I. BACKGROUND 

Defendant Alejandro Alvardo, erroneously sued as Alvardo Alejandro, (“Defendant”) propounded form interrogatories, set one, on plaintiff Saeid Saghian (“Plaintiff”) on December 18, 2023. After receiving no responses, defense counsel sent email correspondence requesting responses on or before January 31, 2024. Plaintiff has failed to serve responses to date. Defendant therefore seeks an order compelling Plaintiff to respond, without objections, to the outstanding discovery and to pay sanctions.  

Any opposition was due on or before April 2, 2024; the motion is unopposed. 

II. MOTION TO COMPEL 

For a motion to compel initial discovery responses, all a propounding party must show is that it properly served its discovery requests, that the time to respond has expired, and that the party to whom the requests were directed failed to provide a timely response. (See Leach v. Superior Court (1980) 111 Cal.App.3d 902, 905 906.) Where a party fails to serve timely responses to discovery requests, the court may make an order compelling responses. (Code Civ. Proc., §§ 2030.290; 2031.300; Sinaiko Healthcare Consulting, Inc. v. Pacific Healthcare Consultants (2007) 148 Cal.App.4th 390, 403.) A party that fails to serve timely responses waives any objections to the request, including ones based on privilege or the protection of attorney work product. (Code Civ. Proc., § 2030.290, subd. (a); § 2031.300, subd. (a).)    

Therefore, because the evidence shows Plaintiff was properly served with discovery and failed to timely respond, any objections have been waived. Defendant’s unopposed motion is GRANTED. Plaintiff is ordered to serve verified responses to Defendant’s form interrogatories, set one, without objections, within fifteen (15) days. (CCP § 2030.290(a),(b).) 

III. SANCTIONS 

Sanctions are mandatory against any party, person, or attorney who unsuccessfully makes or opposes a motion to compel a response, unless a court makes certain findings.¿ (Code Civ. Proc., § 2030.290(c), 2031.300(c).)¿ Plaintiff did not file any opposition. However, sanctions may be awarded, even though no opposition was filed, pursuant to CRC 3.1348(a). Defendant seeks sanctions in the amount of $1,020 for the motion. 

A court has discretion to award sanctions that are “suitable and necessary to enable the party seeking discovery to obtain the objects of the discovery he seeks” but they should not be punitive in nature or levied for the purposes of punishing an offending party. (Vallbona v. Springer (1996) 43 Cal.App.4th 1525, 1545.)         

Defendant is awarded one hour for the motion, and one hour to appear at the hearing, at the requested rate of $240 per hour for a total of $480 in attorney’s fees. Further, Defendant is awarded one motion filing fee of $60 as costs.       

Sanctions are imposed against Plaintiff and Plaintiff’s counsel, jointly and severally. Plaintiff and/or Plaintiff’s counsel are ordered to pay sanctions to Defendant, by and through counsel of record, in the total amount of $540, within twenty (20) days. 

Moving party is ordered to give notice.   

PLEASE TAKE NOTICE: 

Dated this 12th day of April 2024