Midbrook Flowerbulbs Holland B v. v. Holland America Bulb Farms, Inc. ( 2017 )


Menu:
  •                      FOR PUBLICATION
    UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
    FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS HOLLAND                      No. 14-36085
    B.V.,
    Plaintiff-Appellee,                   D.C. No.
    3:14-cv-05409-
    v.                               RJB
    HOLLAND AMERICA BULB FARMS,
    INC., a Washington corporation,                     OPINION
    Defendant-Appellant.
    Appeal from the United States District Court
    for the Western District of Washington
    Robert J. Bryan, Senior District Judge, Presiding
    Argued and Submitted May 8, 2017
    Seattle, Washington
    Filed October 25, 2017
    Before: Carlos T. Bea and N. Randy Smith, Circuit Judges,
    and William Q. Hayes, * District Judge.
    Opinion by Judge Bea
    *
    The Honorable William Q. Hayes, United States District Judge for
    the Southern District of California, sitting by designation.
    2    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    SUMMARY **
    Uniform Foreign-Court Money Judgments
    Recognition Act
    The panel affirmed the district court’s order granting
    summary judgment in favor of Midbrook Flowerbulbs
    Holland B.V., and denying Holland America Bulb Farms,
    Inc.’s discovery request under Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(d), in
    Midbrook’s diversity action seeking recognition of an
    Amsterdam Court of Appeals judgment under Washington’s
    Uniform Foreign-Country Money Judgments Recognition
    Act (“UFCMJRA”).
    Holland America, a Washington company, purchased
    flower bulbs from Midbrook, a Dutch company, and
    Midbrook obtained a judgment against Holland America in
    Dutch court. On appeal, Holland America alleged that
    proceedings in the Dutch courts which led to the Dutch
    judgment were “not compatible with the requirements of due
    process of law” under section 4(c)(8) of the UFCMJRA.
    Concerning the legal standard governing the issue at
    hand, the panel held that the commentary and prefatory
    notice to the UFCMJRA demonstrated that under section
    4(c)(8), courts need ask only whether the party resisting
    judgment “was denied fundamental fairness in the particular
    proceedings leading to the foreign-country judgment,” not
    whether the foreign proceedings literally conformed to the
    requirements of due process under the U.S. Constitution.
    **
    This summary constitutes no part of the opinion of the court. It
    has been prepared by court staff for the convenience of the reader.
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB                  3
    The panel held that it was not necessary to decide whether
    process accorded to Midbrook also passed muster under
    American standards of due process.
    The panel held that the Dutch courts’ treatment of
    Holland America’s discovery requests were a mere
    “procedural difference” that was insufficient to establish that
    the Dutch proceedings were fundamentally unfair. The
    panel further held that Holland America was not denied due
    process when the Amsterdam Court of Appeal overturned
    the Alkmaar District Court’s factual finding denying the
    existence of the parties’ alleged October 1999 settlement
    agreement because the Court of Appeal gave a good reason
    for overturning the finding. In addition, the panel held that
    Holland America failed to establish that even the more
    exacting standards of constitutional due process would have
    required a United States appellant court to defer to a trial
    court’s factual determination under like circumstances.
    Finally, the panel held that the district court did not abuse
    its discretion by denying Holland America’s motion for
    additional discovery under Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(d).
    COUNSEL
    Michael E. Haglund (argued) and Shenoa L. Payne, Haglund
    Kelley LLP, Portland, Oregon, for Defendant-Appellant.
    Steven J. Wells (argued), Dorsey & Whitney LLP,
    Minneapolis, Minnesota; Peter S. Ehrlichman and Andrea C.
    Yang, Dorsey & Whitney LLP, Seattle, Washington; for
    Plaintiff-Appellee.
    4   MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    OPINION
    BEA, Circuit Judge:
    After the collapse of the Dutch Tulip Bubble of 1637,
    we’ve heard little about that flower’s market. But it hasn’t
    gone away.
    This action grows out of a family business dispute: The
    Dutch shipper of tulip bulbs to his brother in America claims
    his brother shorted him. The dispute was litigated at three
    court levels in Holland. The shipper won. Now he comes to
    Seattle to enforce his judgment. Enforce it the district court
    did. The American importer-buyer appeals that judgment.
    He will lose.
    I. Background
    A. Factual Background
    Holland America Bulb Farms, Inc. (“Holland America”)
    is a Washington corporation that grows and sells tulips and
    other varieties of cut flowers. Its sole owners, Benno and
    Klazina Dobbe, founded Holland America together after
    immigrating to the United States from the Netherlands in
    1980.
    In 1994, Holland America began purchasing flower
    bulbs from Midbrook Flowerbulbs Holland, B.V.
    (“Midbrook”), a Dutch corporation in which Arie Dobbe,
    Benno’s brother, was a manager and part owner. Midbrook
    purchased flower bulbs from farms in the Netherlands and
    elsewhere, packaged them for shipment, and exported them
    to Holland America’s farm in Washington. Though Holland
    America and Midbrook never entered into a written
    agreement regarding payment, Benno and Arie orally agreed
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB                        5
    that Holland America would pay Midbrook its “actual costs
    on a one to one basis plus a commission.”
    For each shipment, Midbrook sent Holland America an
    invoice in Dutch guilders. 1 Instead of paying these invoices
    directly to Midbrook in guilders, Holland America deposited
    a lump sum of dollars into a Dutch bank account in
    Midbrook’s name (the “dollar account”). At “fixed
    intervals,” Midbrook withdrew dollars from the dollar
    account, exchanged them into guilders, and then deposited
    them into a second Dutch bank account (the “guilder
    account”), which was also in its name. Then, when the
    invoices became due, Midbrook paid itself the invoiced
    amount of guilders from the guilder account. Midbrook
    regularly sent Holland America statements for the two
    accounts, and Holland America was responsible for ensuring
    that there were enough dollars in the dollar account to cover
    the periodic transfers to the guilder account.
    Sometime in 1997, Benno Dobbe noticed that
    Midbrook’s costs “appeared to be higher than the bulb
    import costs that [his] competitors were obtaining from other
    Dutch suppliers.” Benno became suspicious that Midbrook
    was overcharging Holland America, and he asked Arie to
    provide documentation substantiating Midbrook’s costs.
