Opinion
4:21-cv-05808-HSG (KAW)
05-21-2024
RONALD RAYNALDO, et al., Plaintiffs, v. AMERICAN HONDA MOTOR CO., INC., Defendant.
ORDER TERMINATING 5/17/124 JOINT DISCOVERY LETTER RE PLAINTIFFS' REQUESTS FOR PRODUCTION [DISCOVERY LETTER NO. 2] RE: DKT. NO. 103
KANDIS A. WESTMORE UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE
On May 17, 2024, the parties filed a joint discovery letter regarding Plaintiffs' requests for production of documents. (Joint Letter, Dkt. No. 103.) As Defendant points out, and Plaintiffs acknowledge, the format of the letter does not comply with the Court's standing order. Id. at 1 n. 1, 3. While Plaintiffs contend that the letter does not comply due to the Court's joint letter page limit, if the parties require additional pages to comply with the Court's standing order, they may request them after they have sufficiently met and conferred to narrow the scope of their dispute.
Regardless, upon a cursory review, the letter pertains to the general scope of discovery, and whether Defendant may unilaterally limit the scope of Plaintiffs' requests to the allegedly defective F-CAN system. (See Joint Letter at 1-3.) To aid the parties in their meet and confer efforts, the Court observes that Defendant appears to be improperly narrowing the scope of the requests, because the alleged parasitic drain defect may be found in battery investigation documents that do not include the explicit F-CAN search terms. (See, e.g., Joint Letter at 2, Ex. 1 at 10.) The Court also notes that, absent an agreement from the propounding party, under Rule 34(b)(2)(B), responsive documents must either be simultaneously produced with the responses, or the responses must state a reasonable but certain date on which all responsive documents will be produced. Fed.R.Civ.P. 34(b)(2)(B). Merely promising to produce documents at an uncertain, future date does not satisfy one's discovery obligation. (See Joint Letter, Ex. 1 at 10.) Finally, the Court implores Defendant to be more judicious when asserting objections to discovery requests, as neither of the exemplar requests appear to be vague, ambiguous, overbroad, unduly burdensome, or otherwise run afoul of Rule 26. The fact that Defendant contends that it is “not aware of a ‘Parasitic Drain Defect' as defined by Plaintiffs” is not well taken, as Defendant is well aware of Plaintiffs' allegations. (See Joint Letter, Ex. 1 at 9-10, 69.) Finally, the Court does not tolerate “general objections” to discovery. See Springer v. Gen. Atomics Aeronautical Sys., 16-cv-2331-BTM-KSC, 2018 WL 490745 (S.D. Cal. Jan. 18, 2018). Thus, no discovery responses served in matters pending before this Court should contain any such objections, whether as a preface to discovery responses or repeated verbatim in multiple responses.
Accordingly, the parties are ordered to meet and confer to further narrow the scope of their current dispute. In doing so, they are directed to review Paragraph 9 of the Northern District Guidelines for Professional Conduct, which pertain to discovery, as well as the Northern District E-Discovery (ESI) Guidelines, which are available at: https://cand.uscourts.gov/rules/northem-district-guidelines/. If the parties are unable to entirely resolve their dispute, they are ordered to file another joint discovery letter. If they require additional pages, they shall file a stipulation requesting same. To the extent that the parties have a dispute regarding ESI and search terms, that dispute may be addressed in a joint letter separate from general requests for production of documents.
This resolves Dkt. No. 103.
IT IS SO ORDERED.