Judge: Michael Shultz, Case: 24STCV09235, Date: 2025-04-15 Tentative Ruling
Case Number: 24STCV09235 Hearing Date: April 15, 2025 Dept: 40
24STCV09235
Tomika Smalls v. Lawrence Title, et al.
Tuesday,
April 15, 2025
TENTATIVE ORDER
I.
BACKGROUND
The
complaint alleges that Defendant Lawrence Title (“Defendant”) employed
Plaintiff Tomika Smalls (“Plaintiff”) but failed to pay her all minimum and overtime
wages due and owing, provide her with duty-free meal and rest breaks at the
required intervals, pay her reimbursable expenses, provide sick pay, and keep
accurate records as to Plaintiff’s compensation. The Complaint asserts eight
(8) Labor Code causes of action and a ninth cause of action for unlawful/unfair
business practice.
II.
ARGUMENTS
A.
Motion filed January 31, 2025.
Plaintiff
served Defendant with First Set of Requests for Production of Documents
(“RFP”), Requests for Admission (“RFA”), Special Interrogatories (“SI”), Form
Interrogatories (General) (“FI”), and Form Interrogatories (Employment)
(“FIE”). After Plaintiff received Defendant’s initial responses to the
discovery requests, the attorneys agreed to meet and confer on January 16,
2025, regarding those responses. “[B]ut due to conflicts that arose due to
extensive court hearings, and a deposition, Plaintiff's counsel was unable to
make the conference call.” (Motion, p. 3:9-12.) Plaintiff’s counsel then asked
on several occasions for a follow-up telephonic conference to meet and confer
but defense counsel was unwilling to extend the deadline for the instant motion
to compel further responses. Even after Plaintiff’s counsel informed defense
counsel that the court expected an Informal Discovery Conference (“IDC”) and,
therefore, Defendant should extend the motion to compel deadline to allow the
parties to attend an IDC, defense counsel was not moved. Therefore, Plaintiff
was forced to file the instant motion. Plaintiff avers that the discovery
requests at issue are reasonably calculated to lead to admissible evidence and
assist Plaintiff in preparing for trial. Therefore, the court should grant the
motion and impose sanctions of $2,000 against Defendant.
B.
Opposition filed April 1, 2025.
Plaintiff
did not attempt to meet and confer in good faith. Defense counsel attests to
the following facts. On Sunday, January 12, 2025, Plaintiff’s counsel emailed
defense counsel asking to meet and confer for the first time regarding
Defendant’s responses. (Declaration of Gary Ganchrow (“Ganchrow Decl.”), ¶ 3.)
Defense counsel responded that he was available to speak that coming Thursday
and explained it would be helpful if Plaintiff’s counsel could identify in
writing the discovery responses that were at issue. (Ganchrow Decl., ¶ 3.)
The attorneys agreed to meet telephonically at 11:00 a.m., on Thursday, January
16, 2025. (Ganchrow Decl., ¶ 3; Exhibit 1 – a copy of the email
communications.) Plaintiff’s counsel, however, provided nothing in writing and
did not appear for the telephonic appointment. (Ganchrow Decl., ¶ 4.)
Instead, Plaintiff’s counsel sent an email the next day, Friday, January 17,
2025, asking to meet and confer. (Ganchrow Decl., ¶ 4.) Defense
counsel promptly responded that he was not available that day. (Ganchrow Decl.,
¶ 4.) Despite not sending any written meet and confer letter and
failing to explain why he missed the attorneys’ telephonic appointment on
January 16, 2025, Plaintiff’s counsel asked defense counsel to agree to extend
Plaintiff’s motion to compel deadline; defense counsel agreed. (Ganchrow Decl.,
¶ 5.)
Subsequently, Plaintiff’s counsel sent a meet and confer letter for the first
time on January 31, 2025, the date the instant motion was due, but failed to
address Defendant’s specific objections to the discovery. (Ganchrow
Decl., ¶ 8.) At no time
did defense counsel ever refuse to participate in an Informal Discovery
Conference (“IDC”). (Ganchrow Decl., ¶ 8.) However, he was unwilling to continue extending Plaintiff’s motion
to compel deadline where Plaintiff’s counsel failed or refused to send defense
counsel a written meet and confer letter in a timely manner. The court should
deny the motion given Plaintiff’s failure to meet and confer with Defendant.
C.
Reply filed April 8, 2025.
Other
than focusing on one telephonic conference that was missed, Defendant provides
no excuse or legitimate explanation as to why a further opportunity to meet and
confer telephonically was not provided to Plaintiff’s counsel, despite the
numerous requests in writing. The defense refused to respond to Plaintiff's
reasonable inquiries, blamed Plaintiff for a lack of a meet and confer, and now
wants to abdicate its responsibility to provide discovery, with trial just
months away. In any event, the opposition does not dispute the merits of
Plaintiff's motion: the defense did not provide code-compliant responses.
III.
LEGAL STANDARD
On receipt of responses to interrogatories,
requests for production of documents, or requests for admissions, the
propounding party may move for an order compelling a further response. (Code
Civ. Proc., § 2030.300, subd. (a) [interrogatories]; 2031.310, subd. (a) [requests for
production]; 2033.290, subd. (a) [requests for admission].)
IV.