    Arie assured Benno that Midbrook’s invoices were correct,
    but he refused to provide the requested documentation. In
    June 1999, the parties agreed that they would “terminate
    their relationship” the following year, but that Midbrook
    would “still handle the export of the flower bulb harvest [in
    the fall] of 1999.” Between January 11 and May 22, 2000,
    Midbrook sent Holland America invoices for the 1999
    harvest which totaled 3,211,568 guilders. Holland America
    1
    The Netherlands did not adopt the Euro as its currency until 2002.
    6       MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    never deposited dollars into the dollar account sufficient to
    cover these invoices, and Midbrook overdrew the dollar
    account to pay itself for them.
    B. Procedural Background
    1. Proceedings in the Alkmaar District Court
    In 2002, Midbrook filed a lawsuit against Holland
    America in the Alkmaar District Court in the Netherlands,
    seeking payment for the 1999 harvest shipments. Holland
    America did not deny that it had not paid Midbrook for the
    1999 harvest; rather, it argued that Midbrook had “invoiced
    [Holland America] for too high an amount for years,” and
    that Holland America had “[over]paid more in total during
    the period from 1994 to August 2000 . . . than Midbrook had
    invoiced [for the 1999 harvest].” Though Holland America
    “provisionally estimated” the amount of the overcharge to
    be $4,434,387 (roughly 9 million guilders), it asked the court
    to “order Midbrook to provide its bookkeeping records for
    the years 1984 up to and including December 2000” so that
    Holland America could “more particularly specif[y]” its
    damages.
    In a series of “judgments,” 2 four of which were
    “interlocutory” and one of which was final, the Alkmaar
    District Court rejected Holland America’s counterclaim and
    entered judgment in Midbrook’s favor. In its first
    interlocutory judgment, entered after the court had reviewed
    the parties’ pleadings and briefs, the court made several
    rulings. First, it noted that Midbrook claimed in its briefing
    2
    According to the parties, “[t]he Alkmaar District Court and
    Amsterdam Court of Appeal refer to interlocutory decisions as
    ‘judgment[s].’”
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB                 7
    “that it [had] agreed with [Holland America] on October 22,
    1999 that [Holland America], after receiving a credit note in
    the amount of . . . 100,000 [guilders], would have no more
    right to compensation for damages from improper invoicing
    in the past.” The court ruled that Midbrook would be given
    “the opportunity [] to provide evidence for [this]
    agreement.”
    Second, although the court agreed with Holland America
    that “in principle, [it is] Midbrook’s responsibility to specify
    and justify its invoice[s]” with documentation, it noted that
    “the period for which Midbrook must specify and
    substantiate its invoice[s]” would depend on whether
    Holland America had settled its claims for the harvests of
    1994–1998; if it had, then it would not be entitled to any
    discovery with respect to the invoices for that period. Thus,
    the court deferred ruling on the parties’ remaining claims
    until after it had heard evidence on the alleged settlement
    agreement.
    The district court entered its second interlocutory
    judgment after hearing from witnesses from both parties
    regarding the settlement agreement, which allegedly took
    place at a meeting between Benno and Arie Dobbe in
    October 1999 at Midbrook’s offices in the Netherlands.
    Midbrook’s witnesses were Johannes Elling, Midbrook’s tax
    advisor; and Elisabeth Dobbe–Ruygrok, Arie Dobbe’s wife
    and a secretary at Midbrook. Elling and Dobbe–Ruygrok
    both testified that they were present at the meeting when
    Benno and Arie agreed to settle Holland America’s claims
    for 100,000 guilders. Holland America’s two witnesses,
    Benno Dobbe and Hugo Dobbe (another of Benno’s
    brothers), testified that no such agreement was reached at the
    meeting, and that they had come to the Netherlands only
    because Arie had promised them that they could examine
    8       MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    Midbrook’s records, which Arie ultimately did not allow
    them to do. The district court found that Midbrook’s
    witnesses were not credible 3 and therefore determined that
    no settlement agreement had been reached.
    Having disposed of the settlement issue, the court
    proceeded to address the parties’ claims regarding the
    invoices for the harvests of 1994–99. It directed Holland
    America to “specify the [] invoices [to which it objected]
    concretely, submitting them . . . and indicat[ing] which
    amounts Midbrook invoiced unjustifiably to [Holland
    America] and why.” Then, the court explained, Midbrook
    would “be given the opportunity to respond” by “provid[ing]
    insight into the structure of the invoices” identified by
    Holland America with “documented evidence.”
    After receiving documents and additional briefing from
    the parties, the court entered its third interlocutory judgment.
    In that judgment, the court concluded that Holland America
    “ha[d] not complied with the recommendations of the court
    in its second interim judgment” with respect to Midbrook’s
    invoices for the harvests of 1994–1998. Although Holland
    America had “submitted the invoices whose correctness it
    disputes” and had “state[d] the items that, in its opinion,
    [were] incorrect” with each invoice, it had “neglect[ed] to
    substantiate the basis for the amount of the claimed
    damages.” Because of this failure, the district court
    3
    For example, the court found it “[im]plausible” that Dobbe–
    Ruygrok “was in the room where the meeting took place,” collecting the
    participants’ coffee cups, “[at] precisely at the moment that Benno
    Dobbe [] agreed on behalf of [Holland America] to granting final
    discharge.” Likewise, the court found it suspicious that Elling “refused
    to submit the [written] report that he had made of the [] meeting,” despite
    the fact that “he wished to make use of it when [testifying].”
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB                          9
    dismissed Holland America’s counterclaim for the harvests
    of 1994–1998.
    With respect to the 1999 harvest, the district court noted
    that Midbrook had provided only “cost summaries”
    explaining “the structure of its invoices.” The court did not
    fault Midbrook for “not having submitted at this moment all
    the underlying documents concerning costs that it incurred
    for the 1999 harvest,” however, because Holland America
    had specified which “cost items it disputed” only after the
    court had entered its second interlocutory judgment. The
    court then summarized Holland America’s objections to
    1999 harvest invoices, 4 and stated that Midbrook would be
    given “the opportunity to respond to [these objections] with
    documentation.”
