Judge: Stephen I. Goorvitch, Case: 23STCP02132, Date: 2024-07-17 Tentative Ruling
Case Number: 23STCP02132 Hearing Date: July 17, 2024 Dept: 82
Michael Sullivan Case No. 23STCP02132
v. Hearing
Date/Time: July 17, 2024, at 9:30 a.m.
Location:
Stanley Mosk Courthouse
California Department of Department: 82
Industrial Relations Judge:
Stephen I. Goorvitch
[Tentative] Order Granting in Part and
Denying in Part the Following Motions:
(1) Petitioner’s Motion to Compel a
Deposition of Respondent’s Person Most Knowledgeable, and (2) Respondent’s
Motion for a Protective Order
INTRODUCTION
Petitioner Michael Sullivan (“Petitioner”)
filed this petition under the California Public Records Act (“CPRA”) seeking
information about decisions by the Workers’ Compensation Appeals Board (the
“WCAB”). Now, Petitioner now moves for
an ordering compelling Respondent California Department of Industrial Relations
(“Respondent” or the “DIR”) to produce its person most knowledgeable (“PMK”)
for deposition. The motions are granted
in part and denied in part.
BACKGROUND
A. The First CPRA Request
On
or about August 31, 2022, Petitioner sent a CPRA request (the “August 2022
Request” or the “First CPRA Request”) to the WCAB for the following records:
All panel decisions of the Workers’ Compensation Appeal
Board, including either the panel’s actual order, decision and/or award and
opinion following a Petition for Reconsideration or Removal, and where
incorporated in the order, decision and/or award, the respective Workers’
Compensation Judge’s Report and Recommendation, from January 1, 2002, to
September 30, 2019.
(Pet. ¶ 22, Exh. A.) On September 12, 2022, Anne Schmitz, the
Secretary and Deputy Commissioner for WCAB, responded to the August 2022
Request in an email stating, in relevant part:
The Appeals Board does not maintain a central compendium or
library of its decisions either virtually or in a paper form. Therefore, the Appeals Board is unable to
produce decision for the entire period from January 1, 2002, through September
30, 2019. . . . The Appeals Board does
have paper files that contain judicial deliberations and a copy of the
decision, and these hard copies are retained on a rolling basis for five years,
or back to September 2017. However, in
order to respond to this request, our staff would have to pull the decisions
from the files and scan or copy them for your review. We estimate that pulling and copying or
scanning those decisions for the period from September 2017, to September 2019,
would have to occur on a rolling basis
and would take several hundred hours.
(Id. ¶ 24 & Exh. B.) The response recommended that the requestor
“explore other options for obtaining the records you are seeking,” e.g.,
obtaining electronic copies from the Division of Workers’ Compensation (the
“DWC”). (Id. Exh. B.)
On
October 19, 2022, Petitioner’s counsel and counsel for the DWC, Susan Marsh,
spoke by telephone. (Id. ¶
26.) The next day, Marsh sent an email
stating in relevant part as follows:
The request for “all panel decisions” issued between January
2002 and October 2019 asks for the inspection or production of a record that
does not currently exist. That is, the DIR/DWC does not now have or maintain a
library of "all panel decisions";
A decision issued by the Reconsideration Unit of the WCAB
and forwarded to the DIR/DWC would be filed in the respective workers'
compensation adjudication case file;
DIR/DWC maintains and retrieves its workers' compensation
adjudication case files in a system organized by reference to the ADJ number
assigned to the case upon filing of an application for adjudication and the
name of the injured worker whose claim for compensation benefits is adjudicated….
(Id. Exh. D.) On November 16, 2022, Petitioner’s counsel
and Marsh spoke by telephone, and Marsh identified “970-plus” transfer lists
evidencing WCAB case files that were moved from district offices to the State
Records Center (“SRC”), a State of California storage facility. (Id.
¶ 33; Ans. ¶ 33.)
B. The Second CPRA Request
On
or about November 18, 2022, Petitioner, through counsel, sent a CPRA request (the
“November 2022 Request” or the “Second CPRA Request”) to the Department’s
Division of Workers’ Compensation (“DIR”) for the following records: “[The]
approximately 970 ‘transfer lists,’ discussed during the November 16 meeting,
which are used by the agency to transfer paper records from local offices across
California to the main records center in Sacramento, California.” (Pet. ¶ 34, Exh. H.)
