Lawzilla Additional Information:
Per the Los Angeles court records defendant is represented by attorney Shun Chen who is being sanctioned by the court. Update: It is Lawzilla’s understanding the tentative ruling was adopted as the final ruling of the court.

Case Number: BC674278 Hearing Date: May 01, 2018 Dept: 51

Defendants’ Motion to Compel Plaintiff Jessica Davalos to Further Respond to Defendant’s Requests for Admission and Form Interrogatories Is DENIED.

The motion improperly combines two motions into one (admissions and interrogatories).

The initial discovery responses by plaintiff were inadequate.

However, this motion is being denied due to defendants’ counsel’s failure to meet and confer as required; a material omission in the motion of facts about of the meet-and-confer process; and a premature filing of this motion before a date when further responses from plaintiff were promised (less than two weeks from the originally promised date), with an extension to file this motion provided by plaintiff.

Defendants’ April 5, 2018 motion states the following account of the meet-and-confer process, which is critically incomplete: “Plaintiff’s Counsel responded in a letter dated March 13, 2018 promising supplemental responses and continuing to dispute the necessity and relevancy of the requested information needed by Defendant. Plaintiff’s Counsel subsequently promised to provide supplemental responses by March 29, 2018 but such responses were not received by this date and have not been received to date.” (Motion at 6.)

Thus, a reader of the motion would be led to believe that plaintiff’s counsel simply failed to provide responses by March 29 that he promised on March 13 would be provided by that time, and the instant motion therefore was being filed on April 5.

The opposition provides email correspondence that includes:

March 19, 2018: a letter from plaintiff’s counsel committing to “endeavor to supplement” certain responses by March 26, 2018.

March 26, 2018: an email from plaintiff’s counsel saying he may not be able to get the supplemental responses done, needed to prepare for out-of-town depositions, and would be willing to provide an extension for this motion.

March 29, 2018: an email from plaintiff’s counsel stating: “I have not had a chance to get the supplemental responses verified yet. I will get you supplements asap but no later than April 10 due to my Passover holiday and vacation that starts tonight. You may also have an MTC further extension of 2 weeks to accommodate this delay. Please let me know your new deadline.”

At this point, apparently without further conferring, defendants’ counsel then filed this motion on April 5, without waiting for the April 10 deadline articulated for the further responses.

Further responses then apparently actually were mailed to defendants’ counsel on April 9, allowing him a fresh chance to realize he filed this motion prematurely and to take this motion off calendar before the April 18 opposition was filed.

Plaintiff requests sanctions of $3,400. The Court will award sanctions payable by defendants’ counsel to plaintiff in the amount $2,400, to be paid within 14 days. This reflects 5 hours for researching and drafting the motion and one hour for arguing it, at the $400 rate.

Defendants to give notice.