Judge: Lawrence Cho, Case: 21STCV12626, Date: 2024-03-29 Tentative Ruling

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Case Number: 21STCV12626    Hearing Date: March 29, 2024    Dept: K

CASE NAME:           CONEJO v. CITY OF PASADENA

CASE NUMBER:                              21STCV12626                                               

HEARING DATE:                                                    3/29/24   

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                                                           TENATIVE RULING

PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR COST OF PROOF SANCTIONS:                    DENIED

INTRODUCTION

This was an auto accident trial in which the jury found for Plaintiff (“P”) and awarded $64,250 in damages on 1/24/24.  At trial Defendant (“D”) admitted liability but contested causation and damages.  P now moves for $150,236.42 in “cost-of-proof” sanctions/attorney’s fees based on D having denied or objected to several Requests for Admission (“RFA’s”) regarding causation and damages.    

                                                                    ANALYSIS

A.    Plaintiff’s Motion for Attorney’s Fees/Cost of Proof Sanctions

P seeks “cost of proof” sanctions/attorney’s fees and costs per CCP § 2033.420 based on D’s failure to admit certain RFA’s regarding D’s admitted negligence causing P physical harm.  D asserts that the motion should be denied as (i) procedurally barred, and (ii) because D “had reasonable ground to believe . . . [it] would prevail on the matter,” and/or that he had “other good reason for the failure to admit.”  CCP § 2033.420(a)(3) & (4).   

As a preliminary matter, P’s motion as against Defendant Ralph Alvarado is summarily denied as that Defendant was dismissed prior to trial and therefore no expenses were incurred in proving anything against him.

With respect to D’s failure to admit the RFA’s at issue, all of them in essence requested D to admit that D’s negligent driver caused injuries to P in the collision.  First, as a procedural matter, D did not deny those RFA’s but instead objected to them on the grounds that it had at the time insufficient “information and knowledge” to admit or deny them.  While these objections understandably frustrated P (who believed that D did have sufficient knowledge to be able to admit causation and injury), the proper remedy was for P to have brought a motion to compel further responses upon a showing that D’s objections were “without merit or too general” under CCP § 2033.290(a)(2).  Because no such motion to compel was ever heard (in spite of P’s efforts having filed such a motion), D is correct in that P had waived its right to compel further responses according to CCP § 2033.290(c), and therefore cost of proof sanctions may not be awarded according to CCP § 2033.420(b)(1). 

Moreover, even if the applicable RFA responses had not been procedurally waived per the above, this Court would nevertheless find that sanctions are not justified because D had “reasonable ground to believe that [D] would prevail on the matter.”  CCP § 2033.420(b)(3). 

Those reasons are adequately set forth in D’s Opposition Brief, pps. 6-7, and need not be repeated here.  However, the most persuasive facts that support D’s belief that it could have prevailed (even if later proven erroneous by a jury) are facts that related to the nature of the impact here:

n  It was a slow speed (appx. 10 mph) impact barely felt by D’s driver;

n  The impact was not upon the truck P was riding in, but rather to the rear of the 15 foot open flatbed trailer being towed by the truck P was riding in;

n  The impact was of a diagonal direction with the point of impact at the rear left fender in the back of the trailer on the opposite side of where P was seated in the truck (right passenger seat);

n  P was not the driver of the truck but rather the passenger in the truck cab;

n  There were no injuries reported by either P or the driver next to him to the responding CHP officer;

n  No request was made for paramedics, an ambulance, or any medical treatment at the scene;

n  P and his driver were able to drive away from the scene while still towing the damaged trailer.

For all these reasons in addition to the ones cited in D’s Opp. Brief, this Court finds that D had reasonable grounds to believe it would prevail on the issues of causation and damages.  As such, P’s motion to cost of proof sanctions is DENIED.