Mey v. Matrix Warranty Sols., Inc.
Mey v. Matrix Warranty Sols., Inc.
2022 WL 19978264 (N.D. W. Va. 2022)
November 1, 2022
Mazzone, James P., United States Magistrate Judge
Summary
The court ordered both parties to produce relevant documents, including settlement agreements and correspondence, related to any demand, claim, or litigation they have been involved in within the past five years. The defendants objected, but the court overruled their objections and ordered them to comply. The court also emphasized the importance of timely supplementation and clarified that objections to discovery requests must be specific.
DIANA MEY, on behalf of herself and a class of others similarly situated, Plaintiff,
v.
MATRIX WARRANTY SOLUTIONS, INC., et al., Defendants
v.
MATRIX WARRANTY SOLUTIONS, INC., et al., Defendants
CIVIL ACTION NO.: 5:21CV62
United States District Court, N.D. West Virginia
Filed November 01, 2022
Mazzone, James P., United States Magistrate Judge
ORDER GRANTING DEFENDANTS' MOTION [113] TO COMPEL AND DENYING PLAINTIFF'S MOTION [115] TO COMPEL
*1 Currently pending before the Court on referral from the District Court are two Motions: Defendants' Motion [113] to Compel and Plaintiff's Motion [115] to Compel. The Motions have been fully briefed. Oral argument would not substantially aid the decisional process. Accordingly, the Court has decided the pending Motions on the briefs. The Court's decisions are set forth below.
I. Factual/Procedural History
This case arises out of phone calls allegedly made in violation of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (“TCPA”), 47 U.S.C. § 227. ECF No. 1. These Motions concern discovery propounded by the parties upon each other. Defendants' (Matrix Warranty Solutions, Inc. and Matrix Financial Services, LLC – hereinafter “Defendants”) Motion [113] concerns Interrogatory No. 12 and RPD No. 10 of Defendants' First Set of Discovery Requests, propounded on January 4, 2022. ECF No. 113. Plaintiff's Motion [115] concerns RPD No. 1 of Plaintiff's Sixth Set of Discovery Requests to Matrix Defendants. ECF Nos. 99 and 115.
II. Applicable Law
Motions to Compel are governed by Fed. R. Civ. P. 37, which affords a party seeking discovery the ability to move for an order compelling production if a party fails to answer an Interrogatory submitted under Fed. R. Civ. P. 33 or fails to produce documents under Fed. R. Civ. P. 34. Importantly, “[f]or purposes of [Rule 37], an evasive or incomplete disclosure, answer, or response must be treated as a failure to disclose, answer, or respond.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 37(a)(3).
“Parties may obtain discovery regarding any nonprivileged matter that is relevant to any party's claim or defense and proportional to the needs of the case.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b). “A party who has made a disclosure...or who has responded to an interrogatory, request for production, or request for admission...must supplement or correct its disclosure or response...in a timely manner if the party learns that in some material respect the disclosure or response is incomplete or incorrect, and if the additional or corrective information has not otherwise been made known to the other parties during the discovery process or in writing.” Fed R. Civ. P. 26(e).
Fed. R. Civ. P. 33 governs interrogatories and provides in relevant part as follows: “[e]ach interrogatory shall be answered separately and fully in writing under oath, unless it is objected to, in which event the objecting party shall state the reasons for objection and shall answer to the extent the interrogatory is not objectionable.” Further, all objections “must be stated with specificity.” Id. Objections such as ‘overly broad, burdensome, oppressive, and irrelevant’ do not constitute specific objections within the meaning of the rule. Momah v. Albert Einstein Medical Center, 164 F.R.D. 412, 417 (E.D. Pa. 1996) (quoting Josephs v. Harris Corp., 677 F.2d 985, 992 (3d Cir. 1982)).
“[T]he burden is on the party resisting discovery to clarify and explain precisely why its objections are proper given the broad and liberal construction of the federal discovery rules.” United States Department of Labor v. Randolph County Sheltered Workshop, Inc., 2017 WL 10442120, at *1 (N.D.W. Va. Nov. 17, 2017). “The party who resists discovery has the burden to show that discovery should not be allowed, and has the burden of clarifying, explaining, and supporting its objections.” DIRECTV, Inc. v. Trone, 209 F.R.D. 455, 458 (C.D. Cal. 2002).
