Judge: Daniel S. Murphy, Case: 22STCV13218, Date: 2022-09-16 Tentative Ruling

Case Number: 22STCV13218    Hearing Date: September 16, 2022    Dept: 32

BACKGROUND

            On April 20, 2022, Plaintiff Isaiah Moran filed this action for employment discrimination against Defendants KAB Group Investments, Inc., WC Performance Ford, Inc., Marwan Salah, and Frank Gonzalez. The present discovery dispute arises from the following pertinent facts.

            On May 13, 2022, Plaintiff served on Defendant KAB Group Investments, Inc. a set of Requests for Production of Documents. (Shirazi Decl. ¶ 2.) After two extensions, the deadline for Defendant’s responses was July 15, 2022. (Id., ¶¶ 3-4.) After Plaintiff did not respond to Defendant’s request for a third extension, Defendant on July 15 served responses consisting of identical objections to each RFP, primarily claiming that defense counsel contracted COVID and was unable to respond to the RFPs. (Id., ¶ 5, Ex. D; Roman Decl. ¶¶ 9-10.) Plaintiff then granted a third extension to July 25, 2022, warning that a motion to compel would ensue if responses were not provided by then. (Shirazi Decl. ¶ 6, Ex. E.) Through further correspondence, defense counsel promised to provide substantive responses by August 10, 2022. (Id., ¶ 8.)

On August 17, 2022, Plaintiff filed the instant motion to compel further responses after still receiving no supplemental responses. (Shirazi Decl. ¶ 9.) On August 17, after the motion was filed, defense counsel emailed Plaintiff’s counsel expressing Defendant’s belief that there had been an agreement to produce responses by August 23. (Roman Decl., Ex. G.) As of September 7, Defendant still had not served any supplemental responses. (Shirazi Reply Decl. ¶ 7.)

LEGAL STANDARD

On receipt of a response to a request for inspection, the demanding party may move for an order compelling further responses to the demand if the demanding party deems that (1) a statement of compliance with the demand is incomplete, (2) a representation of inability to

comply is inadequate, incomplete, or evasive, or (3) an objection in the response is without merit or too general. (Code Civ. Proc., § 2031.310, subd. (a).)

MEET AND CONFER

A motion to compel further response to requests for production must be accompanied by a meet and confer declaration. (Code Civ. Proc., § 2031.310, subd. (b)(2).) The Court finds that Plaintiff has satisfied the meet and confer requirement. (See Shirazi Decl.)

DISCUSSION

            Defendant asserted identical objections to each RFP except RFP Nos. 46 and 57, to which Defendant provided no response at all. (Shirazi Decl., Ex. D.) Besides the COVID issue, Defendant made the following objections: “Vague, ambiguous, overbroad. Irrelevant and not reasonably calculated to lead to the discovery of admissible evidence. Harassing. Attorney-client privilege. Work product. Privacy. Calls for expert opinion and premature disclosure of expert opinions.” (Ibid.)

            Defendant makes no attempt to substantiate any of these boilerplate objections and concedes that it asserted the objections merely to preserve them after it could not obtain a third extension. (Opp. 1:26-2:1.) Defendant also acknowledges that “[a]fter the responses were served, counsel met and conferred and Defendant agreed to serve amended responses and produce responsive documents.” (Opp. 2:1-2.) Defendant argues that “[t]his motion is moot because Defendant agreed to provide, and will be providing, Code complaint verified responses, and responsive documents, prior to the hearing.” (Opp. 3:11-12.) Defendant thus admits that it is capable of providing substantive responses and does not articulate any issue with the requests or justify any of the objections.

            Defendant argues that the motion should be denied because “Plaintiff’s counsel agreed he would not file a motion to compel.” (Opp. 3:23-26.) However, Plaintiff’s counsel denies this. (Shirazi Reply Decl. ¶ 2.) Upon granting a third extension to July 25, Plaintiff’s counsel warned that he would file a motion to compel if Defendant did not provide supplemental responses by July 25. (Shirazi Decl., Ex. E.) On July 26, defense counsel apologized for the delay and requested Plaintiff’s counsel to hold off on a motion to compel, but there is no indication that Plaintiff agreed to do so. (See Roman Decl., Ex. F.)

In any case, Defendant still had not provided any substantive responses by September 7. In the July 26 email, Defense counsel claimed that “[w]e are providing amended responses asap.” (Roman Decl., Ex. F.) Defendant then promised to produce responses by August 10, then August 23, then September 2, but failed to meet all of those deadlines. (Shirazi Decl. ¶ 8; Roman Decl., Ex. G; Shirazi Reply Decl. ¶ 5.)

Defendant’s continued delay and failure to meet numerous extensions spanning from July to September is without substantial justification. Thus, sanctions are warranted. However, the amount requested ($9,600) is unreasonably high given the simplicity of the motion. (See Shirazi Decl. ¶ 11.) The reasonable amount is $1,250. (See Opp. 4:14-18.)

CONCLUSION

            Plaintiff’s motion to compel further responses is GRANTED. Defendant KAB Group Investments, Inc. is to produce further responses within 10 days. Sanctions are awarded against Defendant and its counsel in the amount of $1,250, to be paid within 30 days.