    The district court entered its fourth interlocutory
    judgment after receiving Midbrook’s responses. In that
    judgment, the district court addressed each of Holland
    America’s objections to the 1999 harvest invoices in detail,
    rejecting some but granting others. 5 In total, the district court
    4
    The disputed costs included, inter alia: (1) a charge for iris bulbs
    that were delivered to a third party before being passed on to Holland
    America, for which Holland America directly paid the third party;
    (2) charges for certain temperature recording equipment that Midbrook
    had purchased; (3) a tariff on bulbs imported from outside the
    Netherlands, which were allegedly not subject to Dutch tariffs; (4) a
    failure to credit Holland America for certain shipping discounts
    Midbrook received when it shipped multiple containers of bulbs together
    in one shipment; (5) an incorrect daily cost of keeping bulbs cool during
    storage; and (6) charges for loading the containers and completing
    paperwork.
    5
    Specifically, the court found, inter alia, that: (1) “Midbrook . . .
    issued a complete credit to the guilder account for the bulbs that it had []
    initially charged [Holland America] that came from [the third party];
    10 MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    concluded that Midbrook had wrongly charged Holland
    America 40,403 guilders for the 1999 harvest.
    The court then explained how it would calculate
    Midbrook’s damages. Because Midbrook had paid itself for
    the 1999 harvest by overdrawing the dollar account,
    Midbrook’s damages were equal to “the overdraft position
    of the dollar account” in March 2004 (when Midbrook
    closed that account and converted the deficit into euros), less
    the amount that Midbrook had “wrongfully charged” to
    Holland America. In October 2006, after receiving some
    additional information from Midbrook regarding its bank
    statements, the district court entered its fifth and final
    judgment, in which it awarded Midbrook €1,033,291 (at the
    time, the equivalent of $1,250,592), plus any interest that
    had accrued since Midbrook converted the dollar account
    balance into euros in March 2004.
    2. Proceedings in the Amsterdam Court of
    Appeal
    Holland America then appealed the Alkmaar District
    Court’s judgment to the Amsterdam Court of Appeal. On
    appeal, Holland America reiterated its argument that its
    overpayments for the harvests of 1994–1998 had more than
    (2) Midbrook had not provided documentation of the cost of the
    temperature equipment, so the court “presume[d]” that Midbrook had
    overcharged Holland America for that equipment by 2,000 guilders;
    (3) Midbrook wrongfully charged Holland America for tariffs that were
    “not owed for bulbs that do not come from the Netherlands”;
    (4) Midbrook owed Holland America 2,593 guilders in shipping
    discounts, which it had failed to pass on to Holland America; (5) Holland
    America had failed to substantiate its claims that Midbrook had
    misrepresented cooling costs; and (6) Midbrook had overcharged
    Holland America 18,880 guilders in loading and paperwork costs.
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB 11
    compensated Midbrook for its shipments following the 1999
    harvest. It also reiterated its discovery requests for
    documentation of the costs underlying Midbrook’s invoices
    from 1994 through 2000, and it requested bank statements
    for the dollar and guilder accounts. Midbrook cross-
    appealed, arguing that the Alkmaar District Court had
    erroneously rejected its contention that the parties had settled
    Holland America’s claims for the harvests of 1994–1998.
    Like the Alkmaar District Court, the Amsterdam Court
    of Appeal entered a series of judgments, two of which were
    interlocutory and one of which was final. In its first
    interlocutory judgment, the Amsterdam Court of Appeal
    reversed the district court’s determination that Holland
    America had not agreed to settle its claims for the harvests
    of 1994–1998. The court noted that “[i]t is an established
    fact that a credit was issued by Midbrook for an amount of
    [] 100,000 [guilders],” and that “[c]onsidering the
    relationship between the parties . . . , it is unlikely that
    Midbrook would not have demanded [] consideration ‘in
    exchange’ for this credit.” Thus, “[unlike] the District
    Court,” the court of appeal “consider[ed] [it] proven that the
    parties concluded [a] [settlement] agreement.” In light of this
    finding, the court denied Holland America’s requests for
    documentation substantiating the invoices for the harvests of
    1994–1998.
    The court of appeal also denied Holland America’s
    discovery requests with respect to the 1999 harvest. The
    court explained that Holland America had been given a
    chance to “identify in concrete terms the specific costs that
    it had been invoiced against which its objections were []
    directed”; that Midbrook had then “complied with its
    obligation to provide insights into the costs that it had
    []charged”; and that Holland America’s “objections [were]
    12 MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    discussed one by one by the District Court.” Thus, the court
    concluded, Holland America had already been given an
    opportunity to contest the correctness of the invoices for the
    1999 harvest, and it was entitled to no further discovery on
    the issue.
    As to the bank statements for the dollar and guilder
    accounts, the Amsterdam Court of Appeal agreed with
    Holland America that “in principle,” it was “entitled to the
    full details of the dollar account and the [guilder] account
    relationship.” Though the court noted that there was some
    evidence that Holland America had “regularly requested a
    ‘dollar and guilder balance sheet’ [from Midbrook]” and that
    Holland America therefore likely possessed these
    documents already, it nonetheless ordered Midbrook to
    produce the statements for two accounts for the period
    running from January 1994 to January 2000.
    After Midbrook submitted the bank statements, the court
    of appeal entered its second interlocutory judgment. In that
    judgment, the court of appeal addressed several objections
    that Holland America had made to the bank account
    statements 6 and ordered Midbrook to submit corrected
    versions. It also denied Holland America’s request that the
    court order Midbrook to produce “bank statements of the
    contra accounts to which the amounts in guilders were
    credited that arose as a result of the conversion of dollars in
    6
    These included: that on two occasions, Midbrook had converted
    dollars to guilders at a higher exchange rate than the parties had agreed
    upon; that from October 1997, Midbrook had overcharged Holland
    America for interest by an average of 2%; and that Midbrook had omitted
    certain credits it owed to Holland America from the statement of the
    guilder account.
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB 13
    the dollar account into guilders.” 7 “As Midbrook rightly
    brings forward,” the court explained, “the [guilder] account
    statements currently submitted in the proceedings show
    exactly which amounts were entered into the [guilder]
    account in favor of [Holland America].”
    The court entered its third and final judgment in
    September 2011, after Midbrook submitted corrected
    versions of the two bank account statements. The court
    found that, as a result of the corrections, the surplus in the
    guilder account on January 1, 2000 was 460,862 guilders—
    not 312,642 guilders as the district court had found—and it
    adjusted the amount of damages calculated by the district
    court to €959,324 plus interest and costs on appeal.