*2 “[B]oilerplate objections to discovery requests are highly disfavored in this district and throughout the Fourth Circuit, and the failure to state objections with specificity may be regarded as a waiver of those objections.” Fidelity National Title Insurance Company v. Barringer Land SC, LLC, 2014 WL 12594207 (N.D.W. Va. Apr. 15, 2014). “General objections to discovery, without more, do not satisfy the burden of the responding party... because they cannot be applied with sufficient specificity to enable courts to evaluate their merits.” Hager v. Graham, 267 F.R.D. 486, 492 (N.D.W. Va. 2010). “An objection [to a request for production] must state whether any responsive materials are being withheld on the basis of that objection.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 34(b)(2)(C).
III. Defendants' Motion [113] to Compel
With respect to Defendants' Interrogatory No. 12, Defendants argue that Plaintiff has not provided a full and complete answer to the same, and that Plaintiff's supplemental answers constitute objections which are waived inasmuch as they were not raised within the initial 30-day deadline for providing answers and objections to Defendants' discovery requests. Defendants further argue that the information sought by Interrogatory No. 12 is relevant to this action. Plaintiff argues that she has provided a full and complete answer to Interrogatory No. 12, and that her objections are well founded and have not been waived.
With respect to Defendants' waiver argument, the Court would find the same is not persuasive. Inasmuch as Plaintiff supplemented discovery during the meet and confer process (which was lengthy, per the parties' own admissions), the Court would consider Plaintiff's supplemental answers, including supplemental explanations, timely. See Hopkins v. Board of County Commissioners of Wilson County, Kansas, 2018 WL 3536247, at * 3 (D. Kan. July 23, 2018) (holding that Defendants' significant changes to its answers and responses to discovery was part of the meet and confer process and were therefore timely). As a result, the Court will consider the entirety of Plaintiff's answers/responses and supplemental answers/responses to the discovery requests at issue.
Defendants' Interrogatory No. 12 and Plaintiff's answers and supplemental answers thereto are set forth below:
INTERROGATORY NO. 12: Identify any and all settlement agreements you have entered into with any party that markets, sells, or administers vehicle service contracts regarding claims for alleged unlawful telemarketing calls, including any alleged violations of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, from January 1, 2016 to present.
ANSWER: Objection. Plaintiff objects to this Interrogatory for the separate and independent reasons that: (i) this Interrogatory seeks information that is irrelevant to any parties' claims or defenses; and (ii) this Interrogatory is impermissibly broad and not sufficiently limited in temporal scope or to the facts of this case.
FIRST SUPPLEMENTAL ANSWER: Per our March 29, 2022 call, Matrix Defendants agreed that this request shall be limited to lawsuits concerning auto warranty service providers. This answer is limited accordingly. Plaintiff has not entered into any settlements concerning the calls identified in response to Interrogatory No. 1. Nor has she entered into any settlements with the parties identified in response to Interrogatory No. 2.[1] As such, the requested information is irrelevant to any parties' claims or defenses. Beyond relevance, the requested information is, in some cases, subject to agreed confidentiality and, in other cases, believed to be subject to agreed confidentiality. After a case is settled and her taxes are filed for that year, Plaintiff purges that case file, which would necessarily include the settlement agreement. Many of those settlements were subject to agreed confidentiality, which prevents Plaintiff from even disclosing the existence of those settlement agreements. Because Plaintiff is no longer in possession of those agreements, she can no longer determine the scope of agreed confidentiality and therefore cannot produce the requested information without risk that she would violate her obligation to other third parties. Plaintiff is still in possession of at least one settlement agreement with an auto warranty service provider. That settlement agreement, however, precludes Plaintiff from disclosing the existence of that agreement. Subject to the above limitations, Plaintiff entered into a class-wide settlement agreement, which was necessarily made public, in the case styled Mey v. Got Warranty, Inc., et al., No. 5:15-cv-101 (N.D.W. Va.) (April 2017). Though not perfectly responsive to this interrogatory, Pacer should reveal the defendants in TCPA litigation initiated by Plaintiff.
*3 SECOND SUPPLEMENTAL ANSWER: Plaintiff has entered into settlements with the following VSC-industry participants: 1. Pelican Investment Holdings Group, LLC d/b/a AAP, Agreement dated March 21, 2022. A copy of the settlement agreement is produced herewith. 2. Fortegra Financial Corporation. Plaintiff is no longer in possession of this settlement agreement so she cannot discern which additional entities/individuals, if any, were party to this agreement. 3. Palmer Administrative Services, Inc. and N.C.W.C., Inc., see Mey v. Got Warranty, Inc., et al. No. 5:15-cv-I01 (N.D. W. Va.) (April 2017).
