Judge: Armen Tamzarian, Case: 21STCV45961, Date: 2023-05-05 Tentative Ruling

Case Number: 21STCV45961    Hearing Date: May 5, 2023    Dept: 52

Plaintiff State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company’s Motion for Terminating Sanctions

Plaintiff State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company moves for terminating sanctions against defendants Veronica Sims and Barry Reed.

After a court issues an order compelling responses to requests for production, “[i]f a party then fails to obey” the order, “the court may make those orders that are just, including” imposing monetary, issue, evidence, or terminating sanctions.  (CCP § 2031.300(c).)  

Discovery sanctions should be imposed incrementally, “starting with monetary sanctions and ending with the ultimate sanction of termination.”  (Lopez v. Watchtower Bible & Tract Society of New York, Inc. (2016) 246 Cal.App.4th 566, 604.)  “[A] terminating sanction should generally not be imposed until the court has attempted less severe alternatives and found them to be unsuccessful and/or the record clearly shows lesser sanctions would be ineffective.”  (Ibid.) 

Plaintiff’s motion asserts that Sims and Reed disobeyed the court’s order issued on March 7, 2023, which ordered them to serve responses to demands for production of documents and pay monetary sanctions within 30 days.  But defendants did not appear at that hearing, and the court’s order concluded, “Plaintiff’s counsel to give notice.”  (Humphrey Decl., ¶ 3, Ex. A.)  Plaintiff served notice of the ruling by mail on defendants on March 28.  (Id., ¶ 4, Ex. B.)  Plaintiff then served and filed this motion for terminating sanctions on April 7.  This motion was therefore premature.  Defendants’ 30-day period to serve responses had only begun 10 days earlier, when plaintiff gave notice of the court’s order.    

Plaintiff also has not shown that lesser sanctions would be ineffective.  A lesser sanction—such as excluding any documents not produced in discovery—would suffice to accomplish plaintiff’s objects of discovery.  In this action, plaintiff seeks declaratory relief that its insurance policy does not cover any claim for a specific collision.  (Comp., prayer, ¶¶ 2-3.)  Part of plaintiff’s basis for this relief is that defendants “fail[ed] to cooperate in Plaintiff’s investigation, including the failure to provide all requested documents to provide for a full and fair evaluation of Sims and Reed’s claim.  (Id., ¶  22.)  The complaint also alleges plaintiff has evidence showing defendants made material representations based on the vehicle’s “Event Data Recorder” and that inconsistent “passenger information was provided to the Los Angeles Police Department when a desk report was filed after the incident.”  (Id., ¶ 23.)  That defendants had the ability and obligation to produce documents in discovery in this case, but did not do so, supports plaintiff’s claim. 

Moreover, in addition to ordering defendants to respond to requests for production, the court’s March 7 order deemed the truth of matters specified in plaintiff’s requests for admission admitted.  Defendants have thus admitted crucial facts supporting plaintiff’s case.  In these circumstances, plaintiff has not shown that defendants’ failure to respond to requests for production has caused any meaningful prejudice to plaintiff.

The court therefore declines to impose the ultimate sanction of termination by striking defendants’ answer.

Plaintiff State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company’s motion for terminating sanctions is denied.