    Finally, the court of appeal again addressed Holland
    America’s requests for discovery:
    In its motion following the second
    interlocutory judgment, [Holland America]
    has argued that it is litigating with one hand
    tied to its back. It claims having no access to
    the evidence that Midbrook . . . [has] with
    regard to the dollar transactions, the dollar
    forward exchange contracts . . . , the costs of
    the forward exchange contracts, and bank
    statements of the contra accounts to which
    the amounts in guilders were credited that
    [were] conver[ted] [from] dollars in the
    dollar account into guilders. In short,
    7
    Apparently, Holland America requested these statements so that it
    could verify that all of the dollars that Midbrook withdrew from the
    dollar account were converted into guilders and deposited into the
    guilder account.
    14 MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    [Holland America] wishes to have Midbrook
    demonstrate that all cost items recorded by
    Midbrook in the [guilder] account have
    actually been incurred.
    Because Holland America “fail[ed] to specify which items
    in the current account . . . should be substantiated with
    supporting evidence,” however, the court concluded that its
    discovery request was “too general and must be denied.”
    3. Proceedings in the Supreme Court of the
    Netherlands
    Holland America appealed the Amsterdam Court of
    Appeal’s decision to the Supreme Court of the Netherlands.
    In December 2012, the supreme court summarily dismissed
    the appeal and ordered Holland America to pay the costs and
    fees of the appeal. Because Midbrook does not seek to
    enforce the supreme court’s judgment in this action, these
    costs and fees are not at issue here.
    4. Proceedings in the U.S. District Court for the
    Western District of Washington
    In May 2014, Midbrook filed a diversity action against
    Holland America in the U.S. District Court for the Western
    District of Washington, seeking recognition of the
    Amsterdam Court of Appeal’s October 2006 judgment (the
    “Dutch judgment”) under Washington’s Uniform Foreign-
    Country     Money      Judgments      Recognition     Act
    (“UFCMJRA”). See 
    Wash. Rev. Code §§ 6
    .40A.010–
    6.40A.902. After Midbrook filed its complaint, Holland
    America served Midbrook with several discovery requests.
    “For the period of January 1, 1994 through December 31,
    2000,” Holland America requested copies of:
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB 15
    1. [] all of the underlying cost records with regard to the
    purchase, processing and export of the flower bulbs
    delivered by plaintiff to defendant.
    2. [] the detailed dollar account transaction data, dollar
    forward exchange contracts, bank statements of the
    contra account in guilders, and the costs of forward
    exchange contracts related to the dollar account
    involving transactions by plaintiff and/or defendant.
    3. [] the detailed bank statements of the guilder account
    regarding all dollar exchange transactions performed
    by plaintiff and/or defendant.
    Midbrook served Holland America with objections to all
    three requests and then moved for summary judgment.
    Holland America opposed the motion, arguing that under
    section 4(c)(8) of the UFCMJRA, the district court “need
    not” recognize the Dutch judgment, because “[t]he specific
    proceeding in the [Dutch] court leading to the judgment was
    not compatible with the requirements of due process of law.”
    Holland America also requested additional “time . . . to take
    discovery” under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56(d),
    asking again for discovery of Midbrook’s “underlying costs
    records” and “banking records.”
    The district court granted Midbrook’s motion for
    summary judgment and denied Holland America’s request
    for additional discovery. Holland America then filed a
    motion for reconsideration, which the district court denied.
    In December 2014, the district court entered a final judgment
    in Midbrook’s favor for €2,200,513 (the amount of the
    Dutch judgment plus interest for the period leading up to
    16 MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    December 2014). 8 Holland America then timely filed this
    appeal.
    II. Standard of Review
    We review de novo a district court’s determination that a
    foreign-court money judgment does not qualify for
    nonrecognition under one of the UFCMJRA’s discretionary
    exceptions. See Naoko Ohno v. Yuko Yasuma, 
    723 F.3d 984
    ,
    1001–02 (9th Cir. 2013). We review for abuse of discretion
    a district court’s denial of a request under Rule 56(d) for
    additional time to take discovery to oppose a motion for
    summary judgment. See Morton v. Hall, 
    599 F.3d 942
    , 945
    (9th Cir. 2010).
    III. Discussion
    A. The District Court Did Not Err by Granting
    Midbrook’s Motion for Summary Judgment.
    In 1962, the National Conference of Commissioners on
    Uniform State Laws (“NCCUSL”) promulgated the Uniform
    Foreign Money-Judgment Recognition Act (“UFMJRA”) to
    codify the states’ rules regarding the recognition of foreign
    money judgments. See UFMJRA, Prefatory Note. The aim
    of this codification was to “make it more likely that
    judgments rendered in [the] state[s] [will] be recognized
    8
    In August 2014, Holland America filed an action for “preliminary
    relief” in the Noord Holland District Court (formerly the Alkmaar
    District Court), in which it sought, inter alia, “the underlying documents
    for drawing up the invoices” for the 1999 harvest. The Noord Holland
    District Court noted that this same request had been repeatedly denied in
    the earlier Dutch-court proceedings, and it denied Holland America’s
    request.
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB 17
    abroad.” 
    Id.
     In 2005, NCCUSL promulgated the Uniform
    Foreign-Court Money Judgments Recognition Act
    (“UFCMJRA”) to update the 1962 act. See UFCMJRA,
    Prefatory Note. Washington adopted the updated
    UFCMJRA in 2009. See 
    Wash. Rev. Code §§ 6
    .40A.010–
    6.40A.902.
    Under section 4(a) of the UFCMJRA, when a party files
    an action seeking recognition 9 of a “foreign-country
    judgment,” the court “shall recognize” that judgment if it
    “[g]rants or denies recovery of a sum of money; and . . .
    under the law of the foreign country where rendered, is final,
    conclusive, and enforceable.” See 
    Wash. Rev. Code §§ 6
    .40A.010–.030 (emphasis added). Once the party
    seeking recognition demonstrates that the foreign-country
    judgment satisfies these prima facie requirements, see 
    id.
    § 6.40A.020(3), the burden shifts to the party resisting
    recognition to prove that a ground for nonrecognition
    applies. See id. § 6.40A.030(4).