Plaintiff's first answer consists of boilerplate objections only, for which no specific explanation is provided. As explained above, boilerplate objections are impermissible. The same are therefore overruled.
Plaintiff's first supplemental answer is essentially a non-answer. First, Plaintiff attempts to limit Defendants' Interrogatory by drawing parameters around the question which are not supported by the evidence. Then Plaintiff answers the Interrogatory by further limiting the same to information regarding the calls which are the subject of Interrogatory Nos. 1 and 2, which limitation, again, is not supported by the evidence. The Interrogatory itself was not limited in this way in its original form, and there is no evidence that it was subsequently limited by any agreement of the parties. This is therefore an inadequate answer and must be supplemented.
Plaintiff then appears to argue that, because she has not settled with any of the parties to this case (i.e., parties listed in her answers to Interrogatory Nos. 1 and 2), the requested discovery is not relevant. Stated a different way, Plaintiff avers that only settlement agreements by and between the parties to this matter are relevant. This is not an accurate statement of the law of relevancy. See Fed R. Civ. P. 26(b)(1) (“[p]arties may obtain discovery regarding any nonprivileged matter that is relevant to any party's claim or defense”) (in part). Notwithstanding, this argument is not substantively supported and therefore constitutes a boilerplate objection. This objection is therefore overruled.
The balance of Plaintiff's First Supplemental Answer provides contradictory statements about whether and to what extent Plaintiff is in possession of settlement agreements, and whether she can produce them to Defendants. This portion of Plaintiff's answer is, again, non-responsive. Interrogatory No. 12 asked Plaintiff to identify settlement agreements, not necessarily to produce them. Even if Plaintiff is not inclined to identify the settlement agreement itself because of constraints of a confidentiality agreement pertaining to the same, there is no evidence or indication that Plaintiff is prohibited from identifying the civil action and/or the dispute (administrative or informal, as it were) from which the settlement agreement arose. Moreover, and notwithstanding the above, the Court would note that Plaintiff discusses her prior actions in such generalities that it is virtually impossible for Defendants to conduct follow up investigation into her answer. Plaintiff's answer in this respect is so vague as to constitute at best a non-answer, and at worst, what appears to be an attempt at confusion and misdirection.
*4 Plaintiff provides what appears at first glance to be a substantive answer as part of her Second Supplemental Answer, but upon closer examination, is in actuality another inadequate response. Plaintiff's Second Supplemental Answer appears to be responsive only to the limited parameters improperly drawn by Plaintiff (as discussed above). Plaintiff's Second Supplemental Answer is therefore insufficient. Accordingly, Plaintiff is DIRECTED to supplement her answer to Interrogatory No. 12.
Also at issue in Defendants' Motion is Defendants' RPD No. 10. With respect to Plaintiff's responses to Defendants' RPD No. 10, Defendants again argue that Plaintiff should be compelled to provide full and complete answers to Defendants' RPD No. 10. Defendants maintain that the information is relevant and discoverable. Plaintiff argues that RPD No. 10 is impermissibly limitless and seeks confidential information.
Defendants' RPD No. 10 and Plaintiff's responses thereto are as follows:
DOCUMENT REQUEST NO. 10: All pleadings, correspondence, discovery, settlement agreements, and other non-privileged documents relating to any demand, claim, allegation, litigation, administrative, or regulatory investigation or proceeding, other than this Lawsuit, to which you have ever been a party at any time in the past five years in which you have sought damages or any other form of relief under the TCPA or any state law relating to telemarketing.
RESPONSE: Objection. Plaintiff objects to this Interrogatory for the separate and independent reasons that: (i) this Request seeks information that is irrelevant to any party's claims or defenses; (ii) this Request is overly broad and not sufficiently limited in scope, as it is not limited to calls at issue here; and (ii) this Request seeks confidential and proprietary information subject to confidentiality agreements.
