Joe Gibbs Racing, Chris Gabehart granted expedited discovery in court

The Joe Gibbs Racing v Chris Gabehart and Spire Motorsports lawsuit heard arguments over expedited discovery motions in court on Monday morning before Judge Susan Courtwright Rodriguez.

The docket also called for arguments over a preliminary injunction motion but all parties in court agreed that the discovery motion’s importance was of greater priority and the results could affect the course of future hearings so it was tabled to the end of the month instead.

Ultimately, after hearing the arguments from Cary B. Davis (Gabehart), Sarah F. Hutchins (Gibbs) and John S. Gibbs III (Spire), Judge Rodriguez allowed for both a narrowly tailored expedited discovery on Gabehart and a narrowly tailored reciprocal discovery on JGR.

To understand what this means, Judge Rodriguez tackled each of the seven requests made by Joe Gibbs Racing’s attorneys and detailed what she would allow to be sought over the next week.

Italicized below is from the JGR motion and in parenthesis below that is from the pending Judge Rodriguez order)

All Communications between Defendant Spire and Defendant Gabehart Relating to Gabehart’s potential employment at Spire.

(Judge will allow discovery on this point on Gabehart’s devices but not Spire)

All Documents and Communications Relating to any potential or actual agreement by Defendant Spire or its owners to indemnify Defendant Gabehart for any breach of his JGR employment agreement or for any other claim that could be asserted by JGR against Defendant Gabehart, including for using, retaining, transferring, or copying any of JGR’s Confidential Information and Trade Secrets.

(Judge will allow discovery on this point on Gabehart’s devices but not Spire)

All Communications from Defendant Gabehart and any other JGR employees Relating to employment at Defendant Spire.

(This has been removed from the order as there is no basis for expedited discovery)

All Communications between Defendant Spire, Defendant Gabehart, Dan Towriss, and/or Jeff Dickerson Relating to JGR’s race setups, strategy, operations, sponsorships, or employees.

(Judge Rodriguez felt ‘strategy,’ and ‘operations,’ was too broad so Hutchins countered with ‘analytics,’ which was agreeable and the other terms will be discoverable too)

All Communications between Defendant Spire, Defendant Gabehart, Dan Towriss, and/or Jeff Dickerson Relating to the recruitment, hiring, potential employment and employment of Defendant Gabehart.

(Judge will allow discovery on this point on Gabehart’s devices but not Spire)

All Documents and Communications Relating to Defendant Gabehart’s role as Chief Motorsports Officer at Defendant Spire.

(Judge will allow discovery on this point on Gabehart’s devices but not Spire)

All Documents created or generated by Defendant Gabehart from October 1, 2025 until February 17, 2026 Relating to his potential role as Chief Motorsports Officer at Defendant Spire.

(The judge approved expedited discovery on Gabehart from this topic but not Spire, pending an end date agreed upon by both parties before such communication became privileged by represented attorneys.)

Judge Rodriguez will also allow narrowly tailored reciprocal discovery from Gabehart on Joe Gibbs Racing over any non-privileged communications between company executives over how they interpreted internally anything regarding the separation agreement.

This specifically regards Section 6, Paragraph 2 of the employment agreement between Gabehart and JGR that stated:

“Notwithstanding any contrary provision herein, the Noncompete Period will be reduced to one (1) week and Company shall pay Employee $100,000 (in exchange for a complete mutual release and net of all required withholding and deductions) if, at any time after September 1, 2025, and before June 1, 2026: (i) Employee in good faith notifies Company in writing of specific job duties or responsibilities assigned to Employee that are inconsistent with Employee’s reasonable expectations or the job description provided by Company prior to the Start Date; (ii) Employee provides Company at least sixty ( 60) days to resolve such inconsistencies to Employee’s reasonable satisfaction and Company fails to do so; and (iii) Employee provides Company sixty ( 60) days prior written notice of termination without cause due to such unresolved inconsistencies.”

In other words, Gabehart wants to know if Joe Gibbs Racing internally understood that he had notified them of his intent to leave and if they responded in a way that would secure his one-week non-compete.

JGR wants to hold Gabehart away from Spire for the remaining 18 months of their agreement.

Judge Rodriguez has asked the attorneys representing Gabehart and Joe Gibbs Racing to meet and confer to iron out the details of how that court order should read by the end of day on Tuesday.

