Opinion
05 Civ. 2134 (MHD).
July 20, 2006
MEMORANDUM ORDER
Defendant seeks an extended adjournment of the now-passed due date for its designation of a liability expert and the submission of a report from that expert. (See July 19, 2006 letter to the Court from Diane Westwood Wilson, Esq.). The application is in large measure denied.
Plaintiff provided her liability expert report on June 21, 2006. Defendant's due date, under a March 15, 2006 scheduling order, was July 3, 2006. It was only on July 19, 2006 that defendant's counsel made a letter application to adjourn her client's expert-witness designation until the resolution of an as-yet unmade summary judgment motion, which is due on July 31, 2006. Counsel proffers no specific explanation for the delay in seeking relief other than the fact that she herself did not see plaintiff's expert report until June 26, and her client and its insurance carrier apparently have not decided whether to retain an expert. In justifying postponing any further expert discovery until after the Rule 56 motion, she also cites cost savings.
The explanation even for that delay is entirely unclear. Counsel simply refers to the fact that she switched firms at some point although she remains counsel of record for defendant.
Counsel refers at length to the timing of an independent medical examination of plaintiff, but this is simply irrelevant to the scheduling of liability expert reports.
Defendant fails to justify the untimely nature of its request (hesitation by a client in deciding whether to hire an expert is no excuse). We note furthermore that defendant's proposal would unfairly prejudice plaintiff since she has already hired an expert and thus presumably incurred resultant expenses, whereas defendant now seeks to avoid the equivalent expenses while it pursues a summary judgment motion. In short, we deny the application.
We are nonetheless reluctant to hold defendant to the full consequences of its own delay, particularly in view of the short amount of time that was given it to prepare a report in response to plaintiff's liability expert. Accordingly we extend the defendant's time to designate a liability expert and provide a report until August 3, 2006. This additional short period reflects the fact that defendant has been in possession of plaintiff's report for many weeks and should not be allowed to delay matters any further.
This adjustment will not affect the due date for any summary judgment motion, which remains July 31, 2006. If such a motion is filed, we will postpone deposition discovery of experts until the motion is resolved. If no motion is filed, we will set a new and brief schedule for such depositions.