Raceday Center, LLC v. RL BB Financial, LLC
Raceday Center, LLC v. RL BB Financial, LLC
2013 WL 11480644 (E.D. Tenn. 2013)
August 12, 2013
Inman, Dennis H., United States Magistrate Judge
Summary
The court denied the motion to compel RL BB to provide more information in response to Interrogatories Nos. 2 and 3, and Requests for Productions 2, 3, 4, and 5. RL BB had already provided the requested information regarding invoices and billing statements, and the documents and metadata requested did not exist. The request for documents defining RL BB's policies was also deemed irrelevant.
Raceday Center, LLC
v.
RL BB Financial, LLC, et al.
and
RL BB Financial, LLC
v.
David O. Robinette, et al
v.
RL BB Financial, LLC, et al.
and
RL BB Financial, LLC
v.
David O. Robinette, et al
NOS. 2:11-CV-17, 3:11-CV-49
Filed August 12, 2013
Counsel
Thomas O. Helton, Marcie Kiggans Bradley, Philip Monroe Meyer, II, Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz, Chattanooga, TN, for RL BB Financial, LLC.Inman, Dennis H., United States Magistrate Judge
ORDER
*1 Raceday has filed a motion to compel RL BB to “more fully” answer and respond to Interrogatories Nos. 2 and 3, and Requests for Productions 2, 3, 4, and 5, of Raceday's Second Requests for Admission, Related Interrogatories, and Requests for Production.[1]
Somewhat lumped together, the discovery requests asks for three categories of information from RL BB:
(1) any invoices and billing statements that support RL BB's claim for costs, expenses, and attorneys' fees as far as its suit against Raceday and the guarantors is concerned;
(2) documents and metadata showing when RL BB applied the foreclosure purchase price for the Raceday property to its internal accounting records; and
(3) any documents that reflects RL BB's policy relating “to the administration and collection of loans.”
As an initial matter, RL BB claims that this motion to compel was filed after the close of discovery and is therefore untimely. RL BB argues that Raceday could and should have sought this particular discovery earlier in the discovery process, and that a party cannot file a motion to compel after the discovery deadline has passed.
As a discovery request submitted a day after the deadline is too late, a discovery request submitted a day before the deadline is timely. RL BB's argument, if adopted, would make a discovery deadline a moving target, and neither the parties nor the court could ever safely rely upon it.
To be sure, if a party submits a discovery request to his opponent that will consume an inordinate amount of time to satisfy, the court certainly could deny that request on the basis that it was oppressive and unduly burdensome. It almost would amount to the old equity doctrine of laches. But none of the discovery requests at issue here fall within that category.
For RL BB to recover its attorneys' fees, it first will have to prove that it is entitled to recover anything on its underlying claim for damages. If it fails to do that, then any claim for attorneys' fees becomes a non-issue. On the other hand, if RL BB is entitled to recover on its basic claim, it will then have to prove a number of things to recover attorneys' fees, including the hours expended in the litigation, the reasonableness of those hours, and the reasonableness of the value it has assigned to those hours. Until the trial is concluded, the issue of attorneys' fees is premature. This aspect of the motion to compel is denied.
RL BB states in its response that this information has been supplied to the attorneys for Raceday, et al., and there is nothing left it can give them.
The court cannot order RL BB to furnish additional information which does not exist.
*2 In its brief, Raceday suggests that “the claims and defenses in these cases ... are based almost entirely on RL BB's conduct in relation to purchased loans ... [and] [t]hese policies should show how and when RL BB credits the amounts it pays at foreclosures to notes it holds.”
RL BB argues that this information is irrelevant to any issue in the suit, and the court agrees. Moreover, the Requests for Production itself is breathtaking in its potential scope: “all documents,” and “other documents” that states or defines the policies of RL BB and Rialto Capital's policies in “relation to making bookkeeping administering and/or collection loans.” That language was encompass every document, of any kind, generated by RL BB and Rialto.
This aspect of the motion to compel is denied.
Footnotes
Doc. 187, Case No. 3:11-CV-49; Doc. 312, Case No. 2:11-CV-17.