Gassaway v. Jarden Corp.

292 F.R.D. 676, 2013 WL 4736241, 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 125239
CourtDistrict Court, D. Kansas
DecidedSeptember 3, 2013
DocketNo. 12-2769-JTM
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 292 F.R.D. 676 (Gassaway v. Jarden Corp.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, D. Kansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Gassaway v. Jarden Corp., 292 F.R.D. 676, 2013 WL 4736241, 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 125239 (D. Kan. 2013).

Opinion

ORDER

JAMES P. O’HARA, United States Magistrate Judge.

This action arises out of a house fire that resulted in the deaths of plaintiff Coley Gass-awajfs two children. Plaintiff alleges that defendant1 Sunbeam Products, Inc. was negligent in the manufacture, design, inspection, testing, and marketing of certain “space heaters” she purchased and that the fire was caused by defects in one of the subject heaters. Plaintiff seeks wrongful death damages from defendant under theories of strict product liability, negligence, breach of warranty, and violations of the Kansas Consumer Protection Act. Currently before the undersigned U.S. Magistrate Judge, James P. O’Hara, is a motion to compel defendant to supplement its answers to plaintiffs first set of interrogatories (doc. 67). Plaintiff also asks that the court strike defendant’s objections to the interrogatories, award fees and costs, and impose sanctions against defendant. For the reasons discussed below, plaintiffs motion is granted in part and denied in part.

On May 17, 2013, plaintiff served her first set of interrogatories on defendant.2 Defendant served its answers to plaintiffs first set of interrogatories on June 17, 2013.3 Plaintiff sent a “golden rule” letter concerning defendant’s interrogatory answers on June 24, 2013.4 The letter focused on defendant’s objection that it had not yet identified the specific model of the subject heater remains and its date of manufacture.5 At this time, the subject heater is believed to be a Holmes HQH307 quartz space heater (“HQH307”). After several exchanges between the parties’ counsel, plaintiff sent a second golden rale letter to defendant, outlining her concerns with defendant’s answers and objections.6 In response, defendant agreed to amend its interrogatory answers and objections in an attempt to address plaintiffs concerns.7 Plaintiff informed defendant that it had until July 10, 2013 to withdraw all of its objections and supplement all of its answers or plaintiff would seek court intervention.8 Defendant served amended interrogatory answers on July 10, 2013.9 After several failed attempts to resolve the discovery dispute, plaintiff filed her motion to compel discovery on July 29, 2013.10 Defendant timely filed its response on August 12, 2013.11 Plaintiff filed her reply on August 27, 2013.12

Fed.R.Civ.P. 26(b)(1) provides that “[f]or good cause, the court may order discovery of any matter relevant to the subject matter involved in the action.” When a party files a motion to compel and asks the court to overrule objections, the objecting party must specifically show in its response to the motion how each discovery request is objectionable.13 Objections initially raised but not supported in response to the motion to compel are deemed abandoned.14 However, if [680]*680the discovery requests appear facially objectionable in that they are overly broad or seek information that does not appear relevant, the burden is on the movant to demonstrate how the requests are not objectionable.15

Here, plaintiff seeks an order striking defendant’s objections to plaintiffs interrogatories and compelling defendant to supplement its interrogatory answers. With this standard in mind, the court addresses each of the objections.

I. General Objections.

In the District of Kansas, general objections are considered “overly broad and worthless unless the objections are substantiated with detailed explanations.”16 Our courts disapprove of the practice of asserting a general objection “to the extent” it may apply to particular requests for discovery.17

Defendant’s answers to plaintiffs first set of interrogatories included “general objections.”18 Plaintiff informed defendant that these were improper and asked that the objections be withdrawn.19 In response, defendant prepared amended objections, replacing its general objections with “objections to definitions.”20 Plaintiff asserts “that the ‘objections to definitions’ are simply general objections and that ‘general objections’ and ‘objections to definitions’ are improper” and not permitted in the District of Kansas.21 Defendant responds that its “objections to definitions” are proper because it provided detailed explanations for them and that therefore they should not be stricken22

This debate about the propriety of general objections “appears to be an academic exercise” which the court need not belabor.23 Nonetheless, the court will briefly address this issue since the parties were previously warned that unsubstantiated objections would not be tolerated in this case.

In Johnson v. Kraft Foods North America, Inc., the court stated:

This Court has on several occasions disapproved of the practice of asserting a general objection “to the extent” it may apply to particular requests for discovery. The Court has characterized these types of objections as “worthless for anything beyond delay of the discovery.” Such objections are considered mere hypothetical or contingent possibilities, where the objecting party makes no meaningful effort to show the application of any such theoretical objection to any request for discovery. Thus, this Court has deemed such ostensible objections waived or declined to consider them as objections at all.24

Defendant, as the party resisting discovery, has the burden of supporting all of its objections, including its general objections.25 The court finds that defendant’s “objections to definitions” are nothing more than “general objections” and defendant made no meaningful effort to show how any of the general objections apply to a specific interrogatory. Even though defendant’s objections aren’t listed “to the extent” that the objection applies to any of the set of interrogatories, they are meaningless and hypothetical because they are not applied to specific interrogatories. Therefore, the court finds that defendant’s “general objections” and “objections to definitions” to plaintiffs first set of interrogatories are waived.

II. Timeliness of Objections.

It is well settled that the failure to timely assert an objection to an interrogatory re-[681]*681suits in waiver of the objection.26 Fed. R.Civ.P. 33(b)(1) provides that “[t]he party upon whom the interrogatories have been served shall serve a copy of the answers, and objections, if any, within 30 days after the service of the interrogatories.” Subsection (b)(4) of the Rule further provides that “[a]ny ground not stated in a timely objection is waived unless the party’s failure to object is excused by the court for good cause shown.”27

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
292 F.R.D. 676, 2013 WL 4736241, 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 125239, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/gassaway-v-jarden-corp-ksd-2013.