    Sections 4(b) and (c) of the UFCMJRA provide eleven
    grounds—three mandatory and eight discretionary—for a
    court to refuse to recognize a foreign-country judgment. See
    Rev. Code Wash. §§ 6.40A.030(2)–(3). Two of these
    grounds are relevant to this appeal: Section 4(b)(1) provides
    that “[a] court . . . may not recognize a foreign-country
    judgment if . . . the judgment was rendered under a judicial
    system that does not provide impartial tribunals or
    9
    “Recognition of a judgment means that the forum court accepts the
    determination of legal rights and obligations made by the rendering court
    in the foreign country. Recognition of a foreign-country judgment must
    be distinguished from enforcement of that judgment. Enforcement of the
    foreign-country judgment involves the application of the legal
    procedures of the state to ensure that the judgment debtor obeys the
    foreign-country judgment.” UFCMJRA § 4 cmt. 2.
    18 MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    procedures compatible with the requirements of due process
    of law.” See 
    Wash. Rev. Code § 6
    .40A.030(2)(a) (emphasis
    added). Section 4(c)(8), by contrast, provides that “a court
    need not recognize a foreign-country judgment if . . . [t]he
    specific proceeding in the foreign court leading to the
    judgment was not compatible with the requirements of due
    process of law.” See 
    id.
     § 6.40A.030(3)(h).
    On appeal, Holland America does not argue that
    Midbrook has failed to make its prima facie showing that the
    Dutch judgment “[g]rants or denies recovery of a sum of
    money” and “is final, conclusive, and enforceable” under
    Dutch law. Nor does Holland America argue that the Dutch
    judicial system as a whole “does not provide . . . procedures
    compatible with the requirements of due process of law.”
    Rather, it argues only that the “specific proceeding[s]” in the
    Dutch courts which led to the Dutch judgment were “not
    compatible with the requirements of due process of law”
    under section 4(c)(8). This is so, Holland America argues,
    for two reasons: first, the Alkmaar District Court and the
    Amsterdam Court of Appeal “denied [Holland America]
    access to a majority of Midbrook’s cost records and
    therefore deprived it of the opportunity to provide any
    defense in the contract action”; and second, the Amsterdam
    Court of Appeal “arbitrarily and without basis overturned the
    Alkmaar District Court’s credibility rulings regarding
    whether the parties had reached a settlement.”
    1. Legal Standard
    As an initial matter, we must identify the legal standard
    that governs whether specific proceedings in a foreign court
    were “compatible with the requirements of due process of
    law” under section 4(c)(8). Holland America urges us to
    apply “American due process principles”—that is, to
    interpret the phrase “due process of law” as incorporating by
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB 19
    reference the requirements of the Due Process Clauses of the
    Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments. Midbrook, by contrast,
    argues for a more permissive, “international” standard of due
    process. 10 Because the parties ask us to interpret a provision
    of a Washington statute, we begin by looking to the
    decisions of the Washington courts. If those decisions are
    unavailing and the question is one of first impression, we
    must identify the result we think the Washington Supreme
    Court would reach if it were presented with the same
    question. See Brunozzi v. Cable Commc’ns, Inc., 
    851 F.3d 990
    , 998 (9th Cir. 2017).
    Washington’s UFCMJRA does not define the phrase
    “due process of law,” see Rev. Code Wash. § 6.40A.010
    (defining certain terms used in the statute), and the
    Washington courts have not yet addressed the meaning of
    the phrase as used in section 4(c)(8). Nor has any state
    supreme court or any federal court of appeals addressed the
    phrase’s meaning in section 4(c)(8) of any other state’s
    version of the UFCMJRA. See Rev. Code Wash.
    § 6.40A.900 (“In applying and construing this uniform act,
    consideration must be given to the need to promote
    10
    To be clear, Midbrook does not claim that any primary source of
    international law—such as a treaty or rule of customary international
    law—governs the process to which Holland America was entitled in the
    Dutch courts. Rather, Midbrook urges us to apply the “international
    concept of due process” formulated by the Seventh Circuit in interpreting
    the phrase “due process of law” in a similar provision of Illinois’s
    UFMJRA. See Society of Lloyd’s v. Ashenden, 
    233 F.3d 473
    , 477 (7th
    Cir. 2000). Though we find the reasoning of that case persuasive, we
    adopt the phrase “fundamental fairness” because that phrase—unlike the
    phrase “international due process”—appears in the commentary to the
    UFCMJRA.
    20 MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    uniformity of the law with respect to its subject matter
    among states that enact it.”).
    In the absence of any binding authority on point, the
    commentary to section 4 of the UFCMJRA is instructive:
    Subsection 4(c)(8) . . . allows the forum court
    to deny recognition to the foreign-country
    judgment if the court finds that the specific
    proceeding in the foreign court was not
    compatible with the requirements of
    fundamental fairness. . . . [I]t can be
    contrasted with subsection 4(b)(1), which
    requires the forum court to deny recognition
    to the foreign-country judgment if the forum
    court finds that the entire judicial system in
    the foreign country where the foreign-
    country judgment was rendered does not
    provide procedures compatible with the
    requirements of fundamental fairness. While
    the focus of subsection 4(b)(1) is on the
    foreign country’s judicial system as a whole,
    the focus of subsection 4(c)(8) is on the
    particular proceeding that resulted in the
    specific foreign-country judgment under
    consideration. Thus, the difference is that
    between showing, for example, that there has
    been such a breakdown of law and order in
    the particular foreign country that judgments
    are rendered on the basis of political
    decisions rather than the rule of law
    throughout the judicial system versus a
    showing that for political reasons the
    particular party against whom the foreign-
    country judgment was entered was denied
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB 21
    fundamental fairness in the particular
    proceedings leading to the foreign-country
    judgment.
    UFCMJRA § 4 cmt. 12 (emphasis added). This comment
    states that section 4(c)(8) allows for nonrecognition of a
    foreign money judgment if “the specific proceeding in the
    foreign court was not compatible with the requirements of
    fundamental fairness.” As an example, it gives a foreign
    proceeding in which judgment was entered against a
    “particular party” for “political reasons”; elsewhere, the
    comment states that “evidence of corruption” may also
    render a proceeding fundamentally unfair. See id. Nowhere
    does the comment cite our Constitution’s Due Process
    Clauses or otherwise intimate that the phrase “due process
    of law” was intended literally to incorporate their
    requirements.
