Daniel Aragon v. Experian Information Solutions, Inc.

• Court: District Court, S.D. California
• Decided: January 27, 2026
• Docket: 3:25-cv-00814
• Status: Unknown

Opinion

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 9 SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 10 11 DANIEL ARAGON, Case No.: 3:25-cv-0814-BAS-SBC

12 Plaintiff, ORDER GRANTING IN PART AND 13 v. DENYING IN PART MOTION TO CONTINUE ENE AND STAY 14 EXPERIAN INFORMATION PROCEEDINGS SOLUTIONS, INC., 15 Defendant. [Dkt. No. 25] 16 Before the Court is Defendant’s January 21, 2026, Motion to Continue Early Neutral 17 Evaluation and Stay Proceedings (hereafter “Motion”) (Dkt. No. 25) and Plaintiff’s 18 Response in Opposition (hereafter “Opposition”) (Dkt. No. 26). The Motion seeks to 19 continue the Early Neutral Evaluation (“ENE”) currently set for January 28, 2026, at 10:00 20 AM before United States Magistrate Judge Steve B. Chu. (See Dkt. No. 22). After duly 21 considering the submissions, the Motion is GRANTED IN PART and DENIED IN 22 PART for the reasons set forth below. 23 Parties seeking to continue an ENE must demonstrate good cause. (Dkt. No. 22 at 3- 24 4 (Counsel must file a motion “setting forth good cause for the request”); see Fed. R. Civ. 25 P. 6(b) (“[w]hen an act may or must be done within a specified time, the court may, for 26 good cause, extend the time”). Courts have broad discretion in determining whether there 27 is good cause. See, e.g., Johnson v. Mammoth Recreations, Inc., 975 F.2d 604, 607 (9th Cir. 28 1 1992); Olvera v. Citibank, N.A., No. 25-cv-789-H-AHG, 2025 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 117769, 2 at *2, *4-*5 (S.D. Cal. June 19, 2025). “Good cause” is a non-rigorous standard that has 3 been construed broadly across procedural and statutory contexts. Ahanchian v. Xenon 4 Pictures, Inc., 624 F.3d 1253, 1259 (9th Cir. 2010). 5 Here, Defendant represents to the Court that this case is one of three active lawsuits 6 filed by Plaintiff against Experian with the other two pending in the San Diego Superior 7 Court, Small Claims Division (Dkt. No. 25 at 1). Defendant argues that the “allegations in 8 Small Claims Case 0269 are nearly identical to those in this present lawsuit” (Dkt. No. 25 9 at 2) and that requiring the parties to participate in an ENE would “prejudice the parties as 10 it would potentially result in conflicting outcomes regarding the same accounts and 11 claims.” (Dkt. No. 25 at 2). As such, Defendant requests a continuance of the ENE by at 12 least sixty-days (Dkt. No. 25 at 1). 13 In light of Defendant’s claims, the Court finds a thirty-day continuance is prudent. 14 The Small Claims Case 4553 has a hearing on January 28, 2026 (Dkt. No. 25 at 3) and the 15 Small Claims Case 0269 has a settlement deadline of February 15, 2026, (Dkt. No. 25 at 16 2). The Court finds it an efficient use of judicial resources to continue the ENE until after 17 these Small Claims cases have progressed. Defendant has demonstrated good cause that 18 the claims of all three cases are intertwined and would affect how the parties act at the 19 ENE. While Plaintiff opposes the continuance stating that proceeding with the ENE creates 20 no inefficiency or prejudice (Dkt. No. 26 at 7), the Court finds that a thirty-day continuance 21 strikes the right balance between using judicial resources efficiency with the need to hold 22 an ENE early in a case. 23 However, the Court does not find reason to stay the proceedings in its entirety. 24 Defendant has not shown that this case is so dependent on the outcome of the Small Claims 25 cases such that this matter must be stayed until those cases are completely resolved. 26 /// 27 /// 28 /// 1 Accordingly, the Court GRANTS IN PART and DENIES IN PART Defendant’s 2 ||Motion to Continue the ENE and Stay Proceedings. The Court continues the ENE until 3 February 26, 2026, at 02:00 PM. If the case does not settle, the Court will move into the 4 ||Case Management Conference at that time. The parties must comply with all of the 5 ||requirements set forth in the Court’s December 02, 2025, Notice and Order for Early 6 || Neutral Evaluation Conference and Case Management Conference. (Dkt. No. 22) prior to 7 || that ENE. 8 IT IS SO ORDERED. 9 || Dated: January 27, 2026 10

United States Magistrate Judge 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28