On
December 2, 2022, Petitioner received a partial production of transfer lists
from Jamie Spitzer at DIR. (Pet. ¶ 35;
Ans. ¶ 35.) Petitioner’s counsel states
that Respondent “has produced 400 of the 970 transfer lists sought and
indicated that there are no further transfer lists to provide.” (Ahn Decl. dated July 3, 2024, at ¶ 4.)
C. WACB Panel Decisions from 2008 through
2019
From
January 2023 to March 2024, Respondent produced responsive, non-exempt records
maintained in its Electronic Adjudication Management System (“EAMS”), which
contains workers’ compensation cases opened from approximately August 25, 2008,
to the present. (Wurtser Decl. ¶
11.) Petitioner remitted payment of
$4,080 to Respondent for
“data extraction” related to his CPRA Requests.
(Pet. ¶ 36; Ans. ¶ 36.) Petitioner’s counsel acknowledges that
Respondent has produced “19,822 WCAB panel decisions from 2008 through
September 30, 2019 over 14 months and after payment of administrative costs in
the amount of $4,080.” (Ahn Decl., dated July 3, 2024, at ¶ 5.)
D. WACB Panel Decisions from 2002 to 2008
Petitioner
did not receive the WCAB decisions from January 1, 2002, through August 24,
2008. Instead, Respondent’s counsel,
Keith Wurster, sent an email to Petitioner’s counsel, dated November 27, 2023, stating
that a production of all remaining non-exempt, responsive records for the
August 2022 Request—i.e., the WCAB decisions from January 1, 2002,
through August 24, 2008—would take approximately 12 years and cost Petitioner approximately
$755,074. (See Ahn Decl., dated July 3,
2024, at ¶¶ 8, 25 and Exh. 4.) Specifically,
Wurster stated as follows:
As you know
Respondent has completed the sampling of a review of hard copy records that are
stored at the State Records Center (“SRC”). These results are summarized in the
discovery responses but I include them in this email with some analysis so we
can confer on next steps with regard to the hard copy records.
In the sampling,
Respondent pulled twelve boxes of files from the SRC that contained records
from the relevant time period. The shipping charges for these 12 boxes, which
is at a discounted rate, was $100.08, which averages $8.34/box. Once the boxes
were obtained from the SRC it took nearly 6 hours, ranging from 5 minutes to 30
minutes per box, to pull and review the 251 case adjudication files found in
those boxes. One responsive record was located that consisted of 2 pages and it
did not require redaction. Given that this sampling had such a low yield of
responsive documents, the time taken for this review is expected be on the low
end of the time needed to review the average box of potentially responsive
records.
Knowing that
39,536 boxes stored at the SRC have been identified as potentially having
responsive records, and that Respondent has identified another 2,805 boxes
worth of case files located at District Offices that are may have responsive
records, the total number of boxes to be reviewed is at least 42,341. Based on
the sampling performed, the shipping charges for the boxes that need to be
reviewed are estimated to be $353,123.94. In addition, it will take at least .5
hours to review each box for responsive records, thus it will take at least
21,170.5 hours just to review all of those boxes just to locate responsive
records. It would take one trained staff member, working 1776 hours a year
(taking into account holidays, projected sick and vacation days), 11.92 years
to complete the review of the boxes. Thus, the estimated cost for just staff
time to review the boxes is 12 years of salary and benefits for one employee
qualified to do this review. The cost for this staff is estimated to be
$828,924.00 (12 years x annual salary and benefits of $69,077).
In addition there
is a $10 charge per file to locate and prepare the files for transfer to
Respondent for review. I note that given that there is no way to locate the
responsive files that Petitioner is seeking without reviewing them, Respondent
will be charging $10 a box rather than per file, which is a substantial
reduction in potential charges. Thus Petitioner will be charged $395,360.00 just to retrieve
the 39,536 boxes from SRC and there will be additional estimated shipping costs
of $353,123.94 – thus Mr. Sullivan will be charged, at a minimum, estimated
costs of $748,483.94, just to have the files that might contain responsive
material shipped to Respondent so they can be reviewed. All of these costs are
chargeable to Petitioner pursuant to 8 C.C.R. § 9990 (d). Such costs must be
paid prior to the request and delivery of the files pursuant to 8 C.C.R. §
9991.
In addition, there
will be copying costs associated with the copying of the hard copy records.
