Opinion
No. C 03-04417 MHP ARB.
February 10, 2005
MEMORANDUM ORDER
A resident of Minnesota, plaintiff Beverly Schultz rode a commuter train during a visit to San Francisco. She has brought this action, founded on diversity jurisdiction, against defendants Does 1 through 50 and Roes 1 through 50 of the San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District (collectively "BARTD"), alleging that the acceleration of a BARTD train caused her personal injuries. Following disposition of an unopposed motion for summary judgment, plaintiff moved for leave to amend and submitted a draft Second Amended Complaint which included seventeen causes of action, including new claims under the Americans with Disabilities Act ("ADA"), the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, strict liability, and numerous violations of California state law. At a hearing on September 27, 2004, this court instructed plaintiff to significantly pare down her complaint to eliminate nonexistent and erroneous causes of action. Plaintiff timely submitted a revised Second Amendment Complaint. Presently before the court is defendant's motion to strike those portions of the revised complaint which deviate from the court's instructions. Having considered the parties' arguments and submissions, and for the reasons set forth below, the court rules as follows. BACKGROUND
All facts are taken from plaintiffs' Second Amended Complaint unless otherwise noted.
Beverly Shultz alleges that she sustained a broken hip when she was knocked to the floor of a San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District ("BARTD") train as it departed a station. In her First Amended Complaint, plaintiff alleged causes of action for negligence, premises liability, willful failure to warn, dangerous condition of public property, product liability, pendent jurisdiction, negligent infliction of emotional distress, and respondeat superior. On February 23, 2004, defendant filed a motion for partial summary judgment as to plaintiff's products liability cause of action and plaintiff's claims for punitive damages and attorney's fees. The motion was granted by the court as unopposed on April 29, 2004.
On a motion for leave to amend, plaintiff submitted a draft Second Amended Complaint which included new claims under the Americans with Disabilities Act ("ADA"), the Rehabilitation Act, strict liability, and numerous violations of California state law. At a hearing on September 27, 2004, this court instructed plaintiff to redraft the complaint, paring it down to its essence as a negligence claim founded on diversity jurisdiction and eliminating erroneous causes of action such as "pendant jurisdiction" and "respondeat superior." Plaintiff timely filed a redrafted Second Amended complaint which pleads six causes of action: violations of Title II of the ADA, common carrier negligence, negligence, premises liability, willful failure to warn, and dangerous condition of public property. Defendant has moved to strike those portions of the complaint which do not relate to a negligence theory of the case; namely, facts and causes of action related to disability and malicious conduct.
LEGAL STANDARD
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(f) permits a court to strike from a pleading "any insufficient defense or any redundant, immaterial, impertinent, or scandalous matter." Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(f). "[T]he function of a 12(f) motion to strike is to avoid the expenditure of time and money that must arise from litigating spurious issues by dispensing with those issues prior to trial. . . ." Sidney-Vinstein v. A.H. Robins Co., 697 F.2d 880, 885 (9th Cir. 1983). "Immaterial matter is that which has no essential or important relationship to the claim for relief or the defenses being pleaded." Fantasy, Inc. v. Fogerty, 984 F.2d 1524, 1527 (9th Cir. 1993) (quoting 5 Charles A. Wright Arthur R. Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure § 1382, at 706-707 (1990)). "Impertinent matter consists of statements that do not pertain, and are not necessary, to the issues in question." Id. at 1527 (quoting Wright Miller at 711). Motions to strike are generally denied unless it is clear that matter to be stricken could have "no possible bearing on the subject matter of litigation." See LeDuc v. Kentucky Cent. Life Ins. Co., 814 F.Supp. 820, 830 (N.D.Cal. 1992). The tendency towards denials of motions to strike accords with the general rule that "a case should be tried on the proofs rather than the pleadings." Rennie Laughlin, Inc. v. Chrysler Corp., 242 F.2d 208, 213 (9th Cir. 1957).
DISCUSSION
Rather than argue for disposition of plaintiff's controverted causes of action on the merits, defendant has moved to strike portions of the Second Amended Complaint based on plaintiff's purported defiance of this court's instructions on September 27, 2004. Though significantly reduced from its former incarnation, the new Second Amended Complaint retained causes of action arising under the ADA, willful failure to warn, and dangerous condition of public property. Defendant has moved to strike these portions of the complaint because they do not relate to a negligence theory of the case, which this court identified as the essence of plaintiff's action.
Defendant has given this court no grounds for striking portions of plaintiff's complaint on the basis that plaintiff's causes of action are "redundant, immaterial, impertinent, or scandalous."See Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(f). Claims of a violation of the ADA, as well as related factual allegations, bear a relationship to plaintiff's other claims of personal injury, and defendant has argued no basis for this court to find them otherwise immaterial or impertinent. See Fogerty, 984 F.2d at 1527. Similarly, plaintiff's allegation of willful failure to warn, properly understood as a single count of premises liability, may be vulnerable to attack on a dispositive motion, but on the face of the pleadings it is not irrelevant or impertinent in the context of the litigation. LeDuc, 814 F.Supp. at 830.
Furthermore, this court finds no basis for penalizing plaintiff, through the vehicle of a Rule 12(f) motion, for her interpretation of this court's order at the September 27, 2004 hearing. In accordance with this court's instructions, plaintiff eliminated several erroneous causes of action formerly included in her draft Second Amended Complaint and pared down her complaint to more manageable dimensions. Rule 12(f) is not an appropriate vehicle for disposition of the merits of plaintiff's remaining causes of action, nor for sanctioning her lawyer for his inadequacies to date.
At the hearing on this motion, this court instructed the parties to file motions for summary judgment by March 14, 2005. A hearing on the motion will be held on April 18, 2005 at 2:00 p.m. In her opposition to defendant's motion for summary judgment, plaintiff should enumerate the discovery sought pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56(f). Until disposition of this case on summary judgment, defendant need not answer plaintiff's burdensome discovery requests regarding the BART system's compliance with the ADA. Defendant's discovery into plaintiff's medical history should be limited to written discovery. The parties' early settlement conference, scheduled for March 3, 2005 will be deferred, as plaintiff failed to file a letter agreeing to further pare down her complaint to manageable proportions within the ten day period established by this court.
Plaintiff's attorney asserted in court that his client has signed and dispatched releases for her medical records, eliminating the need for depositions of her treating physicians.
CONCLUSION
For the foregoing reasons, the court hereby DENIES defendant's motion to strike portions of plaintiff's Second Amended Complaint.
IT IS SO ORDERED.