FIRST SUPPLEMENTAL RESPONSE: Per our March 29, 2022 call, Matrix Defendants agreed that this request shall be limited to lawsuits concerning auto warranty service providers. With that limitation, Plaintiff stands on her objections, adding that the request is overly burdensome and not proportional to the needs of this case. The requested documents appear to have no bearing on this case. The claims and defenses in this case necessarily focus on Defendants' actions, not Plaintiff's. The collection, review, and production of responsive documents within each requested category would be unnecessarily expensive and burdensome. The burden would unquestionably outweigh any conceivable benefit. Moreover, many of the documents responsive to this request are publicly-available and equally accessible to Defendants via Pacer. Subject to the foregoing objections and limitations, to the best of Plaintiff's recollection, the only lawsuit filed in the past five years concerning auto warranty service providers was Mey v. Got Warranty, Inc., et al. No. 5:15-cv-101 (N.D. W. Va.) (April 2017).
SECOND SUPPLEMENTAL RESPONSE: First, to the extent Matrix Defendants are seeking court filings, that information is a matter of public record that they can easily access themselves, as Plaintiff stated in her prior objection. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(2)(i) (a party need not produce information that is “obtainable from some other source that is more convenient, less burdensome, or less expensive.”). Certainly not “all pleadings” are relevant to the claims at issue here. And because Plaintiff cannot divine which specific court filings Matrix Defendants believe relevant to this case, they are free to access them themselves as needed via Pacer.
*5 For ease of reference, a PACER printout of all federal court filings on Plaintiff's behalf since 2010 has been provided. Second, Plaintiff reiterates her original objection that this request is overly broad, not sufficiently limited in scope, and requests irrelevant information because the request is not limited to the calls at issue or the parties allegedly responsible for said calls. Whether Plaintiff settled with a provider of home security systems, for example, has no bearing on whether Matrix Defendants and their agents called Plaintiff in violation of the TCPA. Nor are settlements with providers of home security systems, for example, likely to unearth a release applicable to Matrix Defendants. Nor are lawsuits against providers of home security systems, for example, likely to unearth a prior business relationship with Matrix Defendants or its agents. At a minimum, because this case concerns allegations of illegal telemarketing for the solicitation of vehicle service contracts (“VSC”), this request should necessarily be limited to other TCPA matters concerning VSC solicitation. Subject to this limitation, Plaintiff has entered into settlements with the following VSC-industry participants: 4. [sic] Pelican Investment Holdings Group, LLC d/b/a AAP, Agreement dated March 21, 2022. A copy of the settlement agreement is produced herewith. 5. [sic] Fortegra Financial Corporation. Plaintiff no [sic] longer in possession of the demand letter sent to Fortegra or the related settlement agreement. A lawsuit was never initiated against this party. 6. [sic] Palmer Administrative Services, Inc. and N.C.W.C., Inc., see Mey v. Got Warranty, Inc., et al. No. 5:15-cv-101, ECF No. 139 (N.D. W. Va.) (April 2017). Counsel for Matrix Defendants have previously suggested that they were involved in this case. Counsel should therefore be in possession of any responsive documents relating to this case. If there is a specific document counsel does not have or that is otherwise subject to another protective order, they should identify that document and Plaintiff will endeavor to collect and produce that document. Otherwise, a blanket production of all documents relating to this case is overly burdensome and not proportionate to the needs of this case.
Plaintiff's initial response to this RPD contains only boilerplate objections without specificity or explanation as is required. Thus, these objections are therefore overruled.
Plaintiff's First Supplemental Response similarly contains boilerplate objections, and thus, the same are overruled. The Court would additionally find that Plaintiff improperly limited the scope of its answer to lawsuits concerning auto warranty service providers. Indeed, there is no evidence that this limitation was agreed to by Defendants. Notwithstanding, Plaintiff stood by her objections, which were boilerplate objections, and added two additional boilerplate objections of “overly burdensome” and “not proportional to the needs of the case.” These objections are overruled. Plaintiff appears to attempt to evade the boilerplate label by elaborating on the boilerplate objections, but Plaintiff fails to elucidate any substantive answers in the process. For example, “[t]he requested documents appear to have no bearing on this case,” is not an appropriate objection under the rules and is merely another way to state Plaintiff's boilerplate relevancy objection. Plaintiff's answer “[t]he claims and defenses in this case necessarily focus on Defendants' actions, not Plaintiff's,” is a non-answer. According to this averment, only information concerning Defendants and their conduct is relevant to this action. Taken to its logical conclusion, such a statement would preclude Defendants from obtaining discovery from Plaintiff at all. This is simply untenable. Additionally, this sentence appears to be a restatement of Plaintiff's boilerplate objection on the basis of relevance. The same is therefore overruled.
