Gluc v. Prudential Life Insurance Co. of America

309 F.R.D. 406, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 104242, 2015 WL 4746249
CourtDistrict Court, W.D. Kentucky
DecidedAugust 5, 2015
DocketCIVIL ACTION NO. 3:14-CV-519-DJH
StatusPublished
Cited by12 cases

This text of 309 F.R.D. 406 (Gluc v. Prudential Life Insurance Co. of America) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, W.D. Kentucky primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Gluc v. Prudential Life Insurance Co. of America, 309 F.R.D. 406, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 104242, 2015 WL 4746249 (W.D. Ky. 2015).

Opinion

ORDER

Dave Whalin, Magistrate Judge, United States District Court

This matter comes before the Magistrate Judge to consider a motion to compel discovery filed by the Plaintiff, Judith Glue.1 Glue has filed an ERISA lawsuit to recover long term disability (LTD) benefits under a disability plan provided by her employer, Geis-inger Systems Services, Inc. Glue claims that the Defendant, Prudential Insurance Company of America (Prudential), which administers the disability plan and pays claims made thereunder, wrongfully denied her LTD benefits. She has sued Prudential for breach of contract in violation of 29 U.S.C. § 1132(a)(1)(B), breach of fiduciary duty under 29 U.S.C. § 1132(a)(3) and for disgorgement of accumulated earnings on the unpaid benefits allegedly due her pursuant to both of the cited ERISA statutes.

1. Glue’s Position

Glue claims that Prudential has an inherent conflict of interest that has resulted in its denial of her disability claim for its own financial gain. She has served Prudential with interrogatories and requests for production, which She maintains that Prudential has not adequately addressed. Prudential has declined to provide certain documents absent entry by the Court of the parties’ agreed protective order. It has also objected to certain discovery requests based on its view that the present case is governed by Wilkins v. Baptist Healthcare System, Inc., 150 F.3d 609 (6th Cir.1989) and the expedited procedures applicable to a “routine ERISA benefits case.”2

At issue are 15 requests for production of documents and 3 interrogatories. Prudential has responded and provided supplemental responses. Glue argues that the responses although supplemented are incomplete, evasive or substantively nonresponsive. The discovery requests in dispute fall into several groups.

Requests for production 19 and 20 seek to obtain documents l’elated to the organizational structure of the claims and the appeal units of Prudential so that Glue may learn the identity of those individuals actually involved in administering her LTD claim and the personnel of the respective departments. The second group of requests for production centers on Glue’s efforts to obtain documents related to the third-party medical reviewers, also referred to as vendors, used by Pruden[409]*409tial. These medical reviewers include: MLS Group of Companies, Inc. (MLS); Sosar Physical Therapy; Your Industrial Solution; Professional Disability Associates, LLC (PDA); Examination Management Services, Inc. (EMSI); and MES Solutions, Inc. (MES). Requests 21, 22, 23, 24, 26 and 28 respectively seek to obtain from Prudential the “contracts, draft reports, final reports, authorization to affix physician signature to a final report, dictated opinions, correspondence, e-mails, notes, diary entries and statistical reports for each of the medical reviewers identified above.”3

The third and final group of requests at issue involves certain of the same medical reviewers. In requests 29, 30 and 31, Glue seeks to obtain from MLS, MES and PDA respectively all of the final review reports provided to Prudential by each medical reviewer, without limitation to Glue’s claim for long term disability benefits. In other words, Glue seeks to obtain review reports for all disability claimants who have sought benefits from Prudential. Glue does not seek to obtain the identity or personal identifiers of these other individuals, but rather only the final reports of the reviewers with respect to their separate claims.4

Three interrogatories are put at issue by Glue’s motion to compel. These interrogatories, 17, 18 and 19, relate to a request for statistical information. In these three requests, Glue seeks to learn from MLS, PDA and MES respectively the number of claimants that each reviewer found to be disabled, not disabled or partially disabled, along with the total compensation paid to each reviewer for its reviews. Finally, Glue seeks to obtain dates to depose the three Prudential personnel that handled her claim and appeal, along with the deposition of a designated corporate representative under Rule 30(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Glue also asks that she be awarded attorney’s fees pursuant to Rule 37(a)(5) as well.

2. Prudential’s Position

Prudential responds that Glue’s discovery requests ignore the setting of the litigation— an ERISA benefits claim case. Prudential insists that in a benefits claim case under ERISA the Sixth Circuit holds that the Court’s review is confined to the administrative record as of the date of the administrator’s final decision denying benefits. Kalish v. Liberty Mut., 419 F.3d 501 (6th Cir.2005) (citing Moon v. Unum Provident Corp., 405 F.3d 373, 378-79 (6th Cir.2005). While a limited exception does exist to this general rule in those cases in which a claimant maintains that she was denied due process in the claims review procedure, before discovery is permitted the claimant must be able to point to specific evidence of a due process violation or actual bias to be entitled to discovery. Boilerplate allegations such as those made by Glue, according to Prudential, are not a basis to “unleash ... extensive discovery.”5 See, Huffaker v. Metro. Life Ins. Co., 271 Fed.Appx. 493, 503-04 (6th Cir.2008); Likas v. Life Ins. Co. of North Amer., 222 Fed.Appx. 481, 485-86 (6th Cir.2007); Putney v. Medical Mut. of Ohio, 111 Fed.Appx. 803, 807 (6th Cir.2004).

Because Glue has not made such a specific showing of bias or procedural irregularity, Prudential insists that she is not entitled to the extraordinary discovery she now demands. To afford her such discovery, in the view of Prudential, would “turn ERISA and its preference for expeditious resolution of claims on its head.”6 While Prudential does not dispute that the company both administers disability claims and pays disability benefits, it argues that the Court can easily assess what weight if any is to be given to such circumstances without embarking upon a discovery fishing expedition such as that now requested.

Prudential adds that even if this Court were to determine that Glue somehow had [410]*410made the specific showing necessary to entitle her to discovery, the discovery requests she has submitted are far beyond what she would be entitled to receive under the existing precedent of the Sixth Circuit. Discovery should be limited only to the alleged lack of due process afforded by the administrator or its alleged bias. Cooper v. Life Ins. Co. of N.A., et al, 486 F.3d 157, 171 (6th Cir.2007).

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Bluebook (online)
309 F.R.D. 406, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 104242, 2015 WL 4746249, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/gluc-v-prudential-life-insurance-co-of-america-kywd-2015.