DISCUSSION
As an initial matter, the court finds the
motion timely. Motions to compel further responses must be brought within 45
days of service of the verified response, supplemental verified response, or on
a date to which the propounding and responding parties have agreed to in
writing; otherwise, the propounding party waives the right to compel further
responses. (Code
Civ. Proc., § 2030.300, subd. (c); 2031.310, subd. (c); 2033.290, subd. (c).) Here, Plaintiff’s counsel
testifies that the parties agreed to extend Plaintiff’s motion to compel
deadline to January 31, 2025, the date that Plaintiff filed the motion. (Motion, Declaration of Alfredo Nava (“Nava Decl.”),
¶ 2.) Defendant concedes that fact. (Opposition, p. 2:1-2.)
The court also finds that Plaintiff has
satisfied the separate statement requirement. (Cal. Rules of Court, rule
3.1345(a)(1), (2), and (3) [stating that motions to compel further responses
must be accompanied by separate statements].) Plaintiff has filed a separate statement as required.
The parties dispute whether the Plaintiff
satisfied the meet and confer requirement.
Motions to compel further responses to
interrogatories, requests for production of documents, and requests for
admissions must be accompanied by meet and confer declarations “under § 2016.040.” (Code
Civ. Proc., § s 2030.300,
subd. (b)(1); 2031.310, subd.
(b)(2); 2033.290, subd.
(b)(1).)
Code of Civil Procedure § 2016.040 states: “A meet and confer declaration in support of a motion shall
state facts showing a reasonable and good faith attempt at an informal
resolution of each issue presented by the motion.” (Code
Civ. Proc., § 2030.040.)
After considering the parties’ papers and
declarations, the court finds the meet and confer efforts insufficient.
Plaintiff’s counsel failed to appear at
the January 16, 2025 meeting without giving the other side prior notice or
later explaining the failure to meet yet expected defense counsel to make
himself available the next day without warning. Moreover, Plaintiff’s counsel’s attempt to
meet and confer on January 31, 2025, the same date that Plaintiff filed the
instant motion, hardly gave Defendant time to evaluate Plaintiff’s arguments or
the parties’ time to discuss the discovery requests at issue.
Not every failure to meet and confer,
however, should result in the denial of a motion to compel. (Obregon
v. Superior Court (1998) 67 Cal.
App. 4th 424, 434, [Not every finding that additional informal
resolution efforts are required can be categorized as a failure so egregious as
to justify summary denial of discovery.].) “The party who attempts informal resolution,
but mispredicts the judge's location on the reasonable spectrum of possible
levels of effort, should not inevitably be penalized by outright denial of
possibly critical discovery.” (Id.) Accordingly,
the Court orders the parties to meet and confer meaningfully to determine whether
they can resolve their discovery dispute.
In their effort to resolve the dispute,
the parties are admonished to meet and confer in good faith. Without ruling on the substance of the
motion, the Court notes that some of Defendant’s objections appear unwarranted.
For example, FIE No. 207.2 asked Defendant whether Plaintiff complained to
Defendant about any unlawful conduct alleged in the pleadings and if so to
provide specific details regarding those complaints. (Separate Statement, p.
38:3-25.) Defendant objected to that FIE, arguing that the “request seeks
information that is neither relevant nor reasonably calculated to lead to the
discovery of admissible evidence.” (Separate Statement, p. 38:1-3.) That
objection appears meritless given the allegations in the Complaint. Defendant
should provide a substantive response that is compliant with the relevant
statutes. (Cf. Code Civ. Proc., §
2030.220, subd. (c) [“If the responding party does not have personal knowledge
sufficient to respond fully to an interrogatory, that party shall so state, but
shall make a reasonable and good faith effort to obtain the information by
inquiry to other natural persons or organizations, except where the information
is equally available to the propounding party”].) On the other hand, some objections
also appeared unwarranted. For example, the FIs ask Defendant questions
regarding the ”incident.” (Cf. Separate Statement, p. 2:10-12 [asking in FI No.
23, whether at the time of the ”incident,” the Defendant had a driver’s
license].) Defendant’s “vague and ambiguous and indecipherable” objection to
the word “incident” in the FIs has some merit because this case does not
involve one incident (it involves nine (9) causes of action ranging from
violations of the various Labor Code laws to violation of California’s Uniform
Competition Law) and the court does not have before it the original FIs to determine
whether Plaintiff had defined that word. Therefore, the parties should meet and
confer in good faith regarding each discovery request at issue and attempt to
informally resolve their discovery dispute.
The court denies Plaintiff’s request for
sanctions because given the insufficient meet and confer process, imposing
sanctions on Defendant would be unjust. (Code
Civ. Proc., § s 2030.300 subd. (d); 2031.310, subd. (h); 2033.290, subd. (d).)
V.
CONCLUSION
Based on the foregoing, Plaintiff’s
request for sanctions is DENIED. Plaintiff’s
motion to compel further responses is continued to May 30, 2024, at 8:30 AM,
Dept. 40, Stanley Mosk Courthouse. The parties are ordered to meet and confer in
good faith using the separate statement that Plaintiff filed with the court on
January 31, 2025, as their guide. If the meet and confer resolves the issues
presented in the motion, Plaintiff should take the motion off the calendar. If
the meet and confer does not resolve all issues presented in the motion, then,
at least ten (10) court days before the next hearing, the parties are ordered
to file and serve a joint separate statement signed by each attorney explaining
which discovery remains at issue and their respective positions regarding that
discovery request. The court shall rule on Plaintiff’s request to compel
further responses to those discovery requests at the next hearing.