Judge Michelle C. Kim, Case 20STCV15846 2023-05-18 Tentative Ruling

On April 27, 2020, Plaintiffs Melanie Gonzalez and Magie Gonzalez (collectively, “Plaintiffs”), filed this action against Defendants County of Los Angeles, City of Los Angeles, The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department (“LASD”), Carlos Turcios, Sylvia M. Turcios, and Does 1 through 100 (collectively, “Defendants”) for motor vehicle negligence, general negligence, negligent infliction of emotional distress upon a bystander, and dangerous condition of public property (violation of Government Code Sections 830 et seq.).

On February 27, 2023, Plaintiffs filed a motion to compel further responses to Special Interrogatories, Set Four, from Defendant LASD and request for monetary sanctions in the amount of $7,000.00. The parties participated in an Informal Discovery Conference on April 21, 2023 (the “IDC”), but were unable to resolve their disagreement regarding the underlying discovery requests, which included requests for information regarding training programs for LASD deputies as it pertains to traffic control. On May 5, 2023, LASD filed an opposition. On May 11, 2023, Plaintiffs filed a reply.

The Court notes that Plaintiffs’ Notice is eight pages long, which appears to be an attempt to circumvent the page limitations for memorandums of points and authorities under California Rules of Court, Rule 3.1333(d). The inclusion of these arguments and information in the Notice is improper, and the Court admonishes Plaintiffs to leave the arguments to the memorandum of points and authorities going forward. The Court further admonishes Plaintiffs for their failure to comply with Rule 3.1333(f), which requires the provision of a table of contents and table of authorities for memorandums of points and authorities that exceed ten pages. Plaintiffs’ memorandum of points and authorities is 13 pages long and should have included a table of contents and a table of authorities. Nevertheless, the Court will still consider Plaintiffs’ motion.

Additionally, Plaintiffs submitted another declaration from Greg Mohrman for their reply. New evidence is generally not permitted on a reply unless it addresses issues created by an opposing party’s opposition; otherwise, the hearing on the matter will needed to be continued to permit the opposing party an opportunity to respond to the new evidence. (Jay v. Mahaffey (2013) 218 Cal.app.4th 1522, 1537-1538.) Thus, to the extent this additional declaration constitutes new evidence and does not address issues raised in LASD’s opposition, it is disregarded.

LASD’s evidentiary objections are OVERRULED, as the Court does not rely on those exhibits in reaching its decision.

CCP § 2030.300(a) also provides that On receipt of a response to interrogatories, the propounding party may move for an order compelling a further response if the propounding party deems that any of the following apply:

(2) An exercise of the option to produce documents under Section 2030.230 is unwarranted or the required specification of those documents is inadequate.

Plaintiffs seek to compel further responses to Special Interrogatory Numbers 91, 92, 94-100, 106-108, 110, and 111 based on LASD asserting the following identical objections to each request, as follows:

“Objection. The interrogatory is overbroad, vague, and ambiguous. It seeks information that is not relevant and/or likely to lead to the discovery of admissible evidence as phrased. Responding [sic] further objects the interrogatory seeks to invade the attorney-client privilege, attorney work-product doctrine, Official Information Privilege of Evidence Code §1040, et seq., Government Code §§ 6254 and 6275, et seq. as well as Penal Code § 832.5, et seq. Responding Party requests that plaintiffs meet and confer on reasonable limitations to this interrogatory.”

Plaintiffs contend that LASD’s objections are without merit, as the information sought is relevant and appropriate to the causes of action. Plaintiffs also contend that the objections of “unduly burdensome and harassing” are moot, as LASD did not promptly move for a protective order under Code of Civil Procedure section 2031.060(a). Plaintiffs contend they have already limited the timeframe for the subject Special Interrogatories to the years of 2004 to 2019 or the year of the incident, where applicable.

In opposition, LASD contends that the subject Special Interrogatories on their face are overbroad, beyond the permissible scope of discovery, and that the motion is premature based on the limitation Plaintiffs proposed at the IDC. LASD also contends that its objections to the Special Interrogatories without the limitation Plaintiffs proposed at the IDC are proper because the interrogatories are overbroad, vague and ambiguous as to any particular time period, and not relevant or reasonably calculated to lead to the discovery of admissible evidence.

LASD then cites to the deposition of Deputy Jonathan Lares who had apparently directed the vehicle involved in the incident to make a U-turn but that this direction was disobeyed and the subject accident followed. LASD also cites to the deposition of Argelia Huerta, who purportedly testified at deposition that she was tasked with keeping the pedestrians from crossing east in the crosswalk at the subject intersection. LASD further contends that the information is subject to the “official information” privilege of a public entity and that the subject discovery requests implicate the attorney-client privilege and attorney work product privilege.

