Superior Court of California¿ 

County of Los Angeles¿ 

Department 78¿ 

¿ 

 

I. BACKGROUND 

Plaintiff Pedro Lozano (“Plaintiff”) filed this action against defendants General Motors LLC (“Defendant”) and Does 1 through 10 under the Song-Beverly Consumer Warranty Act.  

 Plaintiff now moves to compel the deposition of Defendant’s person most knowledgeable (“PMK”) and seeks monetary sanctions. Plaintiff contends that he noticed the PMK’s deposition on October 6, 2023, and that Plaintiff’s counsel sent a meet and confer letter requesting Defendant provide additional dates to conduct the deposition if the noticed date did not work with their schedule. Defendant objected to the deposition notice. Plaintiff argues that Defendant failed to provide alternative dates to proceed with the deposition. 

Defendant opposes the motion, arguing that it served valid objections, but also agreed to produce its PMK for Category Nos. 1-4 and 8-9. Defendant asserts Plaintiff failed to meet and confer in good faith, because Plaintiff’s demand for a deposition date is not the real dispute. 

 

II. LEGAL STANDARD 

CCP § 2025.450(a) provides, “If, after service of a deposition notice, a party to the action or an officer, director, managing agent, or employee of a party, or a person designated by an organization that is a party under Section 2025.230, without having served a valid objection under Section 2025.410, fails to appear for examination, or to proceed with it, or to produce for inspection any document, electronically stored information, or tangible thing described in the deposition notice, the party giving the notice may move for an order compelling the deponent's attendance and testimony, and the production for inspection of any document, electronically stored information, or tangible thing described in the deposition notice.”  CCP § 2025.450 requires the Court to compel the deposition unless it finds a valid objection was served under §2025.410. 

 

III. DISCUSSION¿ 

Here, Plaintiff’s moving papers provide that he accepted Defendant’s responses and objections regarding Plaintiff’s request for production Nos. 1-10, and has “waived any request for a production of documents.” (Mot. 4:14-16.)  

It is unclear to this Court whether there is any genuine dispute. Plaintiff seeks the PMK’s deposition for categories 1, 2, 3, 4, 8, and 9, which Defendant stated it would produce (Opp. 6:3-5), and Plaintiff’s moving papers appear to have rendered any issues concerning the request for production of documents moot.  

Therefore, the parties are ordered to further meet and confer on this matter to clarify the issues and to attempt, in good faith, to informally resolve them. (CCP § 2016.040.) Should the issues not be resolved, the parties are ordered to file a short supplemental brief, no later than 5 court days prior to the continued hearing date, outlining any unresolved issues for this Court’s consideration. If the deposition proceeds to render this motion moot, Plaintiff is ordered to promptly take this motion off-calendar.  

 

IV. CONCLUSION 

Based on the foregoing, Plaintiff’s hearing on the motion to compel deposition is CONTINUED to _________________ in Dept. 78 of Stanley Mosk Courthouse to provide the parties an opportunity to further meet and confer.  

 

Moving Party is ordered to give notice. 

 

DATED: July 10, 2024 

__________________________ 

Hon. Michelle C. Kim¿ 

Judge of the Superior Court 

 

PLEASE TAKE NOTICE: 

• Parties are encouraged to meet and confer after reading this tentative ruling to see if they can reach an agreement. 

• If a party intends to submit on this tentative ruling, the party must send an email to the court at SMCDEPT78@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 without leave.