Judge: Audra Mori, Case: 21STCV26337, Date: 2022-08-25 Tentative Ruling

Case Number: 21STCV26337    Hearing Date: August 25, 2022    Dept: 31

SUPERIOR COURT OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

FOR THE COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES - CENTRAL DISTRICT

Defendant Forum Entertainment LLC (“Defendant”) propounded form interrogatories, special interrogatories, request for production of documents (“RPDs”), request for admissions, all set one, on Plaintiff Nathan Jackson (“Plaintiff”) on September 27, 2021.  Defendant asserts that as of filing the motions, Plaintiff had not served responses.  Defendant therefore seeks an order compelling Plaintiff to respond, without objections, to the outstanding interrogatories and RPDs, deeming the RFAs admitted, and imposing sanctions.

            On August 10, 2022, Plaintiff filed an opposition to each motion to compel and the motion to deem RFAs admitted.  Plaintiff avers that on August 9, 2022, Plaintiff served responses to the subject discovery on Defendant.  As of August 22, 2022, no reply has been filed. 

The court finds that the motions to compel and deem RFAs admitted are moot in light of the responses served on Defendant prior to the hearing.  (St. Mary v. Superior Court (2014) 223 Cal.App.4th 762, 776.)

Sanctions are mandatory.  (CCP §§ 2030.290(c), 2031.300(c), 2033.280(c).)  The Court awards Defendant one hour for preparing each form motion to compel [thee hours total] and one hour to appear at the hearing- but awards this time once- all at the reasonable rate $200 per hour, for a total of $800 in attorney fees.  Further, the Court awards Defendant three motion filing fees of $60, or $180 total, as costs.

Defendant seeks sanctions against Plaintiff and Plaintiff’s attorney of record.  Plaintiff’s counsel provides that the failure to provide timely responses was the fault of Plaintiff’s counsel only.  Sanctions are thus imposed against Plaintiff’s attorney of record.  Plaintiff’s counsel is ordered to pay sanctions to Defendant, by and through counsel of record, in the total amount of $980, within twenty days.

As a final note, the court realizes that Defendant’s motion to compel Plaintiff to respond to interrogatories is actually two motions combined into one: (a) motion to compel responses to form interrogatories, set one, and (b) motion to compel responses to special interrogatories, set one.  In the future, moving party is ordered to obtain separate hearing reservations and pay separate filing fees.  Combining multiple motions under the guise of one motion with one hearing reservation manipulates the Court Reservation System and unfairly jumps ahead of other litigants.  Moreover, combining motions to avoid payment of separate filing fees deprives the Court of filing fees it is otherwise entitled to collect.

Be that as it may, in the absence of any objection by Plaintiff and lack of any showing of prejudice, the court will exercise its discretion to hear all the motions, but the above orders will not become effective until moving party pays an additional $60 in filing fees (1 motions filing fee not paid for x $60 filing fee). 

Defendant is ordered to give notice. 

PLEASE TAKE NOTICE:

• Parties are encouraged to meet and confer after reading this tentative ruling to see if they can reach an agreement.
• If a party intends to submit on this tentative ruling, the party must send an email to the Court at sscdept31@lacourt.org with the Subject line “SUBMIT” followed by the case number.  The body of the email must include the hearing date and time, counsel’s contact information, and the identity of the party submitting.  
• Unless all parties submit by email to this tentative ruling, the parties should arrange to appear remotely (encouraged) or in person for oral argument.  You should assume that others may appear at the hearing to argue.  
• If the parties neither submit nor appear at hearing, the Court may take the motion off calendar or adopt the tentative ruling as the order of the Court.  After the Court has issued a tentative ruling, the Court may prohibit the withdrawal of the subject motion without leave. 

Dated this 25^th day of August 2022