Judge: Lee S. Arian, Case: 23STCV31815, Date: 2024-10-14 Tentative Ruling

Case Number: 23STCV31815    Hearing Date: October 14, 2024    Dept: 27

Hon. Lee S. Arian, Dept 27

MOTIONS TO COMPEL INITIAL RESPONSES AND REQUESTS FOR SANCTIONS

Hearing Date: 10/14/24 

CASE NO./NAME: 23STCV31815 MONY OREN-BENHAMOU vs SMART & FINAL STORES, LLC

Moving Party: Plaintiff

Responding Party: Defendant SMART & FINAL STORES, LLC

Notice: Sufficient 

Ruling:

·        MOTIONS TO COMPEL INITIAL RESPONSES ARE MOOT

·        REQUESTS FOR SANCTIONS ARE CONTINUED, BUT TENTATIVELY GRANTED

On May 24, 2024, Plaintiff served Defendant, Smart & Final Stores, LLC, with Plaintiff’s form interrogatories, set one, Requests for Production, set one, and Requests for Admissions, set one. Defendant S&F’s responses were originally due on June 26, 2024. Plaintiff granted Defendant several extensions, with the last one extending the deadline to August 13, 2024.

Thereafter, the parties met and conferred. On August 21, 2024, Plaintiff’s counsel agreed to wait until August 28, 2024 before moving to compel. As of September 4, 2024, when the present motions were filed, Plaintiff had not received the discovery responses at issue. Plaintiff now moves the court to compel initial responses.

Defendant filed an opposition, citing Code of Civil Procedure § 2031.310, arguing that Plaintiff must show relevance and good cause for each request at issue. However, this provision governs motions to compel further responses. In a motion to compel initial responses, Plaintiff is not required to demonstrate good cause or relevance for each discovery request. Plaintiff need only show that the requests for production were served, the response time has expired, and no responses were provided, which Plaintiff has done in these motions.

Defendant also contends the responses at issue were served on September 6, 2024. Plaintiff filed a reply and does not dispute that the responses were served before the hearing. Therefore, the motions are moot, but the issue of sanctions remains.

Sanctions are mandatory as the Court finds that Defendant did not act with substantial justification. Plaintiff provided Defendant with numerous extensions and repeated warnings that a motion to compel would be filed if responses were not received by the specified deadlines. Despite this, Defendant failed to provide responses within the extended timeframes, only doing so after Plaintiff was forced to file motions to compel. Plaintiff is entitled to attorney’s fees expended in filing the present motions.

Because the parties will be here on November 4, 2024, on a motion that is likely less clearcut than this one, the Court grants  Defendant’s request to move the hearing on sanctions to November 4, 2024, at the time of the motion for relief from waiver of objections. Tentatively, the Court grants Defendant’s sanctions request as follows: Plaintiff requests sanctions in the amount of $1,717.26 per motion. Due to the simplicity of the issues, the Court reduces the sanctions to $3,000 for all three motions combined. Sanctions in the amount of $3,000 are ordered against Defendant and its attorney, jointly and severally, payable to Plaintiff within 20 days of the Court’s final order on this issue.

PLEASE TAKE NOTICE: 

If a party intends to submit on this tentative ruling,¿the party must send an email to the court at¿sscdept27@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.