One of the naval engineers suing the nation's largest military shipbuilders over an alleged no-poach agreement said she's already identified 20 witnesses and produced more than 3,000 pages of documents in discovery, but the companies are still asking for attorney work product in their latest demands.

Susan Scharpf — one of two naval engineers seeking to represent a class of workers whose wages were purportedly suppressed in an alleged decades-long no-poach scheme — filed a response on Wednesday to the defendant contractors' motion to compel interrogatory responses.

Scharpf said the companies are seeking discovery that would easily cross the line into protected attorney work product, including the names of all witnesses her lawyers spoke to during their pre-lawsuit investigation, beyond those mentioned in the complaint.

The companies are also seeking dates and methods of communications with the additional witnesses and all facts obtained in the interviews.

In their Oct. 17 brief, the shipbuilding contractors — who include General Dynamics, Huntington Ingalls Industries and CACI — argued that the additional discovery could strengthen their statute of limitations defense, a key issue in the case.

"In this case, Defendants have an especially strong need to learn the dates of communication because of the statute of limitations," the companies wrote last week. "Plaintiff's claim became time-barred no later than 2017. Plaintiff will thus need to establish at summary judgment and trial that she exercised reasonable diligence in waiting until 2023 to file her claim."

U.S. District Judge Anthony J. Trenga in the Eastern District of Virginia initially dismissed the lawsuit in April, ruling that the 2023 suit, which alleged an illegal "gentleman's agreement" dating back to 2000, fell outside the four-year limit. But a split Fourth Circuit panel revived the case in May, ruling that the plaintiffs had sufficiently pled that the companies deliberately kept them and others in the dark regarding the agreement. The shipbuilders asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review that decision last month.

In the companies' motion to compel last week, they also claimed that the plaintiffs' complaint contains more unattributed allegations than what the 21 identified witnesses provided.

But Scharpf said Wednesday that the dates of the witness interviews are irrelevant to the statute of limitations, because under the Fourth Circuit's 2019 opinion in Edmonson v. Eagle National Bank , they don't bear on the client and her knowledge until the attorneys are retained.

"Defendants' own discovery served on Plaintiff Scharpf has clearly established that Plaintiff herself only 'learned of the Conspiracy from [her] attorneys in 2023,'" Scharpf said in her response. "There thus is no credible statute of limitations issue here: Defendants have all the information they need regarding Plaintiff Scharpf's knowledge of the conspiracy as it relates to the statute of limitations."

Whatever the attorneys knew isn't imputed to other proposed class members either, Scharpf said. And either way, the material should get "nearly absolute immunity" from discovery as opinion work product, which could reveal the attorneys' litigation strategy, according to Scharpf.

Specifically, she said Wednesday, the witnesses the lawyers chose to interview and which to include in the complaint, as well as which facts to use, could reveal protected attorney judgment and strategy. Scharpf cites the Fourth Circuit's 2017 In re Grand Jury Subpoena  opinion, in which the court wrote that an attorney having to "disclose their recollections of witness statements and reveal what they deemed sufficiently important to remember" has been shielded by the Supreme Court, even if it is characterized as a "fact."

"In other words, Defendants' fishing expedition into Plaintiff's pre-filing investigation is not made appropriate by merely characterizing their requests as 'fact' inquiries," Scharpf wrote.

The plaintiffs are represented by Brent W. Johnson, Zachary R. Glubiak, Steven J. Toll, Robert W. Cobbs, Alison S. Deich and Sabrina S. Merold of Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC, Shana E. Scarlett, Steve W. Berman and Elaine T. Byszewski of Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP, George F. Farah, Rebecca P. Chang, Nicholas Jackson and Simon Wiener of Handley Farah & Anderson PLLC, Candice J. Enders and Julia R. McGrath of Berger Montague and Brian D. Clark, Arielle S. Wagner and Stephen J. Teti of Lockridge Grindal Nauen PLLP.

Bath Iron Works Corp., Electric Boat Corp., General Dynamics Corp. and General Dynamics Information Technology Inc. are represented by David G. Barger of Greenberg Traurig LLP and Douglas E. Litvack, Matthew S. Hellman and Michael A. Doornweerd of Jenner & Block LLP.

Huntington Ingalls Industries Inc., HII Fleet Support Group LLC, HII Mission Technologies Corp., Ingalls Shipbuilding Inc. and Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Co. are represented by Adam Block Schwartz, Todd Stenerson, David Higbee and Djordje Petkoski of Allen Overy Shearman Sterling and Robbie Rogart Jost and Sima Namiri-Kalantari of Crowell & Moring LLP.

Bollinger Shipyards LLC is represented by Attison L. Barnes III, Scott M. McCaleb, Jon W. Burd, Daniel T. Park and Krystal B. Swendsboe of Wiley Rein LLP.

Gibbs & Cox Inc. is represented by Perry Lange, Jennifer Milici and John W. O'Toole of WilmerHale.

CACI International is represented by Christopher C. Brewer, Ryan P. Phair, Michael F. Murray and Craig Y. Lee of Paul Hastings LLP.

Marinette Marine Corp. is represented by John F. Terzaken III and Abram J. Ellis of Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP and Allison W. Reimann, Sean O'D. Bosack and Christie B. Carrino of Godfrey & Kahn SC.

Serco Inc. is represented by J. Brent Justus, Nicholas J. Giles, Joshua D. Wade, W. Cole Geddy, Benjamin L. Hatch and Casey Erin Lucier of McGuireWoods LLP.

The Columbia Group Inc. is represented by William T. DeVinney of Briglia Hundley PC.

Thor Solutions LLC is represented by Matthew J. MacLean and Alvin Dunn of Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP.

Tridentis LLC is represented by William Lawler and Amanda DeLaPerriere of Blank Rome LLP.

The case is Susan Scharpf et al. v. General Dynamics Corp. et al., case number 1:23-cv-01372, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.