Bell v. Automobile Club

80 F.R.D. 228
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. Michigan
DecidedApril 7, 1978
DocketCiv. A. No. 39309
StatusPublished
Cited by29 cases

This text of 80 F.R.D. 228 (Bell v. Automobile Club) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. Michigan primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Bell v. Automobile Club, 80 F.R.D. 228 (E.D. Mich. 1978).

Opinion

[229]*229MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

JOINER, District Judge.

The court presently has before it three motions for decision. They are (I) plaintiffs’ motion to punish defendants for contempt and for sanctions; (II) plaintiffs’ motion for sanctions for failure to answer plaintiffs’ fourth interrogatories and to preserve records; and (III) defendants’ motion to dismiss claims of certain named plaintiffs under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

I. Plaintiffs’ Motion to Punish Defendants for Contempt and for Sanctions

In this motion plaintiffs raise a number of problems that have occurred in the course of discovery in this case. The motion can be broken down into three areas of specific concern: (A.) discovery of the Alkema binder on “reasons for move”; (B.) discovery of the materials identified by plaintiffs as the “book of blacks”; and (C.) problems encountered in setting up a computer data bank.

The court will deal with each of these problems separately in this order. However, as a preliminary matter, it should be noted that defendants have raised the issue of the propriety of imposing monetary sanctions for failure to make discovery when the moving party is being financed by a third party, not a party to the suit. Rule 37 provides in both sections (b) and (d) that the court may make such orders involving sanctions “as are just”. The function of imposing sanctions is to assure both future compliance with the discovery rules and to punish past discovery failures, as well as to compensate a party for expenses incurred due to another party’s failure to properly allow discovery. That being the case, the method of financing of litigation is not relevant to a determination of the question of whether to impose monetary sanctions. Therefore, the fact that in the instant suit many of the costs have been borne by Focus: Hope has no relevance to this court’s determination of what, if any, sanctions might properly be imposed against the defendants.

A. Discovery of the Alkema binder on “reasons for move”

Plaintiffs have complained that defendants failed to make discovery in that they failed to identify certain materials relating to the relocation of the defendant’s headquarters in response to interrogatories that, if fully answered, would have elicited the identification.

On February 20, 1974, this court entered an order staying these proceedings in order that further efforts could be undertaken before the EEOC to settíe the claims in this case. This stay was pursuant to 42 U.S.C. 2000e-5(f)(l) which permits a court to stay proceedings up to 60 days for further efforts before the EEOC. In the February 20, 1974 order, the court also granted plaintiffs’ motion to compel answers to plaintiffs’ first set of interrogatories and provided that defendants should answer such interrogatories within 30 days after the com[230]*230pletion of the EEOC’s proceedings. As the plaintiffs have pointed out in their motion for sanctions, this would require answers within 90 days of the date of the order, or on or about May 20, 1974.

Included in plaintiffs’ first set of interrogatories, and subject to this court’s order of February 20, 1974, were interrogatories 71, 72 and 74. The court has examined these and finds that they are framed so that a proper answer to them would call for the identification of a document such as the Alkema binder on “reasons for move”. At the time these interrogatories were served, the Alkema binder was existing. Following the court order of February 20, 1974 and the failure of defendants to identify this document, there were representations made by defendants at several times and in several different contexts that all documents relating to the relocation had been identified and provided to the plaintiffs. In particular, defendants’ third supplementary answers to plaintiffs’ first interrogatories filed on November 22,1974 contained such a representation.

The Alkema binder was, however, not revealed to plaintiffs. The binder which contained the report entitled “reasons for the move” was first discovered by one of plaintiffs’ counsel’s assistants in February of 1976 when the assistant, Mr. Kudek, was permitted to examine the Alkema binders.

The court finds that this binder should have been identified by defendants in response to plaintiffs’ first set of interrogatories and certainly in compliance with this court’s order of February 20, 1974. The court finds that the failure of defendants to identify this document was inexcusable and unjustified. The court' further finds that the circumstances in this case would not make an award of expenses unjust.

The plaintiffs have requested various sanctions under F.R.Civ.P. 37(b). The court has reviewed these requests and finds that the following sanctions are just and appropriate in this case:

1. Plaintiffs will be permitted to take the depositions of all individuals who prepared the Alkema relocation study or who are the sources of, or have knowledge pertaining to the contents of the study, or who were previously deposed by plaintiffs while plaintiffs had no knowledge of the Alkema binder. These depositions shall be taken forthwith. All reasonable expenses, including attorney’s fees incurred in the taking of these depositions, shall be paid by the defendants.
2. The defendants shall be required to pay to the plaintiffs the reasonable expenses, including attorney’s fees, that have been expended by plaintiffs, plaintiffs’ attorneys or any other source on behalf of plaintiffs, because of defendants’ failure to comply with this court’s order of February 20,1974 insofar as this order required the identification of the Alkema study. This amount shall also include all fees and expenses that were incurred by any of the above-mentioned parties, in obtaining any discovery up until February, 1976, that related to reasons for the relocation which fees or expenses would not have been incurred but for the failure of defendants to identify the “reasons for the move” document in its response to plaintiffs’ first set of interrogatories.
3. Defendants shall pay to plaintiffs all reasonable expenses, including attorney’s fees incurred in obtaining this order.
4. The plaintiffs are directed to file, within 30 days from the date of this order, a complete and detailed statement of expenses and fees that plaintiffs believe fall within the above defined parameters. Upon the filing of such a statement, and the service of such statement on opposing counsel, defendants will have 15 days within which to file' specific objections. The objections shall be limited to the issue of whether any particular item falls within the above defined parameters. If any objections are filed, the court will set the matter [231]*231down for prompt hearing at which time the court will make findings as to the appropriateness of the inclusion within the award of any item objected to by defendants.

B. Discovery of materials identified by plaintiffs as the “book of blacks”

Plaintiffs have asked for sanctions against defendants based on defendants’ apparent effort to conceal the existence of a number of materials which plaintiffs have chosen to identify as the “book of blacks”.

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Bluebook (online)
80 F.R.D. 228, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/bell-v-automobile-club-mied-1978.