Judge: Deborah C. Servino, Case: 30-2019-01075202, Date: 2022-07-29 Tentative Ruling

Plaintiffs Main Street Asset Solutions, Inc., Nathan T. Hayes, LLC dba Main Street Funding, and Main Street Capital Funding, Inc.’s motion for an order compelling Defendant Trinity Financial Services, LLC (“Trinity”) to provide further responses to special interrogatories, set two, nos. 30-37,  is granted in part. 

New Evidence Submitted With Reply

The court did not consider the new evidence on reply submitted as Exhibits A and C to the Reply Basse Declaration.

Applicable Law

A party may move to compel further responses to interrogatories on the grounds that the answer is evasive or incomplete.  (Code Civ. Proc., § 2030.300, subd. (a)(1)). If a timely motion to compel has been filed, the burden is on the responding party to justify any objection or failure to fully answer the interrogatories.  (Fairmont Ins. Co. v. Superior Court (2000) 22 Cal.4th 245, 255.)

Merits

The interrogatories at issue seek information about Trinity’s licenses, including applications, denials, and revocations.  To each, Trinity responded:

Responding Party objects to this interrogatory on the grounds that it is unduly burdensome, oppressive, harassing, overbroad and is not reasonably calculated to lead to the discovery of admissible evidence.

In its opposition, Trinity relies solely on its contention that the information sought is not relevant.  For discovery purposes, relevance is broad.  As a general rule, discovery is limited only by relevance in the larger sense. Information is discoverable if it is (1) relevant to the subject matter involved in the pending action and (2) either admissible in evidence or reasonably calculated to lead to the discovery of admissible evidence.  (Norton v. Superior Court (1994) 24 Cal.App.4th 1750, 1755, 1760; Williams v. Superior Court (2017) 3 Cal.5th 531, 541-542.) 

Trinity contends the requests goes beyond the scope of this action.  First, Trinity points to the fact that the parties’ contract does not include a representation by Trinity that it is licensed.  Second, it argues that nothing about its own licensure, or related performance, is relevant to the value of the loans purchased by Plaintiffs.

Plaintiffs contend that Trinity’s ability to service the loans (and thus its licensure) does affect value.  Plaintiffs also argue that information about Trinity’s regulatory performance is more generally relevant to Trinity’s performance, Plaintiff’s fraud claims, and Trinity’s credibility.

Whether Trinity has, was denied, or lost a license does not bear directly on Plaintiffs’ claims that Trinity breached its contracts for sale of certain mortgages or made misrepresentations that Plaintiffs relied on. But Plaintiffs’ allegations are of an ongoing scheme by Defendants, operating at the edge of the regulations governing the mortgage servicing industry.  From this perspective, discovery requests designed to determine what licenses Trinity is supposed to have, has, was denied, or lost are reasonably calculated to lead to the discovery of admissible evidence.

However, there remain an issue as to the scope of the request.  None of the interrogatories are limited by time.  Accordingly, the motion is granted, but only for the period of 2014 to 2018. 

Within 20 days of the notice of ruling, Defendant Trinity is ordered to serve Code-compliant, verified further responses to special interrogatories nos. 30-37 for the period of 2014 to 2018. 

The court declines to award any sanctions.

Plaintiffs shall give notice of the ruling.