Hollingsworth v. City of North Las Vegas

[5] UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT [6] DISTRICT OF NEVADA [7] 8 ANDREA HOLLINGSWORTH, et al., Case No. 2:21-cv-02230-CDS-NJK 9 Plaintiffs, Order 10 v. [Docket No. 54] 11 CITY OF NORTH LAS VEGAS, et al., 12 Defendants. 13 Pending before the Court is Plaintiffs’ motion to compel discovery. Docket No. 54. The 14 Court has considered Plaintiffs’ motion, Defendants’ response, and Plaintiffs’ reply. Docket Nos. 15 54, 61, 75. The motion is properly resolved without a hearing. Local Rule 78-1. 16 I. BACKGROUND 17 On November 15, 2022, the Court issued the operative scheduling order in this case. 18 Docket No. 33. Over the course of the following year, the parties requested extensions of the case 19 management deadlines on four separate occasions. Docket Nos. 38, 40, 42, 45. On December 5, 20 2023, the parties filed a fifth request for extension of the case management deadlines. See Docket 21 No. 49. The parties premised their extension request on several issues relating to scheduling 22 depositions. Id. at 7. 23 The Court found that the parties had failed to diligently engage in discovery. Docket No. 24 50 at 2. In an effort to have the case decided on the merits, however, the Court granted a 45-day 25 extension subject to several caveats. Id. The Court stated, in pertinent part, that leniency would 26 not be provided again. Id. Further, the Court ordered that responses to any remaining written 27 discovery must be provided within 14 days, not 30. Id. at 3-4. The Court stated that “[i]t does not 28 appear that further written discovery is currently contemplated, but these expedited dates apply to 1 any written discovery that arises.” Id. at 4 n.4. The Court further ordered that the expedited 2 deadlines could not be modified by agreement of the parties without obtaining the Court’s 3 approval. Id. at 4. 4 Plaintiffs now seek an order compelling Defendants to produce documents, interrogatory 5 responses, and to deem requests for admission admitted. Docket No. 54. Plaintiffs submit that 6 Defendants failed to timely respond to discovery requests in violation of the Court’s order 7 requiring responses to written discovery within 14 days and that they further failed to even read 8 the portion of the Court’s order requiring expedited responses. Docket No. 54 at 4, 6. Therefore, 9 Plaintiffs argue that any of Defendants’ objections to the discovery requests are waived and ask 10 that the requests for admission be deemed admitted. Id. at 6-8. Plaintiffs also request their costs 11 and fees in bringing this motion. Id. at 8. 12 In response, Defendants submit that Plaintiffs’ additional written discovery was 13 uncontemplated and served only to take advantage of the Court’s expedited deadlines. Docket No. 14 61 at 1. Defendants submit that, since the additional discovery was due during the holiday season, 15 it was impossible to collect the material required to respond to the discovery requests within 14 16 days. Id. Defendants submit that the Court’s expedited deadlines applied only to Plaintiffs because 17 of their failure to supplement their responses to prior discovery requests. Id. at 5-6. Defendants 18 request that Plaintiffs’ motion be denied as moot because Defendants responded to Plaintiffs’ 19 discovery requests within the standard 30 days as provided by Fed. R. Civ. P. 33, 34, and 36. Id. 20 at 8. 21 In reply, Plaintiffs submit that their discovery requests were proper and that the Court’s 22 prior order did not forbid additional uncontemplated discovery. Docket No. 75 at 7-8. Plaintiffs 23 further submit that their motion to compel is not moot because Defendants’ untimely responses 24 are insufficient and point to several deficiencies in Defendants’ responses. Id. at 8-13. Plaintiffs 25 submit that they were prejudiced by Defendants’ untimely responses because the documents were 26 not received until after two depositions had already taken place. Id. at 13-14. Therefore, Plaintiffs 27 ask the Court to find all objections to the discovery requests waived, deem the requests for [28] 1 admission admitted, require Defendants to fully respond to written discovery requests without 2 delay, and request an award of fees and costs. Id. at 14. 