Pedrick v. Deerland Corp.

20 Pa. D. & C.4th 543, 1992 Pa. Dist. & Cnty. Dec. LEXIS 12
CourtPennsylvania Court of Common Pleas, Montgomery County
DecidedOctober 29, 1992
Docketno. 89-20398
StatusPublished

This text of 20 Pa. D. & C.4th 543 (Pedrick v. Deerland Corp.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Pennsylvania Court of Common Pleas, Montgomery County primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Pedrick v. Deerland Corp., 20 Pa. D. & C.4th 543, 1992 Pa. Dist. & Cnty. Dec. LEXIS 12 (Pa. Super. Ct. 1992).

Opinion

LOWE, J.,

This matter is on appeal before the Superior Court of Pennsylvania following the September 8,1992 entry of judgment in favor of plaintiffs. Plaintiffs are adult individuals who at all times pertinent resided at the same address. Defendant is a corporation licensed and authorized to conduct business at all times pertinent to this matter. The alleged incident occurred on December 14,1987 when defendant’s employees were removing debris from the roof of a building where a fire had previously occurred. Plaintiff John Pedrick, who was in the employ of United Parcel Service, had completed a delivery when he was struck and injured by a large piece of debris thrown from the building by defendant’s employees.

A complaint was filed with this court on August 24, 1990. In the course of discovery, plaintiffs served defendant with interrogatories asking defendant to provide plaintiffs with information regarding the identity and location of defendant’s employees present at the site of the incident on the date in question for purposes of depo[544]*544sition. When defendant failed to comply with the request, plaintiffs filed a motion to compel discovery on November 25,1991 to which defendant failed to file a timely response. On January 16, 1992, the court granted plaintiffs’ motion and ordered defendant to produce defendant’s employees for a deposition or, in the case that defendant was unable to produce said individuals, defendant was to provide to plaintiffs the current addresses (if known), the last known addresses, the social security numbers of the individuals, and the operator’s license number of the individuals (if known). Moreover, the court ordered defendant to provide full, complete, responsive, and verified answers to all interrogatories which plaintiffs had served upon defendant within 20 days of the order or risk further sanctions.

In the following months, defendant failed to comply with said order, producing only defendant’s president Peter Borowski at a deposition on March 16, 1992. Inasmuch as Mr. Borowski was not present at the site of the accident, plaintiffs were unable to attain the necessary information for purposes of preparing the matter for trial. However, upon learning from Mr. Borowski during the deposition that the requested information may be contained inside employee files in defendant’s possession, plaintiffs filed a request for discovery of said documents on March 19, 1992. Again, defendant failed to respond.

On June 2,1992 plaintiffs filed a motion for sanctions and judgment in plaintiffs’ favor as well as a motion to compel production of employee files. Again, defendant failed to file a timely response to plaintiffs’ motion to compel. On July 2, 1992 the court granted said motion and ordered defendant to produce said documents or risk [545]*545further sanctions. On August 25, 1992 defendant filed a motion for reconsideration of said court order in which defendant alleged lack of knowledge of the present location of the requested employee files. Furthermore, defendant agreed to allow plaintiffs to enter the premises and search for said documents but admitted that the files were not categorized and that any search may constitute a blind search. On August 31, 1992, upon consideration of defendant’s motion and plaintiffs’ answer, said motion for reconsideration was denied.

On September 8, 1992, after hearing and consideration of arguments submitted by both parties, this court granted plaintiffs’ motion for sanctions and entered judgment for plaintiffs. At the time of the hearing, defendant had not complied with the court’s order to produce the requested documents. On September 8, 1992, Rhonda Hill Wilson, Esquire, withdrew her appearance for defendant. On the same day, Thomas A. Brophy, Esquire entered his appearance for defendant and filed a motion for reconsideration of the court’s ruling of September 8, 1992. On September 29, 1992, the court denied defendant’s motion for reconsideration. On October 5, 1992, defendant served a notice of appeal.

The facts to be considered when imposing a discovery sanction are enunciated in Steinfurth v. LaManna, 404 Pa. Super. 384, 388-89, 590 A.2d 1286, 1288 (1991). The first factor in determining the applicability of a discovery sanction is the degree of prejudice caused to the opposing party as well as the curability of the prejudice. The second factor is the presence of bad faith which can be inferred from the merits of the opponent’s excuse for failing to comply with the discovery order. The third factor considers the number of discovery violations.

[546]*546Instantly, an application of those considerations to the facts of the case justifies the imposition of sanctions. First, defendant caused incurable prejudice to plaintiff’s legal interests by failing to comply with the order of January 16, 1992. This order compelled defendant to produce at a minimum the last known addresses and social security numbers of Martin Coe, Robert Bums, William Sullivan, Mack Westlove, Mark Mayer, and Peter Borowski. Defendant produced Peter Borowski for a deposition on March 16,1992 but failed to produce the social security numbers of the other individuals. It is also in dispute whether defendant produced the last known address of all individuals. In addition, no information whatsoever was provided on Mark Mayer.

The location of defendant’s employees was imperative to plaintiffs’ case since those individuals were present at the time of the accident and were alleged to be implicated in the events leading to its occurrence. (See plaintiffs’ interrogatories addressed to defendant, exhibit “C”.) Defendant’s unwillingness to comply with plaintiffs’ various discovery requests as well as its failure to abide by two court orders directing it to fulfill said requests have been well documented. This conduct has incurably prejudiced plaintiffs’ case. The prejudice is caused as a result of the passage of time from the filing date (12/14/89) which has made locating defendant’s employees an unfair and extremely difficult endeavor; moreover, even if those employees could now be deposed, their memories would undoubtedly be diminished by the passage of time.

Second, the defendant’s conduct evidences bad faith which is illustrated by defendant’s non-meritorious excuses for its conduct.

As stated above, defendant advanced essentially one reason for its failure to comply with plaintiffs’ discovery [547]*547requests, namely that defendant alleges to have supplied plaintiffs with as much information as is available on William Sullivan, Mack Westlove, Martin Coe, and Robert Bums. The court’s order of January 16, 1992 compelled defendant to provide at a minimum the individual’s last known addresses as well as their social security numbers.

An evaluation of defendant’s compliance reveals that while it arguably provided the last known addresses of four individuals, a claim disputed by plaintiffs, it clearly failed to provide Mark Mayer’s address; moreover, defendant never provided the social security numbers of the individuals in question as required by the order. However, this court may have been disinclined to find bad faith on the part of defendant had there been other signs evidencing good faith.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Isenberger v. Schumann
203 A.2d 136 (Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, 1964)
Steinfurth v. LaManna
590 A.2d 1286 (Superior Court of Pennsylvania, 1991)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
20 Pa. D. & C.4th 543, 1992 Pa. Dist. & Cnty. Dec. LEXIS 12, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/pedrick-v-deerland-corp-pactcomplmontgo-1992.