    Moreover, by contrasting section 4(c)(8) with section
    4(b)(1), the comment suggests that the phrase “compatible
    with the requirements of due process of law” has the same
    meaning in both provisions. 11 And as another comment to
    section 4 states, section 4(b)(1) uses the standard “stated
    11
    Indeed, this reading is consistent with the presumption of
    consistent usage, a fundamental canon of statutory construction. See,
    e.g., Util. Air Reg. Group v. E.P.A., 
    134 S. Ct. 2427
    , 2441 (2014) (“One
    ordinarily assumes that identical words used in different parts of the
    same act are intended to have the same meaning.” (citations and internal
    quotation marks omitted)); Antonin Scalia and Bryan A. Garner,
    Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts 170–73 (West 2012).
    22 MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    authoritatively by the Supreme Court . . . in Hilton v. Guyot,
    
    159 U.S. 113
    , 205 (1895)”: 12
    As indicated in [Hilton], a mere difference in
    the procedural system is not a sufficient basis
    for nonrecognition. . . . The focus of inquiry
    12
    In Hilton, the Supreme Court first addressed the recognition of
    foreign judgments as a matter of “general” federal common law. See
    Hilton, 
    159 U.S. at 163
     (“[W]hen, as is the case here, there is no written
    law upon the subject, the duty still rests upon the judicial tribunals of
    ascertaining and declaring what the law is . . . to determine the rights of
    parties to suits regularly broght [sic] before them.”). Rejecting the
    argument that a French judgment should be denied recognition simply
    because French law provided for neither testimony under oath nor cross-
    examination of witnesses, see 
    id. at 117
    , the Court explained:
    When an action is brought in a court of this country,
    by a citizen of a foreign country against one of our own
    citizens, to recover a sum of money adjudged by a
    court of that country to be due from the defendant to
    the plaintiff, and the foreign judgment appears to have
    been rendered by a competent court, having
    jurisdiction of the cause and of the parties, and upon
    due allegations and proofs, and opportunity to defend
    against them, and its proceedings are according to the
    course of a civilized jurisprudence, and are stated in a
    clear and formal record, the judgment . . . should be
    held conclusive upon the merits tried in the foreign
    court, unless some special ground is shown for
    impeaching the judgment, as by showing that it was
    affected by fraud or prejudice, or that by the principles
    of international law, and by the comity of our own
    country, it should not be given full credit and effect.
    
    Id.
     at 205–06. After Erie v. Tompkins, 
    304 U.S. 64
     (1938), state law—
    not Hilton—controls the recognition of foreign judgments in federal
    diversity cases like this one. See Naoko Ohno v. Yuko Yasuma, 
    723 F.3d 984
    , 990 (9th Cir. 2013); Restatement (Third) of the Foreign Relations
    Law of the United States § 481 cmt. a (1987).
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB 23
    is not whether the procedure in the rendering
    country is similar to U.S. procedure, but
    rather on the basic fairness of the foreign-
    country procedure. Procedural differences,
    such as absence of jury trial or different
    evidentiary rules are not sufficient to justify
    denying recognition under subsection (b)(1),
    so long as the essential elements of impartial
    administration and basic procedural fairness
    have been provided in the foreign
    proceeding.
    UFCMJRA § 4 cmt. 5 (citations and internal quotation
    marks omitted); see also Tonga Air Services, Ltd. v. Fowler,
    
    826 P.2d 204
    , 209 (Wash. 1992) (finding that “due process
    of law” was satisfied under the predecessor to section 4(b)(1)
    of Washington’s UFCMJRA where, inter alia, foreign law
    “impose[d] more onerous standards for the introduction of
    documentary evidence on foreigners” and there was no
    verbatim transcript of the foreign proceedings). Taken
    together, these two comments demonstrate that section
    4(c)(8)—like section 4(b)(1)—requires only “basic” or
    “fundamental” fairness for a specific foreign proceeding to
    be “compatible with the requirements of due process of law.”
    Our conclusion that section 4(c)(8) requires only
    “fundamental fairness” is buttressed by the prefatory note to
    the UFCMJRA, which states that the act’s purpose is to
    “make it more likely that money judgments rendered in that
    state would be recognized in other countries.” Certainly, it
    would undermine this purpose to enforce only those foreign
    judgments which resulted from proceedings that conformed
    to our own notions of constitutional due process. See
    Ashenden, 
    233 F.3d at 476
     (rejecting the argument that
    foreign courts should have to follow “the latest twist and turn
    24 MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    of our courts regarding, for example, the circumstances
    under which due process requires an opportunity for a
    hearing in advance of the deprivation of a substantive right
    rather than afterwards”). Such a high bar would encourage
    foreign powers to condition the enforcement of our
    judgments on the satisfaction of their procedural
    requirements, which could be just as onerous as our own.
    We are unpersuaded by Holland America’s analogy to
    the U.N. Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of
    Foreign Arbitral Awards, June 10, 1958, 21 U.S.T. 2517 (the
    “New York Convention”). Article V, section 1(b) of that
    treaty states that recognition of a foreign arbitral award “may
    be refused” if, inter alia, “[t]he party against whom the
    award is invoked was not given proper notice of the . . .
    arbitration proceedings or was otherwise unable to present
    his case.” As Holland America points out, at least two of our
    sister circuits have held that this language “essentially
    sanctions the application of the forum state’s standards of
    due process.” Iran Aircraft Industries v. Avco Corp.,
    
    980 F.2d 141
    , 145 (2d Cir. 1992) (citing Parsons &
    Whittemore Overseas Co. v. Societe Generale de L'Industrie
    du Papier (RAKTA), 
    508 F.2d 969
    , 975–76 (2d Cir. 1974));
    see also Generica Ltd. v. Pharm. Basics, Inc., 
    125 F.3d 1123
    ,
    1129–30 (7th Cir. 1997). According to Holland America,
    these cases demonstrate that “it is possible to apply an
    American due process analysis in individual proceedings
    just like this one.”
