; orders quashed.
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