Vermont subpoenas: any county will issue it, and a magistrate can sign it

Vermont removes the venue question that dominates subpoena practice elsewhere. There is no county to work out, no separate issuing court for depositions and productions. One sentence disposes of it.

Any county

Rule 45(a)(2) is four words longer than it needs to be:

A subpoena may issue from the court in any county.

Compare South Carolina, where a non-party subpoena must issue from the county where that person lives or works, or Arizona, which routes a subpoena three different ways depending on what it commands. In Vermont the question does not arise.

Signing is correspondingly broad. The clerk issues a blank subpoena for a party to complete, and "[a]n attorney or a magistrate may also issue and sign a subpoena." A magistrate is an unusual addition — most states name the clerk, a judge and an attorney of record and stop there.

Every party gets a copy, and not late

Rule 45(a)(4) fixes the timing relative to the recipient rather than by a count of days:

A copy of every subpoena must be served on all parties to the case before or at the same time that it is served on the person to whom it is directed, with the exception of subpoenas for appearance in court for a trial or other hearing.

Before or at the same time. Vermont does not give the parties a head start the way Nevada and Idaho do, but it does forbid the common practice of copying opponents afterwards — which is what Colorado allows.

Trial and hearing subpoenas are excepted, so a witness summons for the courtroom needs no circulation.

Serving it

Rule 45(b)(1): "A subpoena may be served by any person who is not a party and is at least 18 years of age."

Fifty miles, each way

Vermont measures a witness's obligation in miles rather than counties, and Rule 45(c)(3)(A) puts the figure among the mandatory grounds for quashing:

On timely motion, the court for which a subpoena was issued shall quash or modify the subpoena if it (i) fails to allow reasonable time for compliance; (ii) requires a resident of this state to travel to attend a deposition more than 50 miles one way unless the court otherwise orders; requires a nonresident of this state to travel to attend a deposition at a place more than 50 miles from the place of service unless another convenient place is fixed by order of court, or (iii) requires disclosure of privileged or other protected matter and no exception or waiver applies, or (iv) subjects a person to undue burden.

Fifty miles one way, and the anchor differs by residence: for a Vermonter the distance runs from home; for a non-resident it runs from the place of service. Both yield to a court order fixing another convenient place.

The four grounds are mandatory — the court "shall quash or modify" once one is made out. Rule 45(c)(3)(B) adds the discretionary grounds, covering trade secrets and other confidential research, development or commercial information.

Because a Vermont subpoena can issue from any county, note which court "the court for which a subpoena was issued" actually is before filing — it is the issuing court, not necessarily the one hearing the case.

The issuer owes a duty, and it is enforced

Rule 45(c)(1) puts an affirmative obligation on whoever sends the subpoena out:

A party or an attorney responsible for the issuance and service of a subpoena shall take reasonable steps to avoid imposing undue burden or expense on a person subject to that subpoena. The court for which the subpoena was issued shall enforce this duty and impose upon the party or attorney in breach of this duty an appropriate sanction, which may include, but is not limited to, lost earnings and a reasonable attorney's fee.

Note "shall enforce" and the express mention of lost earnings. A non-party's time is compensable, not merely their photocopying.

Producing documents and electronic information

Rule 45(d)(1) sets out what compliance looks like:

(A) A person responding to a subpoena to produce documents shall produce them as they are kept in the usual course of business or shall organize and label them to correspond with the categories in the demand. (B) If a subpoena does not specify the form or forms for producing electronically stored information, a person responding to a subpoena must produce the information in a form or forms in which the person ordinarily maintains it or in a form or forms that are reasonably usable. (C) A person responding to a subpoena need not produce the same electronically stored information in more than one form.

Three defaults worth knowing from either side. Records come as kept or labeled to the demand's categories — the responder chooses. Where no form is specified for electronic information, the responder picks between how it is ordinarily maintained and any reasonably usable form. And nobody has to produce the same data twice in different formats.

Disobedience is a statutory matter

Where most states make failure to obey a contempt of the issuing court and leave it there, Vermont points outside the rules:

The provisions of 12 V.S.A. §§ 1623 and 1624 shall apply to failure by any person without adequate excuse to obey a subpoena served upon that person.

Those sections are statutes, not rules, and they are not carried on this site. Read them before assuming the consequence is ordinary contempt.

Discovery for an out-of-state case

Rule 45(f) governs the inbound interstate problem: "This rule governs depositions and discovery conducted in Vermont in connection with a civil action brought in another state." A "foreign jurisdiction" means a state other than Vermont, and Rule 45(f)(3) sets out how a subpoena for interstate depositions and discovery is issued.

For a lawyer in another state seeking records or testimony in Vermont, that subdivision — rather than the general provisions above — is the starting point.

A short checklist

Issuing one:

1. Do not agonize over venue. Any county's court may issue the subpoena.
2. Copy every party before or when you serve — afterwards is too late.
3. Skip the circulation for a trial or hearing witness subpoena.
4. Use any non-party server aged 18 or over.
5. Note which court issued it, because that is where a motion to quash belongs.
6. Start at Rule 45(f) if the case is pending in another state.

Receiving one:

1. Check whether the parties were copied on time; the obligation runs to the issuer.
2. Move in the issuing court, which may not be the court hearing the case.
3. Use the mandatory grounds — reasonable time, the 50-mile limit, privilege, undue burden.
4. Read 12 V.S.A. §§ 1623 and 1624 before ignoring a subpoena; the consequences are statutory.

Where these rules live

• V.R.C.P. 26 — General Provisions Governing Discovery
• V.R.C.P. 30 — Depositions Upon Oral Examination
• V.R.C.P. 34 — Production of Documents and Things
• V.R.C.P. 45 — Subpoena
• Subpoenaing records in another state
• Vermont motion to compel discovery

This page explains what the rules say. It isn't legal advice, and 12 V.S.A. §§ 1623 and 1624 are statutes this site doesn't carry.