AmerGen Energy Co. ex rel. Exelon Generation Co. v. United States

94 Fed. Cl. 413, 106 A.F.T.R.2d (RIA) 6158, 2010 U.S. Claims LEXIS 664, 2010 WL 3448102
CourtUnited States Court of Federal Claims
DecidedSeptember 1, 2010
DocketNo. 09-108 T
StatusPublished
Cited by16 cases

This text of 94 Fed. Cl. 413 (AmerGen Energy Co. ex rel. Exelon Generation Co. v. United States) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering United States Court of Federal Claims primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
AmerGen Energy Co. ex rel. Exelon Generation Co. v. United States, 94 Fed. Cl. 413, 106 A.F.T.R.2d (RIA) 6158, 2010 U.S. Claims LEXIS 664, 2010 WL 3448102 (uscfc 2010).

Opinion

OPINION

BUSH, Judge.

The court now has before it Plaintiffs Motion to Compel Answers to Requests for Admission (Pl.’s Mot.), defendant’s response brief (Def.’s Opp.) and plaintiffs reply brief (Pl.’s Reply).1 For the reasons stated below, plaintiffs motion is denied. To the extent that plaintiffs reply brief also requests that the court compel defendant to answer plaintiffs first set of inteiTOgatories and second request for document production, Pl.’s Reply at 1 n. 1, that request is denied as well.

BACKGROUND

I. Relevant Facts2

This is a readjustment of partnership items case under the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 1982 (TEFRA), codified at 26 U.S.C. §§ 6221-6234 (2006). Plaintiff is AmerGen Energy Co., LLC (AmerGen), by and through Exelon Generation Co., LLC, AmerGen’s tax matters partner. AmerGen purchased three nuclear power plants and took over their operation in 1998-99.3 Compl. ¶¶ 1, 25, 30, 36-37, 43^14, 50. According to plaintiff, the tax treatment of “assumed decommissioning liabilities” was the subject of private letter rulings (PLRs) issued both to the sellers of the nuclear power plants and to AmerGen. Id. ¶¶ 18, 57-58; Pl.’s Mot. at 2-4. The primary dispute in this case, at least as regards plaintiffs motion, concerns the tax treatment of any decommissioning liabilities that were assumed by AmerGen. Plaintiff states that to win on this issue, it must show that the assumed decommissioning liabilities were not contingent, i.e., that these liabilities were fixed and reasonably determinable in amount at the time of the purchases. See Compl. ¶ 66; Pl.’s Mot. at 8-9.

II. Procedural History

Plaintiff filed its complaint on February 20, 2009. Discovery is underway, but disputes have arisen. The primary dispute before the court at this time concerns plaintiffs requests for admission regarding the PLRs issued to the sellers of the nuclear power plants. In essence, plaintiff asserts that these PLRs are relevant to the issue it must prove to win its case:

These Requests for Admission would demonstrate that the factual and related legal questions regarding whether the decommissioning liabilities at issue in this case were fixed and reasonably determinable at the time they were assumed by [plaintiff and] have already been determined [in the sellers’ PLRs], and would allow the Court to resolve on summary judgment the core legal issue in this case, which is whether [plaintiff] may include in its tax basis of each facility the nuclear decommissioning liability it assumed as part of the purchases, thus avoiding a trial and conserving judicial resources.

PL’s Mot. at 7. In plaintiffs view, the PLRs issued to the sellers of the nuclear power plants constitute evidence that the decommissioning liabilities assumed by plaintiff were fixed and reasonably determinable in amount at the time of the purchases. Id. at 18 (“The United States has already decided [in the PLRs issued to the sellers] that the nuclear decommissioning liabilities that are at issue in this case are fixed and reasonably determinable.”).

[416]*416Defendant opposes plaintiffs motion, and argues that the PLRs in question are irrelevant to plaintiffs claims in this suit:

[AJn investigation into the reasons why the IRS did or did not make certain statements in various private letter rulings, as well as any attempt now to interpret and understand the qualifications to those statements, and to compare the much more limited set of (untested) factual representations made to the IRS ten years ago to the actual, and much more complete, record that will be presented here, can have no bearing on the issues in this case.

Def.’s Opp. at 3. As to other requests for admission not related to the PLRs issued to the sellers, defendant argues that responding to those requests cannot proceed until more progress on discovery has been made. Id. at 3-4. Plaintiffs motion appears to address only the requests for admission related to the sellers’ PLRs, Pl.’s Mot. at 7-8, and does not clearly state a position as to other requests for admission.

DISCUSSION

I. Standard of Review

Rule 36 of the Rules of the United States Court of Federal Claims (RCFC) states that “La] party may serve on any other party a written request to admit, for purposes of the pending action only, the truth of any matters within the scope of RCFC 26(b)(1) relating to: (A) facts, the application of law to fact, or opinions about either; and (B) the genuineness of any described documents.” 4 RCFC 36(a)(1). The party receiving these requests for admission must answer:

If a matter is not admitted, the answer must specifically deny it or state in detail why the answering party cannot truthfully admit or deny it. A denial must fairly respond to the substance of the matter; and when good faith requires that a party qualify an answer or deny only a part of a matter, the answer must specify the part admitted and qualify or deny the rest. The answering party may assert lack of knowledge or information as a reason for failing to admit or deny only if the party states that it has made reasonable inquiry and that the information it knows or can readily obtain is insufficient to enable it to admit or deny.

RCFC 36(a)(4). A party may also object to a request for admission, but “[tjhe grounds for objecting to a request must be stated. A party must not object solely on the ground that the request presents a genuine issue for trial.” RCFC 36(a)(5).

If the party requesting admissions is not satisfied with the answers or objections provided by the party served,

[tjhe requesting party may move to determine the sufficiency of an answer or objection. Unless the court finds an objection justified, it must order that an answer be served. On finding that an answer does not comply with this rule, the court may order either that the matter is admitted or that an amended answer be served.

RCFC 36(a)(6). Plaintiffs motion is brought under RCFC 36(a)(6), and although styled a motion to compel, is most accurately described as a motion challenging the sufficiency of defendant’s answers and objections to certain requests for admission.

As other courts have noted, the purpose of requests for admission is to eliminate issues over facts that are not in dispute, and to narrow issues to be tried before the court. See, e.g., Stockdale v. Stockdale, No. 4:08-CV-1773 CAS, 2009 WL 5217001, at *1 (E.D.Mo. Dec.30, 2009) (“Requests for admission are ... intended to save costs by establishing uncontested facts without the time, trouble and expense of proving these facts through discovery.”) (citation omitted). A distinction between requests for admission and discovery requests must be made however: “requests for admission are not designed to obtain discovery of the existence of facts, but rather are intended to establish the admission of facts about which there is no real dispute.” Id. at *2. One ground, among many, that can justify an objection to a request for admission is that the request for admission seeks an admission that is irrelevant to the case being tried. See, e.g., Estate [417]*417

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94 Fed. Cl. 413, 106 A.F.T.R.2d (RIA) 6158, 2010 U.S. Claims LEXIS 664, 2010 WL 3448102, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/amergen-energy-co-ex-rel-exelon-generation-co-v-united-states-uscfc-2010.