    Though it may be “possible” to apply American
    constitutional due-process standards here, we nonetheless
    decline to do so, because we think the New York Convention
    cases are distinguishable. Unlike the UFCMJRA, the New
    York Convention provides no guidance—in commentary or
    elsewhere—regarding the standards to apply in interpreting
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB 25
    section 1(b) of article V. Indeed, in Parsons & Whittemore
    Overseas, the seminal case on which Holland America’s
    cited authority relies, the Second Circuit relied exclusively
    on a footnote in a law review article which highlights this
    fact:
    It should be noted that there is no
    specification of the standards for judging the
    propriety of the notice or the adequacy of the
    opportunity to be heard [under section 1(b) of
    article V]. . . . [I]t can be argued that the law
    chosen by the parties or the law of the
    rendering State should govern. On the other
    hand, the concept of due process is closely
    linked with the public policy of the forum,
    and it can be expected that the enforcing State
    will apply its own standards of due process.”
    Leonard V. Quigley, Accession by the United States to the
    United Nations Convention on the Recognition and
    Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards, 
    70 Yale L.J. 1049
    ,
    1082 n.81 (1961) (emphasis added). Here, we need not rely
    on “public policy” to determine the standard governing
    section 4(c)(8), because the text of the UFCMJRA’s
    commentary provides the answer: “fundamental fairness.”
    In sum, both the commentary and prefatory note to the
    UFCMJRA demonstrate that under section 4(c)(8), courts
    ask only whether the party resisting judgment “was denied
    fundamental fairness in the particular proceedings leading to
    the foreign-country judgment,” not whether the foreign
    proceedings literally conformed to the requirements of due
    process under our own Constitution. UFCMJRA § 4 cmt. 12.
    To demonstrate a lack of “fundamental fairness,” the party
    resisting the judgment must point to more than mere
    26 MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    “procedural differences”—like a lack of trial by jury or
    “different evidentiary rules”—between the process that the
    party received in the foreign proceeding and the process to
    which it would have been entitled here. UFCMJRA § 4 cmt.
    5. Rather, the party must establish a deprivation of “basic
    procedural fairness” by, for example, proffering evidence of
    “corruption” or that the foreign judgment was entered for
    “political reasons.” See UFCMJRA § 4 cmt. 12. We proceed
    to consider whether Holland America has satisfied this
    standard with respect to the Dutch proceedings. Thus, it is
    not necessary for us to decide whether process accorded to
    Midbrook also passed muster under American standards of
    due process. 13
    2. Holland America’s Discovery Requests
    First, Holland America argues that it was denied due
    process in the Dutch proceedings because the Alkmaar
    District Court and the Amsterdam Court of Appeal “denied
    [Holland America] access to a majority of Midbrook’s cost
    records.” Holland America cites no authority for the
    proposition that “fundamental fairness” requires that a
    litigant be afforded an opportunity for pretrial discovery, and
    we are aware of none. See, e.g., Ashenden, 
    233 F.3d at
    479–
    80 (“[T]he right to pretrial discovery is not a part of the U.S.
    concept of due process, let alone of international due
    process.”) (internal citations omitted).
    In any case, we need not decide whether it would violate
    fundamental fairness to deny a party the opportunity to take
    13
    The “cardinal principle of judicial restraint” is that “if it is not
    necessary to decide more, it is necessary not to decide more.” PDK Labs.
    Inc. v. U.S. D.E.A., 
    362 F.3d 786
    , 799 (D.C. Cir. 2004) (Roberts, J.,
    concurring in part and concurring in judgment).
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB 27
    any pretrial discovery, because here, Holland America was
    afforded some pretrial discovery. Instead of ordering
    Midbrook to produce all of its cost and banking records, as
    one of our federal district courts might have done, the Dutch
    courts ordered Holland America to identify specific records
    that it wished to discover and to explain why it needed them.
    Then, in each case where Holland America complied, the
    Dutch courts ordered Midbrook to produce documentation.
    For example, although the Dutch courts repeatedly
    denied Holland America’s requests for documentation
    substantiating all of the costs underlying Midbrook’s
    invoices, the Alkmaar District Court afforded Holland
    America the opportunity to identify and explain “[the]
    amounts [that] Midbrook invoiced unjustifiably to [Holland
    America] and why.” The court then ordered Midbrook to
    respond to Holland America’s arguments with supporting
    documentation, and, after it received Midbrook’s responses,
    it addressed Holland America’s objections one by one.
    Likewise, although the Dutch courts did not grant
    Holland America access to all of Midbrook’s records related
    to the dollar and guilder accounts, the Amsterdam Court of
    Appeal did order Midbrook to produce the statements of
    those accounts. Then, it gave Holland America an
    opportunity to challenge the accuracy of those statements,
    addressed Holland America’s objections one by one, granted
    several of them, and adjusted Midbrook’s damages award
    accordingly. Far from comparing to “corruption” or the entry
    of judgment against Holland America for “political reasons,”
    UFCMJRA § 4 cmt. 12, the Dutch courts’ treatment of
    Holland America’s discovery requests was a mere
    “procedural difference” that is insufficient to establish that
    the Dutch proceedings were fundamentally unfair.
    28 MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    Our conclusion is buttressed by the fact that not even
    constitutional due process—a standard which our sister
    circuits have recognized as being more demanding than
    “fundamental fairness” 14—requires full pretrial discovery.
    See, e.g., N.L.R.B. v. Valley Mold Co., 
    530 F.2d 693
    , 695
    (6th Cir. 1976) (“It is well settled that parties to judicial or
    quasi-judicial proceedings are not entitled to discovery as a
    matter of constitutional right.”); see also Weatherford v.
    Bursey, 
    429 U.S. 545
    , 559 (1977) (“There is no general
    constitutional right to discovery in a criminal case.”);
    Thomas v. Bible, 
    896 F.2d 555
     (9th Cir. 1990) (unpublished)
    (“There is . . . no constitutional right to pretrial discovery in
    administrative proceedings.”). Indeed, there was no
    statutory right to full pretrial discovery in federal cases
    before the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure were enacted in
    1938. See, e.g., Hickman v. Taylor, 
    329 U.S. 495
    , 500 (1947)
    (describing “[t]he pre-trial deposition-discovery mechanism
    established by Rules 26 to 37” as “one of the most significant
    innovations of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure”). Thus,
    given that Holland America would not have been entitled to
    full pretrial discovery even under our own constitutional
    14
    In applying the “fundamental fairness” standard to evaluate
    foreign judicial systems under section 4(b)(1), our sister circuits have
    consistently recognized that constitutional due-process standards are
    more demanding. See Society of Lloyd’s v. Ashenden, 
    233 F.3d 473
    , 477
    (7th Cir. 2000) (interpreting the predecessor to section 4(b)(1) of
    Illinois’s UFCMJRA as employing an “international concept of due
    process” that was “less demanding” than “the complex concept that has
    emerged from American case law”); DeJoria v. Maghreb Petroleum
    Expl., S.A., 
    804 F.3d 373
    , 380 (5th Cir. 2015) (recognizing that under the
    predecessor to section 4(b)(1) of Texas’s UFCMJRA, “the foreign
    judicial system must only be fundamentally fair” and “need not comply
    with the traditional rigors of American due process” (citations,
    alterations, and internal quotation marks omitted)); Society of Lloyd’s v.