Plaintiff further contends that “[t]he collection, review, and production of responsive documents within each requested category would be unnecessarily expensive and burdensome. The burden would unquestionably outweigh any conceivable benefit.” Again, this statement is merely a restatement of Plaintiff's boilerplate burden objection. This objection is therefore overruled.
Plaintiff then attempts to improperly shift the burden of obtaining the information sought by this RPD to Defendants. The authority on which Plaintiff relies to do so is not entirely clear. The Court's best estimation is that Plaintiff is relying upon Fed. R. Civ. P. 33(d). Fed. R. Civ. P. 33(d) does not, however, permit Plaintiff to shift her responsibility to answer this discovery request. Moreover, and despite Plaintiff's contention, not all of the requested categories of documents are available on PACER. Indeed, correspondence, discovery, settlement agreements, and other non-privileged documents are not necessarily contained in a Court file. Further, Plaintiff's litigation activities are not necessarily confined to the Federal Court System, and therefore, PACER would not include a complete list of the actions which pertain to this RPD, even if Defendants could replicate the same.
*6 To the extent the second part of Plaintiff's Second Supplemental Answer may be considered as something more than a boilerplate relevancy objection, the Court would nevertheless overrule the same because this portion of Defendants' objection is still too general for the Court to meaningfully consider. Indeed, it is extremely difficult, if not impossible, for this Court to conduct a relevancy analysis on actions to which Plaintiff only makes a general and passing reference. See Plaintiff's Second Supplemental Response, i.e., “[w]hether Plaintiff settled with a provider of home security systems, for example, has no bearing on whether Matrix Defendants and their agents called Plaintiff in violation of the TCPA.” Without more information as to the nature of the cases which Plaintiff argues are irrelevant, the Court cannot adequately evaluate Plaintiff's argument. This objection is therefore overruled.
To the extent Plaintiff has named certain actions for which there is a settlement agreement, the Court would note that the list appears to be confined to those in Federal Court. The list does not include and does not make any reference to those actions or disputes which may have been filed in State Court or in another venue, i.e., with an administrative agency, or those which were never formally pursued, but were informally resolved. There is not even a statement as to whether those exist at all. The substantive portion of Plaintiff's answer is therefore insufficient on this basis, in addition to the bases listed above. To the extent Plaintiff has answered this RPD but has failed to provide documents, Plaintiff's answer is also insufficient on this basis. Plaintiff is hereby DIRECTED to supplement her response to this RPD and to provide the responsive documents in accordance with her answer and the applicable Rules of Civil Procedure. Again, it is Plaintiff's responsibility under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure to provide the documents sought, absent a claim of privilege. No such claim has been made here. Plaintiff's vague assertion that the burden is similar for both parties to obtain the documents is not enough. The lawsuits about which Defendants seek information and documents were initiated by Plaintiff. Thus, Plaintiff would be in the best position of all of the parties involved here to obtain, compile, and provide the information and documents requested.
Finally, Plaintiff argues that RPD No. 10 seeks confidential information. This is not an appropriate basis on which to withhold documents or information. This is especially so when a Protective Order is in place, as it is here, and absent a more thorough and specific showing as to confidentiality of certain specific documents. Plaintiff's argument as to confidentiality constitutes a boilerplate objection and is therefore overruled. Plaintiff is DIRECTED to supplement this discovery response.
IV. Plaintiff's Motion [115] to Compel
Plaintiff filed her Motion to Compel approximately one week after Defendants filed their Motion to Compel. Plaintiff's Motion to Compel relates to one discovery request only, which is Plaintiff's RPD No.1. As Plaintiff readily acknowledges, this discovery request is virtually identical to Defendants' RPD No. 10, which is at issue in Defendants' Motion [113] to Compel. The RPD and Defendants' response thereto is as follows:
REQUEST FOR PRODUCTION NO. 1: All pleadings, correspondence, discovery, settlement agreements, and other nonprivileged documents relating to any demand, claim, allegation, litigation, administrative, or regulatory investigation or proceeding, other than this Lawsuit, to which Matrix Defendants have ever been a party at any time in the past five years in which someone else has sought damages or any other form of relief against them under the TCPA or any state law relating to telemarketing.