From there, discovery will take place through the weekend. Spire Motorsports was excluded from the expedited discovery orders as they tend to fall more under standard Rule 26(f) court procedures. The possibility that Gabehart could be causing imminent harm to Joe Gibbs Racing warranted at least some degree of immediate discovery.

Evidence of JGR data being used by Spire?

During her argument, Joe Gibbs Racing attorney Sarah Hutchins also told Judge Rodriguez that she wanted to seek a third-party subpoena from Justin Marks and Todd Meredith from Spire, Joe Custer from Haas Factory Team and Rick Ware Racing’s Rick Ware and Tommy Baldwin.

Hutchins said there is ‘new information’ ‘that I believe is coming in as I speak’ about communications from individuals within the NASCAR community that prove Spire is in possession of trade-secreted information from Joe Gibbs Racing.

Judge Rodriguez conceded ‘this is concerning’ but also told Hutchins that ‘I can’t give you carte blanche’ and ‘I need specifics.’

Hutchins was not able to provide specifics in court at that time but also said she would get more information for the court.

“I would be happy to, your honor.”

For now, the judge did not allow for the third-party subpoena ‘without prejudice,’ meaning this matter can be brought up again but not as part of this specific expedited discovery motion.

Should someone file a relevant declaration for JGR, or if discovery produced evidence that this is occurring, the judge would reopen the matter for filings and a hearing.

It’s worth noting that Meredith served as one of the founding executives of Joe Gibbs Racing in 1992 and was formally with the company until 2016. He joined Trackhouse as President of Racing Operations in July 2025.

Forensic analysis ‘fell apart’

Over the weekend, the attempts by the attorneys representing Gabehart and Joe Gibbs Racing ‘fell apart’ regarding an agreement for additional forensic analysis on devices owned by the Chris and Jennifer Gabehart.

For one, Gabehart purchased a new computer on November 15, which is before the last date that JGR claims that he continued accessing proprietary files and after he stopped ‘performing duties’ as competition director on November 10.

Joe Gibbs Racing’s forensic analyst, Clark Walton, says a Known Synced Googled Drive continued to interact with a file on Gabehart’s JGR computer that had a folder titled ‘Spire’ through November 23.

“For what purpose could he possibly be going into these files,” said Hutchins, arguing on behalf of JGR?

Hutchins said that Gabehart’s camp has refused to allow for a forensic analysis of that new computer. At one point, Davis said they had ‘imaged’ every device in question in preparation for discovery or a court order, but then contradicted himself and said the new personal computer had not yet been imaged by a forensic expert.

The judge then admonished Davis for a ‘misrepresentation’ about what was imaged and preserved. Davis apologized.

“I am scratching my head over why one of Mr. Gabehart’s computers have not been imaged,” said Judge Rodriguez.

The argument being made by Hutchins and JGR is that they have no idea if there is still a jump drive containing trade secrets that have been plugged into this computer that JGR hasn’t been given access to yet.

Spire says, and have produced, a document that show Gabehart signed a non-disclosure agreement upon his first day with Dickerson saying they don’t want nor need Joe Gibbs Racing analytics due to their relationship with Hendrick Motorsports.

One of the files Gabehart accessed was a folder containing something called ‘Project Howler’ before and after his December lunch with Dickerson that was captured by a private investigator.

Hutchins wants to know why Gabehart was googling ‘indemnity’ immediately after a call from JGR CFO Eric Schaffer to Spire president Bill Anthony on December 4. To indemnify ‘is to compensate another party for losses, damages, or legal liabilities, or to protect them against such risks.’

She echoed a sentiment her team made in a filing earlier in the month.

“Gabehart conducted a Google search for the term ‘indemnify’ at 12:15 a.m. on December 4, 2025—only hours after Schaffer’s call. It begs the question, why would Gabehart suddenly research indemnification in the middle of the night? The logical inference is because Spire had just warned him about potential legal exposure and agreed to pay his expenses.”

Judge Rodriguez also told everyone in court to consider that misappropriation could also include mere acquisition and possession, and that this hasn’t been posed enough in filings or in court so far.

What next?

March 18: Attorneys representing Gabehart and JGR come to terms on Judge Rodriguez’ court order terms
March 22: Expedited discovery period ends
March 23: Response due
March 25: Supplemental filings due
March 26: Hearing set for preliminary injunction

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