LASD also contends that the instant motion is premature because Plaintiffs had proposed some limitations on the subject Special Interrogatories at the April 21, 2023 IDC to certain unidentified LASD Sheriff’s deputies. LASD further contends the instant motion is premature because it cannot determine when some of the information sought will be available to produce and also due to Plaintiffs’ refusal to continue the hearing date on the motion to sometime in June 2023.

In reply, Plaintiffs contend that many matters regarding these Special Interrogatories are undisputed, i.e., Plaintiffs acted timely in propounding special interrogatories and LASD has never given code compliant responses, LASD ignored Plaintiffs’ efforts to resolve this matter without court intervention, and that LASD materially misleads the Court regarding the scope of deputies present. LASD is withholding crucial information regarding the training of deputies it admits were involved in the subject accident.

The Court finds that Plaintiffs have established they are entitled to further responses from LASD regarding the subject discovery requests. There is nothing in the language of the subject Special Interrogatories at issue to show that they are overbroad, vague or ambiguous, as they are focused on issues of deputy training with respect to traffic control, with the exception of Special Interrogatory Number 111, which will be limited as described below. Plaintiff has also indicated a willingness to limit the timeframe to the years of 2004 to 2019 for all of the Special Interrogatories, except for Number 94 being limited to the year of the incident.

LASD’s objections as to relevance and not likely to lead to the discovery of admissible evidence are not well-taken. “Any doubts about relevance are generally resolved in favor of allowing the discovery.” (Mercury Interactive Corp. v. Klein (2007) 158 Cal.App.4th 60, 98.) Evidence need not be admissible at trial to be discoverable. (Chapin v. Superior Court In and For Kern County (1966) 239 Cal.App.2d 851, 855.)

LASD has not provided sufficient information to determine whether its objections regarding privilege, whether attorney-client, attorney work product, or official information are proper. It is unclear how the information sought in these Special Interrogatories would implicate any of those privileges, but to the extent they do, LASD can provide a code-compliant privilege log that enables Plaintiffs to adequately assess the assertion of the privilege.

Therefore, the Court will grant Plaintiffs’ motion to compel further responses as requested to Special Interrogatory Numbers 91, 92, 94-100, 106-108, 110, and 111. As to Special Interrogatory Number 111, the Court finds that the word “possible” is overbroad. Therefore, the motion to compel further responses is granted as to Number 111 as follows: “Describe in detail all training you provide DEPUTIES regarding TRAFFIC CONTROL.”

The Court finds that monetary sanctions are warranted in the reduced amount of $2,200.00, comprised of 3.0 hours preparing the motion, 1.0 hour reviewing the opposition, 1.0 hour preparing the reply, and 0.5 hours for appearing at the hearing on the motion, for a total of 5.5 hours, multiplied by an hourly rate of $400.00. The Court finds that Plaintiff’s counsel’s hourly rate of $850.00 combined with in excess of 16 hours of work in relation to the motion to be excessive. (Morris v. Hyundai Motor America (2019) 41 Cal.App.5th 24, 41 [court may reduce hourly rate if matter at issue was not particularly difficult or complex].) This motion was not complicated and the moving papers included a fair amount of extraneous information in this motion, particularly in the notice as noted above. The separate statement was largely cut-and-paste since LASD’s objections were identical to each of the subject Special Interrogatories. The initial declaration submitted in support of the motion was also excessive by including up to 36 exhibits totaling 318 pages in length, the vast majority of which were unnecessary and had no bearing on the Court’s decision. The additional declaration provided on reply was also unnecessary.

Based on the foregoing, Plaintiffs’ motion to compel further responses to Special Interrogatory Numbers 91, 92, 94-100, 106-108, 110, and 111 is GRANTED, subject to the Court’s limitation on number 111. The Court orders Plaintiff to provide code-compliant verified further responses to same within 30 days of the date of this order.

Defendant’s request for monetary sanctions in the reduced amount of $2,200.00 is also GRANTED. Plaintiff and Plaintiff’s counsel are ordered to direct such payment to Defendant’s counsel within 20 days of the date of this order.

Parties who intend to submit on this tentative must send an email to the court at sscdept31@lacourt.org indicating intention to submit on the tentative as directed by the instructions provided on the court website at www.lacourt.org. If the department does not receive an email indicating the parties are submitting on the tentative and there are no appearances at the hearing, the motion may be placed off calendar. If a party submits on the tentative, the party’s email must include the case number and must identify the party submitting on the tentative. If the parties do not submit on the tentative, they should arrange to appear remotely.

Hon. Michelle C. Kim

Judge of the Superior Court