    Reinhart, 
    402 F.3d 982
    , 994–95 (10th Cir. 2005) (similar, regarding the
    predecessor to section 4(b)(1) of New Mexico’s UFCMJRA).
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB 29
    standards, we have no difficulty holding that Holland
    America was not denied fundamental fairness in the Dutch
    proceedings.
    3. Reversal of the Alkmaar District Court’s
    Factual     Finding   and     Credibility
    Determination
    Next, Holland America argues that it was denied due
    process when the Amsterdam Court of Appeal overturned
    the Alkmaar District Court’s factual finding denying the
    existence of the parties’ alleged October 1999 settlement
    agreement without deferring to the district court’s
    determination that the testimony of two of Midbrook’s
    witnesses was not credible and thus vitiated any such
    settlement agreement.
    Again, the authorities cited by Holland America fall far
    short of establishing that “fundamental fairness” requires a
    foreign appellate court to defer to a foreign trial court’s
    factual findings. We also hesitate to insert our own rule of
    decision regarding the deference owed to trial court factual
    findings. See United States v. Hinkson, 
    585 F.3d 1247
     (9th
    Cir. 2009).
    In any case, we are convinced that Holland America was
    afforded fundamental fairness here, because the Amsterdam
    Court of Appeal gave a good reason for overturning the
    Alkmaar District Court’s finding that the parties had reached
    no settlement agreement in October 1999. As the court of
    appeal explained:
    It is an established fact that a credit was
    issued by Midbrook for an amount of []
    100,000 [guilders]. [Holland America] does
    not declare in any way what consideration on
    30 MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    its part stood against this credit. Considering
    the relationship between the parties . . . it is
    unlikely that Midbrook would not have
    demanded a certain consideration ‘in
    exchange’ for this credit. On the other hand,
    it is plausible that the parties would have
    wanted to clear up the past before working
    together for one final year.
    Thus, the court of appeal’s reversal of the district court’s
    factual finding was based not only on its own evaluation of
    the credibility of Midbrook’s witnesses, but also on the
    unexplained 100,000 guilder payment, which the court of
    appeal interpreted as a settlement of past accounts between
    the parties. Especially in light of this additional ground for
    reversal, the court of appeal’s reversal reflects at most a mere
    “procedural difference” between U.S. and Dutch law,
    UFCMJRA § 4 cmt. 5, and was therefore fundamentally fair.
    We are further persuaded of this conclusion because
    again, Holland America has failed to establish that even the
    more exacting standards of constitutional due process would
    have required a United States appellate court to defer to a
    trial court’s factual determination under like circumstances.
    Most of the American cases cited by Holland America refer
    either expressly or impliedly to Federal Rule of Civil
    Procedure 52(a)(6), which provides that a district court’s
    “[f]indings of fact . . . must not be set aside unless clearly
    erroneous, and the reviewing court must give due regard to
    the trial court’s opportunity to judge the witnesses’
    credibility.” See, e.g., Anderson v. City of Bessemer, 
    470 U.S. 564
    , 573 (1985) (“[T]he standard governing appellate
    review of a district court's finding of discrimination is that
    set forth in Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 52(a) . . . .”)).
    Rule 52 is a statutory rule, however, and none of Holland
    MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB 31
    America’s cited authority establishes that the Constitution
    independently requires appellate courts to defer to trial-court
    factual findings. Thus, Holland America could claim no
    constitutional violation had an American appellate court
    taken the same action as the Amsterdam Court of Appeal,
    and this too suggests that the Dutch proceedings were
    fundamentally fair.
    B. The District Court Did Not Abuse Its Discretion
    by Denying Holland America’s Motion for
    Additional Discovery Under Federal Rule of Civil
    Procedure 56(d).
    Finally, Holland America argues that the district court
    abused its discretion by denying Holland America’s request
    for additional discovery under Federal Rule of Civil
    Procedure 56(d). Rule 56(d) provides that “[i]f a nonmovant
    shows by affidavit or declaration that, for specified reasons,
    it cannot present facts essential to justify its opposition, the
    court may . . . allow time to obtain affidavits or declarations
    or to take discovery.” To prevail on a request for additional
    discovery under Rule 56(d), a party must show that “(1) it
    has set forth in affidavit form the specific facts it hopes to
    elicit from further discovery; (2) the facts sought exist; and
    (3) the sought-after facts are essential to oppose summary
    judgment.” Family Home & Fin. Ctr., Inc. v. Fed. Home
    Loan Mortg. Corp., 
    525 F.3d 822
    , 827 (9th Cir. 2008).
    Here, the additional discovery that Holland America
    sought in its opposition to Midbrook’s summary judgment
    motion was the same discovery that it sought in the Dutch
    proceedings: “Midbrook’s underlying cost records and
    banking records[.]”As the district court noted, however, this
    discovery would not “preclude summary judgment,”
    because it had no bearing on whether the proceedings in the
    Dutch courts were “compatible with the requirements of due
    32 MIDBROOK FLOWERBULBS V. HOLLAND AM. BULB
    process of law” under section 4(c)(8) of Washington’s
    UFCMJRA. Rather, Holland America sought this discovery
    because it would “conclusively determine whether
    Midbrook was in fact entitled to any judgment whatsoever
    in the Dutch proceedings.” Because this fact was not
    relevant—let alone “essential”—to the issues raised by
    Midbrook’s motion for summary judgment, the district court
    did not abuse its discretion by denying Holland America’s
    request for additional discovery.
    IV. Conclusion
    We AFFIRM the district court’s order granting
    summary judgment for Midbrook and denying Holland
    America’s discovery request under Rule 56(d).