Pursuant to 8 C.C.R. § 9990 (a), Petitioner will be charged $1/page for each
page of paper records that needs to be copied…. So all told for the paper
records Mr. Sullivan will pay $755,074 to obtain 3,295 responsive records –
that is a cost of nearly $230 per responsive record.
This does not take
into account staff time needed for review, copying, redacting, and uploading
the responsive records into an electronic database for delivery to Petitioner.
Given that the volume of paper records that might be located that are
responsive to the PRA request is unknown at this time, it is premature to
provide an accurate estimate of time or costs associated with the tasks of
reviewing, copying, redacting, and uploading responsive records into an
electronic database for transfer to Petitioner. But at a minimum, the costs to
Respondent, even taking into account the costs that will be borne by Mr.
Sullivan as described above, Respondent will have to dedicate staff time and
facilities in excess of $828,924.00…. When you factor in the other costs for
facilities and storage of records during the review period, and the additional
time to review, redact, and prepare the copied records for production, which
could take thousands of additional hours of staff time – the public interest in
not requiring Respondent to have bear the burden and expense to locate and
produce copies of responsive paper records outweighs the limited value to the
public of obtaining copies of roughly 3,300 “panel decisions” that are 15 to 31
years old.
(See Ahn Decl., Dated July 3, 2024,
at Exh. 4.)
E. Procedural History
On
June 16, 2023, Petitioner filed the instant petition for writ of mandate. The petition seeks a writ “directing the
Defendants to promptly provide Petitioner with all requested records at
no additional cost to Petitioner, including those archived at the State
Records Center, and that Defendants are ordered to return all charges
assessed to Petitioner to date in connection with his CPRA Request.” (Pet. Prayer ¶ 1 [bold italics added].)
Petitioner
served written discovery on Respondent, which provided responses to
Petitioner’s special interrogatories, form interrogatories, requests for
admissions, and requests for production of documents. (See Wurster Decl., dated July 10, 2024, at ¶¶
3-4 and Exhs. 4-7.) Respondent provided responses to written
discovery on topics that include how and where responsive records are stored;
how Respondent searched for responsive records; and the estimate of the costs
that would be imposed on Petitioner to complete production of responsive
records for the CPRA Requests. (Id.
¶ 3.) Respondent also produced documents
related to DIR’s record storage and retention policies and procedures. (Id. ¶ 4.)
Petitioner
served multiple deposition notices. Petitioner
served the first deposition notice on October 31, 2023, seeking testimony on 16
topics and requesting production of 27 categories of documents. (See Wurster Decl., dated June 24, 2024, at ¶
4.) Then, Petitioner served the second
deposition notice, seeking testimony in 18 topics and again requesting
production of 27 categories of documents.
(See Wurster Decl., dated June 24, 2024, at ¶ 7 and Exh. 1.) The second deposition notice appears to be
the operative notice. Respondent
objected, and the instant motions followed.
LEGAL
STANDARD
A. California Public Records Act
Pursuant to the CPRA, Gov. Code § 7921.000, et
seq., individual citizens have a right to access government records. In enacting the CPRA, the California
Legislature declared that “access to information concerning the conduct of the
people’s business is a fundamental and necessary right of every person in this
state.” (Gov. Code, § 7921.000; see also
County of Los Angeles v. Superior Court (2012)
211 Cal.App.4th 57, 63.) Significantly,
Article
1, Section 3(b) of the Constitution affirms that “[t]he people have the right
of access to information concerning the conduct of the people’s business.” The Constitution mandates that the CPRA be
“broadly construed,” while any statute “that limits the right of access” must
be “narrowly construed.” (See Nat’l
Lawyers Guild v. City of Hayward (2020) 9 Cal.5th 488, 507.)
To establish an agency has a duty to disclose
under the CPRA, the petitioner must establish that the record qualifies as a
“public record” and the record is “in the possession of the agency.” (See Anderson-Barker v Sup.Ct. (2019)
31 Cal.App.5th 528, 538.) However,
exemptions under the CPRA must be narrowly construed and the agency bears the
burden of showing that a specific exemption applies. (Sacramento
County Employees’ Retirement System v. Superior Court (2013) 195
Cal.App.4th 440, 453.) “Because the agency has full
knowledge of the contents of the withheld records and the requester has only
the agency’s affidavits and descriptions of the documents, its affidavits must
be specific enough to give the requester ‘a meaningful opportunity to contest’
the withholding of the documents.” (ACLU of Northern Cal. v. Sup.Ct. (2011) 202
Cal.App.4th 55, 83, citation omitted.)
