Payless Shoesource Worldwide, Inc. v. Target Corp.

237 F.R.D. 666, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 54419, 2006 WL 2805706
CourtDistrict Court, D. Kansas
DecidedAugust 4, 2006
DocketNo. 05-4023-JAR
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 237 F.R.D. 666 (Payless Shoesource Worldwide, Inc. v. Target 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
Payless Shoesource Worldwide, Inc. v. Target Corp., 237 F.R.D. 666, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 54419, 2006 WL 2805706 (D. Kan. 2006).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

SEBELIUS, United States Magistrate Judge.

This matter comes before the court upon plaintiffs motion to extend deadline for disclosure of expert witnesses (Doc. 48); plaintiffs motion for protective order, emergency stay, to compel production of documents, and to extend discovery (Doc. 60); and defendants’ motion to compel production of documents (Doc. 65), to which plaintiff has filed a cross-motion for protective order (Doc. 69). All these motions have been fully briefed, or the time for further briefing has expired, and are now ripe for consideration.1

1. Plaintiffs Motion to Extend Deadline for Disclosure of Expert Witnesses (Doc. 48)

Plaintiff filed this motion seeking an extension of its time to serve its expert witness disclosures pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 26(a)(2). Under the current amended scheduling order, the parties were to have served such disclosures, with respect expert witnesses on issues where the disclosing party has the burden of proof, by March 24, 2006, with disclosures regarding experts on issues where the disclosing party does not have the burden of proof due on May 9, 2006.2

Plaintiff seeks a 60-day extension of the deadline for its affirmative expert disclosures, until and including May 23, 2006. Plaintiff offers in support of its request that defendants’ responses to its first set of requests for production of documents and other things were ■ due on January 20, 2006, and that defendants did not provide their responses until March 17,2006.

Defendants oppose plaintiffs motion on the basis that plaintiff fails to demonstrate good cause for the requested extension. Defendants report that they timely served their responses to plaintiffs first set of requests for production on January 20, 2006, by making the responsive documents available for inspection and copying. Additionally, defendants point to the fact that plaintiff did not inquire about there supposed missing discovery responses until March 23, 2006 — the day before its Fed.R.Civ.P. 26(a)©-disclosures were required to be served.

The court has already observed in a prior order that defendants’ responses to plaintiffs first set of requests for production of documents and other things were timely provided on January 20, 2006.3 As such, there is little [670]*670cause found in plaintiffs motion to justify why the expert deadlines in this case should be extended.

However, as will be discussed in greater detail below, the court has decided to permit the parties an additional 60 day period to complete additional discovery. Moreover, the court has an interest in seeing that the parties are able to make a complete and comprehensive presentation of their claims so that a fully informed and fair determination can be made and a just resolution reached. To this end, the court has decided to include new deadlines for the parties’ affirmative and defensive expert disclosures as part of the new schedule for completion of discovery it will enter below. For this reason, and despite plaintiffs meager showing, the court will grant the instant motion.

II. Plaintiffs Motion for Protective Order, Emergency Stay, to Compel Production of Documents, and to Extend Discovery (Doc. 60)

Plaintiff filed this motion, on the eve of certain depositions noticed by defendants, seeking a protective order to stay those depositions, an order to compel defendants to produce documents responsive to plaintiffs second requests for production prior to such depositions being permitted, and a 60-day extension of the deadline for completion of discovery.

Defendants elected to adjourn the depositions in question to allow the parties time to fully brief the parties’ remaining discovery issues. As a consequence, plaintiffs requests for a protective order and emergency stay are now moot. The court will, therefore, turn to the remaining issues of whether defendant should be compelled to produce responses to plaintiffs second requests for production and whether the deadline for completion of discovery should be extended.

Plaintiff served its second requests for production upon defendants on March 28, 2006.4 On May 1, 2006, defendants served their responses and objections to plaintiffs requests.5 On March 22, 2006, plaintiff filed the instant motion seeking to compel additional responses.

The court first addresses whether plaintiff has satisfied the certification requirement provided in Fed.R.Civ.P. 37(a)(2)(B) and D. Kan. Rule 37.2. Defendants argue that plaintiffs motion should be denied because plaintiff does not include, within its motion, a certification that it satisfied its duty to confer, or attempt to confer, with defendants, in an attempt to resolve the issues related to defendants’ responses, prior to filing the instant motion. Because plaintiff did not file a reply to defendants’ response to the instant motion, the court does not have the benefit of plaintiffs reaction on this issue.

Fed.R.Civ.P. 37(a)(2)(B) requires that a motion to compel include “a certification that the movant has in good faith conferred or attempted to confer with the person or party failing to make the discovery in an effort to secure the information or material without court action.” 6 Thus, “[b]efore filing a motion, the movant must make reasonable efforts to confer.”7 “A ‘reasonable effort to confer’ means more than mailing or faxing a letter to the opposing party.”8 “It requires that the parties in good faith converse, confer, compare views, consult and deliberate, or in good faith attempt to do so.”9 “When a party certifies compliance with conference requirements, whether by a separate document or within the motion and supporting memoranda, it should set forth [671]*671with particularity the steps taken to resolve the dispute.”10

Plaintiffs does not include any explicit certification of its efforts to confer in either or its motion or it memorandum in support, nor did it file such a certification as a separate document. Within its memorandum, plaintiff does, however, describe the steps it had taken to confer regarding defendants’ responses to its second requests for production prior to filing its motion:

Payless set forth all these deficiencies, and others, in a May 18, 2006 letter. See May 18, 2006 letter from Cameron Garrison to Jim Steffan, attached hereto as Exhibit I and incorporated herein by reference. Target has yet to offer any reply.11

As noted above, “[a] ‘reasonable effort to confer’ means more than mailing or faxing a letter to the opposing party.”12 Moreover, it is not unreasonable that defendants had not yet offered any response to plaintiffs letter when that letter contained three and half pages of detailed objections related to defendants’ responses at issue and had been sent just four days prior to the filing of the instant motion.

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237 F.R.D. 666, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 54419, 2006 WL 2805706, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/payless-shoesource-worldwide-inc-v-target-corp-ksd-2006.