OBJECTION: The Matrix Defendants object to this request insofar as it does not seek information relevant or reasonably calculated to lead to the discovery of admissible evidence about the merits of Plaintiff's individual or class claims, which relate only to any Defendant, or the Defendants acting collectively, making, or directing another party to make, the calls at issue, such that this request regarding unrelated matters has no bearing here and discovery into such collateral matters is not proportional to the needs of this case. Cox v. Dalton, Civil Action No. 1:21-CV-4, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 221185 (N.D.W. Va. Nov. 16, 2021); Pajack v. Under Armour, Inc., 339 F.R.D. 375 (N.D.W. Va. 2021); Kinsale Ins. Co. v. JDBC Holdings, Inc., CIVIL ACTION NO. 3:20-CV8, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 75156 (N.D.W. Va. April 20, 2021). Furthermore, the Matrix Defendants object to this request as duplicative and redundant because the Matrix Defendants previously provided responses to Plaintiff's First and Second Discovery Requests to the Matrix Defendants seeking information relating to collateral TCPA matters involving Dealer Renewal Services, the only other party Defendant entity from whom Plaintiff purchased a Matrix-administered vehicle service contract. See, e.g., Matrix Responses to Plaintiff's First Discovery Requests at 6 (Response to Interrogatory 5); Matrix Responses to Plaintiff's Second Discovery Requests at 12-13 (Responses to Document Requests 10 and 11). Thus, the only conceivably relevant, responsive information has already been produced. The Matrix Defendants do not and have never made outbound telemarketing calls themselves, so vicarious-liability-related claims concerning non-parties have no rational bearing on Plaintiff's claims in this case. Accordingly, the Matrix Defendants further object to this request as overly broad and unduly burdensome, and not proportional to the needs of the case, because it seeks in part information the Matrix Defendants have already provided, and this additional request for all pleadings, correspondence, and discovery from unrelated matters, including information equally available to Plaintiff in public filings, serves no purpose other than to harass and cause undue burden.
*7 Defendants have objected to this RPD and argue that the same seeks irrelevant information and is designed to harass Defendants. Defendants further aver that they have already provided information that would be responsive to this RPD, and Defendants refer Plaintiff and the Court to their answer to Interrogatory No. 5 in Plaintiff's First Set of Discovery Requests and their response to RPD No. 10 and 11 in Plaintiff's Second Set of Discovery Requests.
Plaintiff argues that the information sought is relevant and is not designed to harass. Plaintiff avers that Defendants have conceded the relevancy of this question by posing the same question to Plaintiff. Plaintiff contends that if Defendants' Motion to Compel is granted, so must Plaintiff's Motion to Compel be, and vice versa. For the reasons that follow, the Court would find that Plaintiff's Motion should be denied.
Plaintiff's Motion papers, particularly ECF No. 115-1, demonstrate that Plaintiff did not engage in a good faith effort to resolve this dispute prior to filing this Motion as is required under the rules. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 37(a)(1) and LR Civ P 37.02. Indeed, rather than attempt to resolve the instant discovery issue, Plaintiff's “meet and confer” emails show that Plaintiff tried to change and/or control Defendants' litigation behavior by threatening to file the instant Motion. See ECF No. 115-1. Thus, the Court has no choice but to conclude that the instant Motion was filed in retaliation for Defendants' Motion [113] to Compel. To illustrate this point further, the Court will examine in detail the correspondence Plaintiff has held out as their good faith effort to resolve this issue.
ECF No. 115-1 is a package of emails which appear to have been exchanged by and between the parties with respect to the issue raised in Plaintiff's Motion. Page 3 of ECF No. 115-1 is the first email, chronologically speaking, in the package of emails appended as ECF No. 115-1, and it appears to be the first correspondence exchanged between the parties vis-à-vis this discovery dispute. Almost immediately, Plaintiff ties her Motion to Compel to Defendants' ‘insistence’ on filing its own Motion to Compel: “Given that Matrix insists on compelling responses to Interrog. 12 and REP 10, I will be moving to compel a response to RFP 1 in Plaintiff's Sixth Set of Discovery to Matrix.” By her own admission, then, Plaintiff filed this Motion because Defendants planned to file theirs (ECF No. 113). Plaintiff went on to say that she would only agree not to pursue her Motion if Defendants agreed not to pursue theirs: “I would propose that Matrix withdraw its motion to compel. In turn, Plaintiff would agree not to compel a response to her nearly identical request. If that is not acceptable, we will file our motion tomorrow.” This type of communication is not what is contemplated by the good faith requirement of either Fed. R. Civ. P. 37(a)(1) or LR Civ P 32.02(a)(3), and this is not the designated purpose of motions to compel. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 37. The Court further notes Plaintiff's final statement in this email correspondence: “Consider this my attempt to confer on the issue.” This statement does not reflect a meaningful attempt to resolve any discovery dispute.