B. Discovery in CPRA Writ Proceedings
Code of Civil Procedure section 2017.010
provides: “Unless otherwise limited by order of the court in accordance with
this title, any party may obtain discovery regarding any matter, not
privileged, that is relevant to the subject matter involved in the pending
action or to the determination of any motion made in that action, if the matter
either is itself admissible in evidence or appears reasonably calculated to lead to the
discovery of admissible evidence.” (CCP § 2017.010 [bold italics added].) An “action” includes “a civil action and a
special proceeding of a civil nature.” (Code
Civ. Proc. § 2016.020(a).)
In
City of Los Angeles v. Sup. Ct.
(Anderson-Barker) (2017) 9 Cal.App.5th 272, the District Court of Appeal
held as a matter of first impression that the Civil Discovery Act applies to
CPRA proceedings, which fall within the definition of a “special proceeding of
a civil nature.” (Id. at
284-288.) However, the scope is narrow:
The CPRA is
intended to “permit the expeditious determination” of a narrow issue: whether a
public agency has an obligation to disclose the records that the petitioner has
requested. Although many CPRA cases are
likely to involve questions of law based on undisputed facts (including, for
example, whether a particular type of record is subject to a disclosure
exemption), other cases will require the court to make factual findings based
on conflicting evidence. In some such
cases, discovery may be necessary to test the agency’s assertion that it does
not have an obligation to disclose the records at issue. When a party does seek
to compel discovery (or seeks a protective order from a discovery request), the
trial court must determine whether the discovery sought is necessary to resolve
whether the agency has a duty to disclose, and to additionally consider whether
the request is justified given the need for an expeditious
resolution.
(Id.
at 289, citations and alterations omitted.)
“[T]he trial court has discretion to consider whether the petitioner has
made an adequate showing that the discovery is likely to aid in the resolution
of the particular issues presented in the proceeding.” (Id. at 290.) Moreover, discovery “remains subject to the
trial court’s authority to manage and limit discovery as required.” (Id. at 288, citations omitted.)
The
District Court of Appeal recently affirmed that pretrial discovery in a CPRA
action is limited to the “narrow issue of whether the agency has a duty of
disclosure” and that the trial court has discretion to determine whether
discovery furthers that purpose. (County
of San Benito v. Superior Court (2023) 96 Cal.App.5th 243, 255.) The District Court of Appeal also limited the
right to discovery in two respects.
First, a petitioner may not serve requests for production “of the very
documents sought by the underlying public records request.” (Ibid.) Second, a petitioner may not serve
interrogatories “calling for the [respondent] to generate new substantive
content that is beyond the scope of discovery relevant to the merits of a
Public Records Act enforcement proceeding as a means to collect information
that is not subject to disclosure under the Act.” (Ibid.)
As relevant to the instant motions,
the San Benito Court also upheld the trial court’s order compelling the
respondent to provide verified, amended responses, without objections, to a
special interrogatory asking the respondent for information about its record
retention policies. The Court of Appeal
reasoned:
Records retention
policies may well inform Western’s assessment of the reasonableness of the
County’s search for documents in response to its public records request. The
County's argument that the Public Records Act does not dictate any substantive
retention policy misses the point: Western is not seeking the County’s
retention policy to assess whether the policy failed to meet some substantive
standard; Western is seeking the
retention policy
to assess whether the County conducted a reasonable search for records in
response to Western’s public records request.
(San
Benito, supra, 96 Cal.App.5th at 258.)
C. Motion for Protective Order
For good cause shown, the court may enter a
protective order to prevent unwarranted annoyances, embarrassment, oppression,
undue burden, and expense in discovery.
(Fireman’s Fund Ins. Co. v. Sup.
Ct. (1991) 233 Cal.App.3d 1138, 1141; see also CCP § 2025.420(b), §
2017.020(a), and § 1987.1.) Moving
parties have the burden to show good cause for a protective order. (Emerson Elec. Co. v Sup. Ct. (1997) 16
Cal.4th 1101, 1110; Weil & Brown, Civ. Pro. Before Trial (The Rutter Group
2011) ¶ 8:689.)
