In the case of City of L.A. v. PricewaterhouseCoopers, LLC (2024) 17 C5th 46 the California Supreme Court unanimously held that the Discovery Act gives courts independent authority to impose sanctions for discovery abuses and patterns of discovery abuse provisions. This was a complete reversal of the Court of Appeal’s decision which had limited the
Consider the following question I received from a defense attorney.
“Plaintiff timely served updated verified responses to Form Interrogatories, Set #1, #6.4, 8.4, 8.6, 16.1- 16.8 and 17.1 (RFA #5) pursuant to a Supplemental Interrogatory request. Instead of providing the information requested in the interrogatories, Plaintiff responded to each of the interrogatories with the following response:
Pursuant to CCP §2030.230, Plaintiff identifies the documents Bates Stamped 00001 – 00290 she produced on March 1, 2024
The email went on to ask if Plaintiff’s response was proper. The answer is no.
Reason #1: Plaintiff failed to meet her obligations under C.C.P. §2030.220 in responding to Defendants’ Supplemental Interrogatories. The code requires that a party must make a reasonable and good faith effort to obtain the information in responding to interrogatories. C.C.P. §2030.220; Regency Health Services, Inc. v. Superior Court (1998) 64 CA4th 1496. “A party cannot plead ignorance to information which can be obtained from sources under his control.” Deyo v. Kilbourne (1978) 84 CA3d 771, 779. This includes a party’s lawyer (Smith v. Superior Court (1961) 189 CA2d 6, 12); agents or employees (Gordon v. Sup. Ct. (1984) 161 CA 3d 151, 167-168); family members (Jones v. Superior Court (1981) 119 CA 3d 534, 552); and experts who have been retained by a party. Sigerseth v. Superior Court (1972) 23 CA 3d 427, 433. Cal. Prac. Guide: Civil Procedure Before Trial (TRG 2024) ¶ 8:1051-1060. This means that an attorney can’t just attach 290 documents with no descriptions. Sinaiko Healthcare Consulting, Inc. v. Pacific Healthcare Consultants (2007) 148 CA4th 390. The statute and the case law make it very clear that a party and the attorney must be proactive in obtaining the information to enable them to fully respond to the interrogatories. Continue Reading Can I Reference Documents When Answering Interrogatories?
A common area ob abuse occurs when attorneys instruct a witness not to answer a deposition question.
Continue Reading What to do When the Deponent Refuses to Answer
That is what the Eighth Division of the Second District Court of Appeal said in their opinion in Beth Field v. U.S. Bank National Association B309111 filed on June 9, 2022. The Court of Appeal went further and said “You likewise harm your own prospects if ever you hope for a fee award. (See Karton v. Ari Design & Construction Inc. (2021) 61 Cal.App.5th 734, 747 [attorney unprofessionalism justifies reducing fee awards].)”
Have you ever been in any of these situations?
Ten days after your client was served with the summons and complaint, the client was personally served with Form Interrogatories, 35 specially prepared interrogatories, 35 requests for admissions and 50 document requests.
Days after an unsuccessful mediation, you are served with 75 requests for admission, 60 special interrogatories, Form Interrogatory #17.1 and 100 requests for documents. A Declaration of Necessity was served with the discovery.
Eleven days before the close of discovery, opposing counsel hand serves you with a Person Most Knowledgeable/Custodian of Records Deposition Notice with 27 separate categories for testimony and 67 requests for documents.
In each of these situations, the discovery propounded was proper according to the Code of Civil Procedure.
Continue Reading WHEN YOU GET BOMBARDED WITH DISCOVERY…
On July 29, 2021, in the case of Braganza v. Albertson’s LLC, (2021) 67 Cal. App. 5th 144, the Fourth District Appellate District affirmed the trial court’s denial of Plaintiff’s motion to continue the hearing for a Motion for Summary Judgment and thereafter granting the defense’s motion. The key: Plaintiff’s counsel sought the continuance on the ground that she needed additional discovery to oppose the motion but did not demonstrate diligence in timely conducting discovery before seeking the continuance.
Continue Reading You Must be Diligent in Discovery to get a MSJ/MSA Continued
A plaintiff counsel writes in asking for advice:
“Today is July 7th. Trial is July 31. Discovery cut-off was July 1 and expert discovery closes on July 16th. Well, my client sought additional treatment on June 25thwith a neck, back and spine specialist. The results of the visit were provided to me on June 26th and I immediately mailed the results to opposing counsel that day. Now opposing counsel is stating the discovery is after the cutoff and inadmissible and the doctor can’t testify because expert disclosure has passed. I’m really worried about whether I will be able to use the evidence and if so, how I will be able to use the evidence?”
Opposing counsel is blowing smoke at this young lawyer.Continue Reading Opposing Counsel is Blowing Smoke
I received a comment about one of my blogs saying:
Many young(er) attorneys abuse discovery as a matter of course – as if they have been taught how to be obstructionists at law school. I also think newer attorneys do the scorched earth route to create more billing. One dope sent me objections that were over 100 pages.
I have written many blogs regarding how to handle discovery abuse by opposing counsel. These include filing motions to compel further responses, filing motions for protective orders and how to recover sanctions.Continue Reading DO YOU KNOW WHAT YOUR OBLIGATIONS ARE IN RESPONDING TO WRITTEN DISCOVERY?
Several times per month I receive questions from attorneys regarding a discovery dilemma. Mostly the questions offer a novel twist on basic discovery. However, this latest query was quirkier than most and raised some interesting issues and misconceptions, so I thought I would share it with you. It went like this:
I served written discovery on a cross-defendant in a case, we are one of the defendants. Cross-defendant (represented by, the plaintiff’s counsel) has appeared in this case by way of demurrer. Cross-Defendant has refused to answer for the following reasons, (1) my clients are not parties to the cross-complaint so therefore we cannot propound discovery; (2) the court sustained the demurrer with leave to amend and the amended cross-complaint will be filed shortly by the cross-complainant; and (3) the cross-defendant lives in Europe and I need to go through the Hague Convention. I don’t think any of these are legitimate reasons for not responding to discovery.
Continue Reading DISCOVERY GAMES AND MISCONCEPTIONS – Are These Objections Legitimate?
I have always been a strong advocate that you should be awarded sanctions if you had to bring a motion to get the relief you were entitled to even if the other side complied prior to the hearing on the motion. However in the case of Evilsizor v. Sweeney (2014) 230 CA4th 1304, the First District Court of Appeal had an interesting take on the issue.
Continue Reading Should you withdraw your motion if the other side has complied?