Page 1 of ECF No. 115-1 further demonstrates that, rather than resolve a disagreement over certain discovery requests, the purpose and intent of Plaintiff's Motion appears to be retaliatory in nature. For example, after Defendants attempted to resolve the disagreement (ECF No. 115-1 at p. 2), Plaintiff responded thusly: “Matrix hasn't limited its request, so why would Plaintiff limit hers?” Also, “If Plaintiff is going to have to respond to Matrix's limitless request, then Matrix will have to respond to the same request.” Plaintiff appears to acknowledge the nature of her tactics: “I doubt Matrix is eager to embark on this discovery, nor do I think it will be keen to produce all their settlement agreements for the past few years.” ECF No. 115-1 at p. 1.
*8 Plaintiff's failure to comply with the good faith requirement may be explained by the fact that Plaintiff believes her motion is not well-founded. Indeed, according to Plaintiff's Motion, she does not actually seek all of the information implicated by RPD No. 1. Rather, Plaintiff only seeks information regarding National Auto Protection Corp. and Gustav Renny. See ECF No. 115 at p. 4 (“Mey's request is therefore designed to unearth additional past and present relationships between Matrix, NAPC, and Renny...Mey's request is also designed to unearth notice Matrix had of NAPC and Renny's prior suspected violations”). A review of RPD No. 1 demonstrates that the RPD is not tailored to meet those ends. Plaintiff thus appears to have posed a request for production that is overly broad. It is difficult to understand how or why Plaintiff believes the Court should compel an answer to a request for production that seeks more information than what Plaintiff appears to want or need.
Finally, and perhaps most tellingly, is Plaintiff's statement at p. 1 of the Motion itself (ECF No. 115) that this Motion should be denied. ECF No. 115 at p. 1 (“[h]owever, for reasons stated in the forthcoming Plaintiff's Response in Opposition to Matrix Defendants' Motion to Compel [ECF No. 113], both motions to compel should be denied”) (emphasis in original). If Plaintiff knew at the outset that the Motion should be denied, this begs the question of why Plaintiff filed the Motion in the first place. Such an admission underscores the Court's belief that Plaintiff filed the instant Motion for reasons other than the inability to resolve a discovery issue. This is not an appropriate use of the discovery tools available to parties in Federal Court. Plaintiff's Motion [115] to Compel is therefore DENIED. See Kidwiler v. Progressive Paloverde Ins. Co., 192 F.R.D. 193, 197 (N.D.W. Va. 2000) (finding the failure to engage in good faith efforts to resolve a discovery issue prior to filing a motion to compel constitutes grounds for the court to deny the motion to compel).
V. Conclusion
Accordingly, and for all of the foregoing reasons, Defendant's Motion [113] to Compel is GRANTED. Plaintiff is DIRECTED to supplement her answers to discovery as set forth more fully above. Plaintiff's Motion [115] to Compel is DENIED.
It is so ORDERED.
Any party may, within FOURTEEN DAYS of this Order, file with the Clerk of the Court written objections identifying the portions of the Order to which objection is made, and the basis for such objection. A copy of such objections should also be submitted to the District Court Judge of Record. Failure to timely file objections to the Order set forth above will result in a waiver of the right to appeal from a judgment of this Court based upon such an Order.
The Court DIRECTS the Clerk of the Court to serve a copy of this Order upon any pro se party by certified mail, return receipt requested, and upon counsel of record herein.
Footnotes
Interrogatory No. 1: Identify all telephone calls to Your Cellular Telephone Numbers for which you seek recovery in this Lawsuit that you allege were made by or on behalf of Matrix, and state all factual basis for your contention that each call was made by or on behalf of Matrix.
Interrogatory No. 2: If you contend that Matrix is vicariously liable for any of the telephone calls identified in your answer to Interrogatory No. 1, identify such telephone calls and state all facts in support of such contention with respect to each such call.