EVIDENTIARY
ISSUES
A. Respondent’s objections to Declaration
of Frank Ahn, dated April 29, 2024
1. Sustained
2. Sustained
3. Overruled
4. Overruled
5. Overruled
6. Sustained
7. Sustained
8. Overruled
B. Petitioner’s objections to Declaration
of Keith L. Wurster, dated June 24, 2024
1. Overruled
2. Sustained
3. Sustained
C. Respondent’s objections to Declaration
of Frank Ahn, dated July 3, 2024
1. Sustained
2. Sustained
3. Sustained
4. Overruled
5. Sustained
6. Sustained
7. Sustained
8. Overruled
9. Sustained
10. Overruled
11. Overruled
DISCUSSION
A. Petitioner’s Effective Denial and
Unreasonable Delay Theories
Petitioner
contends that “DIR’s statement that Petitioner will have to wait 12 years and
pay nearly $800,000 to obtain public decision records is effectively a denial
of the CPRA Requests,” and that the deposition topics are necessary to
investigate this “effective denial” of the CPRA Requests. (Motion to Compel (“MTC”) 8-9.) Respondent counters that it has “simply communicated
the time required and a subset of the costs that permissibly may be charged to
Petitioner to fulfill Petitioner’s sweeping request.” (Opposition to MTC (“MTC Oppo.”) 11-12.) The court need not resolve the merits of this
issue at this stage. Petitioner is
entitled to investigate the factual basis for Respondent’s estimates of the
cost and time to complete production, which are relevant to this CPRA action
and the duty of disclosure.
B. Respondent’s
Tenth Affirmative Defense: The Catchall Exemption
Petitioner
also contends that the PMK deposition is relevant to this action because it
seeks information to investigate Respondent’s tenth affirmative defense. (MTC 9.)
In the tenth affirmative defense, Respondent alleges that any
non-disclosed records are exempt from disclosure pursuant to the “catchall
exemption” in Government Code section 7922.000 “because the expense, time, and
inconvenience of engaging in the unduly burdensome search requested by
Petitioner demonstrates that the public interest in non-disclosure clearly
outweighs the public interest in disclosure of the requested records.” (Answer p. 11.) Respondent also alluded to this affirmative
defense in Wurster’s email, dated November 27, 2023, quoted at length
above. (See Ahn Decl., dated July 3,
2024, at Exh. 4.)
Despite
statements suggesting otherwise in Wurster’s email, Respondent now contends
that it “is not refusing to disclose records based on the catchall exemption,
or for any other reason.” (MTC Oppo.
16:18-25.) Respondent also contends that
“[t]he fact that a potential disclosure exemption was pled as an affirmative
defense does not automatically mean it is an actual issue to be litigated in
the proceeding.” (Ibid.) To the contrary, Petitioner is entitled to
pursue discovery on any potential defense: “Discovery may relate to the claim or
defense of the party seeking discovery or of any other party to
the action.” (Code Civ. Proc. §
2017.010, emphasis added.) Petitioner has
not formally withdrawn the defense.
C. Petitioner’s Motion to Compel Deposition
of PMK on Topics
The
court finds that Petitioner is entitled to discovery primarily in two areas:
(1) Does Respondent have a duty to disclose the documents, which necessarily
implicates issues relating to the volume and locations of documents, as well as
the time and expense of gathering them; and (2) What are Respondent’s record
retention policies and procedures.
Accordingly, the court rules as follows:
1. Topics
1 through 4 – GRANTED IN PART; DENIED IN PART
These
topics relate to policies and procedures for storing documents. Petitioner may inquire on these topics with
one exception: Petitioner
may not ask deposition questions solely related to Respondent’s compliance with
laws or regulations governing record retention or storage.
2. Topic 5 – DENIED. This topic seeks discovery to investigate
whether Respondent has complied with alleged record retention “mandates.” (See MTC 10-11, citing Gov. Code §§ 12274 and
12272.) Petitioner’s counsel states that
“Petitioner has reason to believe that the delays and cost are due to
Respondent’s improper retention, storage, and cataloguing of the requested
records.” (Ahn Decl., dated April 29, 2024, at ¶ 4.) Petitioner also contends that Respondent has
impermissibly “passed the buck” on record retention and its control of
disclosure of public records.
(Opposition to Motion for Protective Order 16:12-20.) Petitioner is not entitled to this discovery,
as it falls outside the narrow scope of permissible topics. (See Los Angeles Police Department v.
Superior Court (1977) 65 Cal.App.3d 661, 668 [the CRPA “does not undertake
to prescribe what type of information a public agency may gather, nor to
designate the type of records such an agency may keep, nor to provide a method
of correcting such records. Its sole function is to provide for disclosure.”].) Petitioner has not cited any authority to the
contrary and has not justified discovery regarding Respondent’s compliance with
laws or regulations governing record retention and storage. Therefore, the motion is denied with respect
to this topic.
