In a recent legal development, U.S. District Judge Iain D. Johnston has denied John Deere’s efforts to prevent the deposition of its Chief Financial Officer, Joshua Jepsen. The ruling, which comes as part of a multi-district litigation, allows a group of farmers to question the executive about the company’s financial reporting and its considerations of “right to repair” legislation. Deere & Co., the parent company of the agricultural manufacturing giant, attempted to invoke the apex witness doctrine to limit what it termed “overly burdensome discovery requests” commonly targeted at top-level executives. However, Judge Johnston found no evidence that the deposition efforts were “harassing, embarrassing, abusive, or any more annoying than any other good-faith deposition” (Law.com).