American Rockwool, Inc. v. Owens-Corning Fiberglas Corp.

109 F.R.D. 263, 1985 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 18942
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. North Carolina
DecidedJune 13, 1985
DocketNo. 83-39-CIV-8
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 109 F.R.D. 263 (American Rockwool, Inc. v. Owens-Corning Fiberglas Corp.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. North Carolina primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
American Rockwool, Inc. v. Owens-Corning Fiberglas Corp., 109 F.R.D. 263, 1985 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 18942 (E.D.N.C. 1985).

Opinion

[264]*264ORDER

CHARLES K. McCOTTER, Jr., United States Magistrate.

This matter is before the Court for resolution of a discovery matter, Plaintiff’s Third Motion to Compel Discovery and for Sanctions filed on March 29, 1985. At the hearing on this motion conducted on May 1, 1985, counsel advised the Court that they had substantially agreed on all matters in dispute raised by the motion to compel except the question of sanctions. Counsel reduced this to writing and presented same to the Court in the form of a consent order, which the Court entered on June 4, 1985, nunc pro tunc for May 14, 1985.

In respect to sanctions, the plaintiff seeks to recover almost $30,000 in costs and expenses incurred in its extensive efforts to discover price and sales information from the defendant. Specifically, the plaintiff seeks an order requiring the defendant to pay (a) all costs of preparing and prosecuting its Third Motion to Compel; (b) costs of counsel’s trip to Toledo, Ohio, in September, 1983; (c) costs of plaintiff’s second motion to compel filed February 21, 1984, as well as all other costs relating to a computer controversy; and (d) all other costs associated with efforts to get price and sales information from the defendant. The plaintiff also seeks as a sanction that the defendant be precluded from initiating further discovery and limited in discovery already noticed. To decide this motion, it becomes necessary to review the proceedings in federal court.

American Rockwool manufactures rock-wool insulation, a mineral wood product used to insulate commercial and residential structures. It competes with defendant Owens-Corning in selling insulation products to producers of manufactured housing and to insulation contractors. Both American Rockwool and Owens-Corning market their insulation in loose-fill and batt form. American Rockwool brought this lawsuit alleging that Owens-Corning has engaged in unfair, predatory and anti-competitive conduct in violation of federal and state trade regulation laws. Since the institution of this action, the parties have engaged in lengthy and contested discovery.

Beginning on May 4, 1983, the plaintiff has served the defendant with five sets of interrogatories and requests for production of documents. Plaintiff has accused the defendant of systematically trying to frustrate plaintiff’s discovery efforts by filing incomplete and late responses and failing to provide information when it stated it would do so. American Rockwool’s most meritorious discovery complaint focuses upon the defendant’s alleged abuse of Rule 33(c) in the production of voluminous documents in Toledo, Ohio, in September, 1983, in response to plaintiff’s First Interrogatories Nos. 13 and 15. American Rockwool says that the defendant has other records available from which the information sought in the interrogatories can be easily gleaned with substantially less cost than that incurred by American Rockwool in trying to obtain the information from the mass records produced.

Plaintiff’s First Interrogatories Nos. 13 and 15 sought (a) sales summary information by customer and product; and (b) information of each sale not made at Owens’ regular price. The defendant invoked Rule 33(c) and sent plaintiff to an Ohio warehouse containing more than a million invoice documents, unsorted by customer or product. So much information was provided that the plaintiff did not have the time or resources to glean from this production the information sought.

American Rockwool asked if there was an easier way of obtaining the information it sought. Owens-Corning failed to reveal to American Rockwool that the information was available elsewhere, sorted by customer. The use of the defendant’s computer to obtain the information was discussed, and plaintiff devoted much time to pursuing this aspect, including the hiring of computer experts to assist in obtaining the information. In this regard, the plaintiff filed a Second Motion to Compel. Although the Court found some merit in Owens-Corning’s opposition to this motion, the Court ordered the defendant to describe the na[265]*265ture of its computer system to American Rockwool. A hearing was scheduled for April 19, 1984, to resolve the conflicting contentions as to the cost and feasibility of providing American Rockwool with discovery through use of the defendant’s computer system. This hearing was not conducted because plaintiff’s counsel advised the Court that the computer search question had been resolved except as to cost, which would be later submitted to the Court for resolution in the event counsel were unable to reach agreement.1 Ultimately, counsel were unable to agree upon a reasonable cost; however, they never resubmitted the matter to the Court.

A year and a half after the Toledo production, Owens-Corning advised American Rockwool that another source of documents was available from which American Rockwool might be able to obtain the discovery sought. In the winter of 1984-85, deposition testimony of Owens-Corning’s employees began to reveal that copies of invoices are maintained at Owens-Corning’s field offices, grouped by customer. On April 19, 1985, counsel for Owens-Corning revealed to American Rockwool’s counsel that copies of invoices are routinely forwarded to the relevant branch office, where they are ordinarily filed by customer name.

In September, 1983, counsel for Owens-Corning was unaware of this option and had directed American Rockwool to the voluminous records in Toledo. Counsel for American Rockwool spent two days of manual search on September 19 and 20, 1983, in Toledo seeking price and sales information from these extensive records. The availability of an alternate source of records from which American Rockwool could obtain its desired discovery with much less effort and expense emphasizes the futility of the September, 1983 search.

Joseph A. Stancati, corporate counsel for Owens-Corning, supervised Owens-Corning’s responses to discovery propounded by American Rockwool. He was responsible for production of invoices from Owens-Corning’s official document repository in Toledo, Ohio, during the week of September 19, 1983. Stancati was advised by a person in the company knowledgeable as to their sources of documents that the invoices were maintained by Owens-Corning and were located in Toledo. Stancati was told that the invoices were kept by plant, by invoice number, and would include invoices for all products which were manufactured at the plant, including building insulation. These documents are the only complete set of invoices maintained by Owens-Corning.

The Court concludes that Owens-Corning abused Rule 33(c) by failing to specify its records in sufficient detail to permit American Rockwool to locate and identify as readily as Owens-Corning the records from which the answers to the interrogatories could be ascertained. Rule 33(c) provides:

Where the answer to an interrogatory may be derived or ascertained from the business records of the party upon whom the interrogatory has been served ... and the burden of deriving or ascertaining the answer is substantially the same for the party serving the interrogatory as for the party served, it is a sufficient answer to such interrogatory to specify the records from which the answer may be derived or ascertained and to afford to the parties serving the interrogatory rea[266]*266sonable opportunity to examine, audit, or inspect such records and to make copies, compilations, abstracts or summaries.

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Bluebook (online)
109 F.R.D. 263, 1985 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 18942, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/american-rockwool-inc-v-owens-corning-fiberglas-corp-nced-1985.