3. Topic 6 – GRANTED IN PART; DENIED IN
PART. See above.
4. Topic 7 – DENIED
5. Topic 8 – DENIED
6. Topic 9 – GRANTED IN PART; DENIED IN
PART. See above.
7. Topic 10 – DENIED. To the extent this request seeks policies and
procedures, that is duplicative of other topics.
8. Topic 11 – GRANTED IN PART; DENIED IN
PART. Petitioner may inquire about Respondent’s
efforts to ascertain the volume and location of documents, as well as the time
and expense of gathering those documents.
The motion is otherwise denied.
9. Topic 12 – GRANTED
10. Topic 13 – GRANTED
11. Topic 14 – GRANTED
12. Topic 15 – DENIED
13. Topic 16 – GRANTED
14. Topic 17 – DENIED. This topic seeks broad testimony from Respondent’s
PMK concerning “discovery responses.” Petitioner
did not identify the specific discovery
responses that require clarification from a PMK, or explain how PMK testimony
on this topic would relate to the narrow scope of discovery. Therefore, the motion is denied in this
respect.
15. Topic
18 – GRANTED
B. Petitioner’s Requests for Production of
Documents
The
deposition notice includes 27 requests for production of documents (“RPDs”). (Wurster Decl., dated June 24, 2024, at Exh.
1.)
Petitioner did not include these RPDs in its separate statement. Further, the 27 RPDs in the deposition notice
appear identical to the 27 RPDs that Petitioner served on Respondent as part of
its written discovery. Respondent
provided responses to those RFPs and produced documents. (See Wurster Decl., dated July 10, 2024, at ¶¶
3-4 and Exh. 4-7.)
Petitioner has not moved to compel further responses to those RPDs. In these circumstances, Petitioner has not
shown that compliance with the RPDs in the deposition notice is “likely to aid
in the resolution of the particular issues presented in the proceeding.” (Anderson-Barker, supra, 9 Cal.App.5th
at 290.) To
the extent Petitioner seeks to enforce the RPDs in the deposition notice, the
motion to compel is DENIED.
C. Respondent’s Motion for a Protective
Order
The
motion is denied to the extent Respondent seeks to avoid making a PMK available
for a deposition. Respondent argues that
the PMK deposition is unduly burdensome and that a protective order should be
granted because “DIR may have to produce multiple witnesses, who will need to
meet with DIR’s counsel for their deposition preparation.” (MTC Oppo. 18; see also Motion for Protective
Order 15-16.) An “objection based upon
burden must be sustained by evidence showing the quantum of work required.” (West Pico Furniture Co. v. Superior Court
(1961) 56 Cal.App.2d 407, 417-418.)
“The objection of burden is valid only when that
burden is demonstrated to result in injustice.”
(Ibid.) Respondent has not submitted any evidence of the “quantum of
work” required to participate in the PMK deposition. The court finds insufficient evidence that
producing a PMK for the deposition would result in undue burden or cause an
injustice.
Reaching
the merits of the motion, the court grants the motion in part and denies the
motion in part consistently with its rulings on Petitioner’s motion to compel
testimony on the 18 topics. As
discussed, for
purposes of these discovery motions only, the court agrees with Respondent that
compliance with record retention laws is not at issue in this CPRA action. (See Los Angeles Police Department v.
Superior Court (1977) 65 Cal.App.3d 661, 668.) Therefore, the court grants the motion in
this respect. Petitioner may not ask
deposition questions relating to Respondent’s compliance with applicable laws
or regulations governing record retention or storage.
CONCLUSION AND
ORDER
Based
upon the foregoing, the court rules as follows:
1. Petitioner’s motion to compel a
deposition from Respondent’s PMK on 18 topics is granted in part and denied in part.
2. Petitioner’s motion to compel the
production of documents at the deposition is denied.
3. Respondent’s motion for a protective
order is granted in part and denied in part.
In particular, Petitioner
may not ask deposition questions relating to Respondent’s compliance with applicable
laws or regulations governing record retention or storage.
4. The court’s clerk shall provide notice.
IT IS SO
ORDERED.
Dated: July 17, 2024 ____________________________
Stephen
I. Goorvitch
Superior
Court Judge