Owens v. Sprint/United Management Co.

221 F.R.D. 657, 2004 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10643, 94 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 772, 2004 WL 1292007
CourtDistrict Court, D. Kansas
DecidedJune 2, 2004
DocketCiv.A. No. 03-2371-JWL-DJW
StatusPublished
Cited by13 cases

This text of 221 F.R.D. 657 (Owens v. Sprint/United Management Co.) 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
Owens v. Sprint/United Management Co., 221 F.R.D. 657, 2004 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10643, 94 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 772, 2004 WL 1292007 (D. Kan. 2004).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

WAXSE, United States Magistrate Judge.

This matter comes before the Court on Defendant’s Motion to Compel Full and Complete Answers to Interrogatory No. 6 and Request for Production No. 13 (doc. 47). Defendant moves this Court for an Order compelling Plaintiff to identify her medical and health care providers and produce documents relating to her medical care, treatment, and counseling. In addition, Defendant requests the option of reconvening Plaintiffs deposition for the sole and limited purpose of permitting its counsel an opportunity to examine Plaintiff on any documents or information Plaintiff is ordered to produce. Defendant has also filed a separate certificate of compliance1 of its efforts to confer with Plaintiffs counsel prior to filing this motion. For the reasons set forth below, Defendant’s motion is granted to the extent set forth herein.

I. Introduction and Brief Factual Background

Plaintiff brings this action against Defendant asserting claims for sex discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964,2 and age discrimination under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (“ADEA”).3 She alleges that Defendant demoted her from her position as Senior Director of International Service Management to a lower-grade managerial position based upon her gender and age when it relocated her Director’s position to Virginia and filled it with a younger, male employee.

On December 3, 2003, Defendant served Plaintiff with its First Set of Interrogatories and First Request for Production of Documents.4 Plaintiff served her Answers to Defendant’s First Interrogatories and Defendant’s First Request for Production of Documents on January 19, 2004.5 After attempting to confer with Plaintiff to resolve the issue without court action, as required by Fed.R.Civ.P. 37(a)(2)(A) and D. Kan. Rule 37.2, Defendant filed the instant Motion to Compel on February 18, 2004.

II. Discovery Requests at Issue

A. First Interrogatory No. 6 and First Request for Production No. 13

Defendant’s First Set of Interrogatories No. 6 requests that Plaintiff “identify each medical or health care provider who has treated you for any medical condition, including but not limited to physical, emotional or mental conditions, during your employment with Defendant.” For each individual identified, it requests further information, including the conditions for which Plaintiff sought treatment, dates treatment was sought, identification of medical records, and whether Plaintiff claims that Defendant’s conduct caused, exacerbated, or affected the condition. It also requests that Plaintiff execute and return an Authorization for Release of Health Information to Defendant. Defendant also propounded a corresponding Request for Production No. 13, which seeks “all [659]*659documents relating to any medical care, examination, treatment, therapy, group or individual counseling, or other health care you have received since January 1,1993.”

Plaintiff served the following Answer to Interrogatory No. 6:

See General Objection. Plaintiff further objects to this interrogatory in that under the ADEA plaintiff will seek actual pecuniary damages, plus liquidated damages. She will not seek damages such as mental anguish, mental distress, emotional pain, anxiety, embarrassment, humiliation, career disruption, inconvenience etc. Plaintiff has not sought medical treatment for injury which she claims defendant is responsible, she does not seek damages for same. Thus this question is not reasonably calculated to lead to discovery of admissible evidence.
Under Title VII, plaintiff will seek actual damages and non-pecuniary damages for what certain decisions have called “garden variety” damages such as mental anguish, mental distress, emotional pain, anxiety, embarrassment, humiliation, career disruption, inconvenience etc., foreseeably flowing from defendant’s actions. Plaintiff has not sought medical treatment for injury for which she claims defendant is responsible.

Plaintiff responded to Defendant’s corresponding Request for Production No. 13 by referencing her answer to Interrogatory Nos. 6.

1. General objection to Interrogatory No. 6

In her initial answer to Interrogatory No. 6, Plaintiff referenced her General Objection to the discovery requests. In her General Objection, Plaintiff asserted that Defendant’s privilege instructions are unduly burdensome and exceed the requirements under Rule 26(b)(5). In addition, she generally objected that many of the interrogatories contain multiple subparts, which thereby exceed the Rule 33(a) numerical limit on number of interrogatories.

Defendant’s only apparent reference to Plaintiffs general objections is contained in a footnote in its Memorandum in Support of its Motion to Compel, in which Defendant states that “Plaintiffs ‘General Objections’ are immaterial to this dispute____”6 Plaintiff also does not mention these objections in her response to the Motion to Compel. The Court therefore cannot determine whether these objections are still at issue and need to be resolved. The Court will therefore take up these objections at the final pretrial conference on June 8,2004.

2. Relevancy objections

Plaintiff specifically objected to Defendant’s Interrogatory No. 6 on the grounds that it is not reasonably calculated to lead to discovery of admissible evidence. She contends that she should not be required to produce the information and documents sought by these discovery requests because she only seeks actual pecuniary damages plus liquidated damages under her ADEA claim and “garden variety” damages under her Title VII claim. Plaintiff argues that she is only seeking actual damages and non-pecuniary damages under Title VII for what some courts have called “garden variety” damages, such as mental anguish, mental distress, emotional pain, anxiety, embarrassment, humiliation, career disruption, and inconvenience, foreseeably flowing from Defendant’s actions.

Generally, discovery requests seeking an employment discrimination plaintiffs medical and psychological records are held to be relevant as to both causation and the extent of plaintiffs alleged injuries and damages if plaintiff claims damages for emotional pain, suffering, and mental anguish.7 The fact [660]*660that these damages claims may be the “garden variety” of damage claims for emotional distress does not automatically exempt them from discovery.8 Plaintiffs argument is more applicable in the context of a Rule 35 motion to compel physical or mental examinations, where courts have found that a “garden variety” emotional distress claim, one which amounts to no more than an attempt to recover for the generalized insult, hurt feelings and lingering resentment which anyone could be expected to feel if he or she were the recipient of an adverse employment action attributed to discrimination, does not place the plaintiffs mental condition “in controversy” for purposes of justifying a mental examination under Rule 35.9

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
221 F.R.D. 657, 2004 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10643, 94 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 772, 2004 WL 1292007, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/owens-v-sprintunited-management-co-ksd-2004.