Maria Daniel vs City of Santa Barbara et al

Case Number

20CV03516

Case Type

Hearing Date / Time

Fri, 05/03/2024 - 10:00

Nature of Proceedings

10 Motions to Compel; 2 Motions for Admissions

Tentative Ruling

On December 13, 2023, plaintiff separately propounded Form Interrogatories (Set 2), Special Interrogatories (Set 2), Requests for Admissions (Set 2) and Requests for Production of Documents (Set 2) on defendants City of Santa Barbara and Granite Construction Company.

On December 19, 2023, plaintiff separately propounded Supplemental Requests for Production of Documents, and Supplemental Interrogatories on each defendant.

Defendants requested and received two-week extensions of time to respond to each set of the discovery.

When responses had not been provided by the extended dates for response, plaintiff on February 13, 2024, filed motions to compel responses to the form interrogatories, special interrogatories, and requests for production of documents, and motions for deemed admissions (or alternatively to compel responses without objections), with respect to the first set of discovery. On February 14, 2024, plaintiff filed motions to compel responses to the supplemental discovery. Each of the twelve motions filed by plaintiff seeks $1,100.00 in sanctions against the responding party. The hearings on all twelve motions were set for May 3, 2024.

On February 28, 2024, defendants served unverified responses to the discovery on plaintiff. The City’s verifications were provided on March 4, 2024, and Granite’s verifications were provided on March 18, 2024. Although defendants’ counsel requested that plaintiff take the motions off calendar, plaintiff did not do so.

Defendants have opposed the motions, contending that their provision of responses has rendered the motions moot. Defendants further contend that an award of sanctions is inappropriate, since it had appeared to counsel that the supplemental discovery had been served in response to her communications about the originally served discovery, and that the two sets were duplicative, and she received no response to her inquiry whether that was correct until February 1, 2024. Counsel notes that the motions were filed without any further meet and confer efforts.

In reply, plaintiff asserted that the motions are not moot, and sanctions are warranted for each motion, noting that the responses were initially unverified, and contained objections which had been waived, without a motion for relief from such waiver having been filed. Consequently, the responses were not code-compliant. Plaintiff notes that no meet and confer is required where no responses have been provided.

Plaintiff’s position is legally correct. She had no obligation to accept as “code-compliant” any responses containing objections, when those responses were served after such objections had been waived, and no motion for relief from such waiver had been filed.

The Court will order that defendants provide verified responses to the form interrogatories, special interrogatories, requests for production of documents, requests for admissions, supplemental requests for production of documents, and supplemental interrogatories, without objections, on or before May 24, 2024. If defendants file a motion for relief from their waiver of the objections to this discovery prior to that date, their time for response will be held in abeyance pending the resolution of that motion. Only one motion need be filed to address all of the discovery at issue. If any such motion is granted, no further responses to the discovery will be required.

To the extent that plaintiff’s motions with respect to the requests for admissions alternatively sought to have the matters set forth in the requests deemed admitted, those motions are denied.

The Court notes that plaintiff sought sanctions of $1,100.00 for each of the twelve motions, for a total of $13,200.00. The Court finds that amount excessive for “no response” motions which were largely duplicative, and which could have been addressed in a single motion for each set and defendant. The Court notes further that, pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure section 2033.280(c), sanctions are mandatory against any party, attorney, or both, whose failure to serve a timely response to a request for admissions necessitates a deemed admissions motion.

The Court will therefore order defendants, their attorneys, or both, to pay to plaintiff sanctions in the total amount of $5,000.00, arising from their failure to timely respond to the discovery which was served.