3 II. STANDARDS 4 “The discovery process in theory should be cooperative and largely unsupervised by the 5 district court.” Sali v. Corona Reg’l Med. Ctr., 884 F.3d 1218, 1219 (9th Cir. 2018). When an 6 amicable resolution to a discovery dispute cannot be attained, however, a party seeking discovery 7 may move the Court to issue an order compelling that discovery. Fed. R. Civ. P. 37(a). The party 8 seeking to avoid discovery bears the burden of showing why that discovery should not be 9 permitted. V5 Techs. v. Switch, Ltd., 334 F.R.D. 306 , 309 (D.Nev. 2019).1 10 III. ANALYSIS 11 Defendants violated the Court’s order. The Court ordered that responses to any remaining 12 written discovery must be provided within 14 days, not 30. See Docket No. 50 at 4. The Court 13 expressly stated that these expedited dates apply to any written discovery that arises. Id. The clear 14 language of the Court’s order demonstrates that it applies to all written discovery, including future 15 written discovery. Docket No. 50 at 3-4, n.4. Further, the Court finds Defendants’ contention that 16 Plaintiffs served the additional written discovery to take advantage of the expedited deadlines 17 during the holiday season unpersuasive, as Defendants never sought an extension of the deadlines 18 from the Court. See Docket No. 50; see also Fed. R. Civ. P. 29(b). In any event, Defendants failed 19 to timely respond to the discovery requests, both under the Court’s order and under the standard 20 30 days permitted by Fed. R. Civ. P. 34.2 [21] 1 “The party who resists discovery has the burden to show that discovery should not be 22 allowed, and has the burden of clarifying, explaining, and supporting its objections.” Cable & Computer Tech., Inc. v. Lockheed Saunders, Inc., 175 F.R.D. 646, 650 (N.D. Cal. 1997); see also, 23 e.g., Blankenship v. Hearst Corp., 519 F.2d 418, 429 (9th Cir. 1975) (“Under the liberal discovery principles of the Federal Rules defendants were required to carry a heavy burden of showing why 24 discovery was denied”); V5 Technologies, 334 F.R.D. at 309-10 (“The party seeking to avoid discovery bears the burden of showing why that discovery should not be permitted”); F.T.C. v. 25 AMG Servs., Inc., 291 F.R.D. 544, 553 (D. Nev. 2013) (“The party resisting discovery bears the burden of showing why a discovery request should be denied” (citation and internal quotations 26 omitted)). 27 2 Defendants submit that they responded within the standard time provided under Fed. R. Civ. P. 33, 34, and 36, but the record demonstrates that their responses were ultimately not received 28 until January 24, 2024. Docket Nos. 75-6, 75-7, 75-8, 75-9. 1 Here, Defendants clearly failed to timely respond to Plaintiffs’ discovery requests. 2 Therefore, their objections are waived. See Richmark v. Timber Falling Consultants, 959 F.2d 3 1468, 1473 (9th Cir. 1992). The Court will, however, deny Plaintiffs’ motion to the extent it seeks 4 to have their requests for admission be deemed admitted since Defendants admitted to all of the 5 requests. See, e.g., French v. United States, 416 F.2d 1149, 1152 (9th Cir. 1968) (“A trial judge 6 has discretion to permit a late response to a request for admissions made pursuant to [Rule 36], 7 and thus relieve a party of apparent default”); see also Docket No. 61-3. 8 Plaintiffs are clearly entitled to an award of expenses. Fed. R. Civ. P. 37(a)(5)(A). An 9 award of expenses is not warranted when the opposing party’s positions were substantially justified 10 or other circumstances that would make an award of expenses unjust. Fed. R. Civ. P. 11 37(a)(5)(A)(ii-iii). A position is justified when “the parties had a genuine dispute on matters on 12 which reasonable people could differ as to the appropriate outcome.” Big City Dynasty v. FP 13 Holdings, LP, 336 F.R.D. 507 , 513 (D.Nev. 2020) (quoting Roberts v. Clark Cty. Sch. Dist., 312 14 F.R.D. 594 , 609 (D.Nev. 2016). The Court finds Defendants’ position in failing to respond to 15 Plaintiffs’ discovery requests within the Court-ordered 14 days – or even 30 days – was not 16 justified.3 17 IV. CONCLUSION 18 For the reasons discussed above, Plaintiffs’ motion to compel is GRANTED in part and 19 DENIED in part. Docket No. 54. The Court GRANTS Plaintiffs’ motion in all respects except 20 for the portion that asks that the requests for admission be deemed admitted, which it DENIES. 21 Further, Plaintiffs’ request for an award of expenses is GRANTED. The parties must meet and 22 confer, no later than March 25, 2024, regarding the discovery responses and Plaintiffs’ request for 23 fees and costs. To the extent the parties cannot agree on a reasonable number, Plaintiffs must file 24 their motion for fees and costs no later than March 29, 2024. Further, to the extent the parties [26] 3 This position appears to have been one that Defendants came up with after the fact, as 27 their attorney admitted that he had not read—at the very least—the portion of the Court’s order requiring expedited discovery responses. It goes without saying that all attorneys are required to 28 read Court orders in full. 1} cannot agree regarding the discovery responses, Plaintiffs must file any further request no later 2|| than March 29, 2024. 3 IT IS SO ORDERED. 4 Dated: March 19, 2024 Zo 5 Zax . oe ~~, Nancy J. Koppe: 6 United States agistrate Judge [10] 1]