Opinion
No. C 03-1180 SBA (MEJ).
January 22, 2007
ORDER DEEMING RFAs ADMITTED AS TO CERTAIN PLAINTIFFS
Before the Court is the parties' joint discovery dispute letter, filed November 17, 2006, regarding defendant Cintas Corporation's First Set of Requests for Admissions (RFAs) ("Joint Letter"). (Doc. # 585.) On April 14, 2006, Cintas served its RFAs on 483 plaintiffs in this action. At the request of plaintiffs' counsel, Cintas granted an extension to respond to the RFAs until June 19, 2006. After plaintiffs served blanket objections on behalf of all 483 plaintiffs on June 21, Cintas and plaintiffs' counsel entered into a stipulation, which provided that plaintiffs would have until September 8, 2006 to serve answers to each RFA. The stipulation further provided:
To "answer" an individual RFA, the plaintiff shall specifically admit the matter or specifically deny the matter or set forth in detail the reason why the answering plaintiff cannot truthfully admit or deny the matter, and shall set forth such other information as is more fully described in and required by Rule 36 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure as to an answer to an RFA.
An objection or objections without an "answer" to any RFA or Interrogatory does not qualify as an "answer" to such RFA or Interrogatory under this Stipulation. By this Stipulation, and in any event, Cintas does not agree to an extension pursuant to which any plaintiff could serve an objection to any RFA or Interrogatory that is not accompanied by an "answer" to that RFA or Interrogatory.
(Joint Letter at 1-2.) The parties subsequently extended this stipulation to September 15, 2006.
On September 15, 2006, on behalf of 216 plaintiffs, plaintiffs' counsel served the following statement as to each RFA:
Plaintiff can neither admit nor deny this Request as plaintiffs' counsel has made, and continues to make, a reasonable, extensive and good faith investigation into the matters addressed by this Request, and the information currently available is insufficient to allow this Request to be admitted or denied.
(Joint Letter at 2.)
On November 8, 2006, Cintas moved that the Court rule the matters in the RFAs to be admitted. (Doc. #553.) On November 14, 2006, the Court found Cintas' RFAs relevant, especially given the parties' July 13, 2006 stipulation and the apparent compliance with the request by over 200 plaintiffs. (Doc. #556.) However, the Court found that deeming the requests admitted for those optin plaintiffs that had yet to respond might effectively dismiss certain plaintiffs and permitted them until December 14 to comply with the requests. Id. The Court warned that failure to respond by that date may result in the imposition of sanctions, including deeming the requests admitted.
In the Joint Letter, Cintas states that 93 plaintiffs have still not provided responses to the RFAs. Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 36, the failure to timely respond to requests for admissions results in automatic admissions of the matters requested. F.T.C. v. Medicor LLC, 217 F. Supp. 1048, 1053 (C.D. Cal. 2002). Here, Cintas stipulated to three extensions of the due date and the Court gave the plaintiffs an additional 30 days to respond. Despite having over eight months to provide responses, 93 plaintiffs have failed to do so. Their failure to do so prejudices Cintas.
Accordingly, pursuant to Rule 36, the Court deems the RFAs admitted as to the 93 plaintiffs listed in Exhibit A of the parties' Joint Letter. So as to avoid any future disputes that these plaintiffs have somehow responded through the June 21, 2006 or September 15, 2006 blanket objections, the Court strikes those objections as to the 93 plaintiffs.
Provided, however, that this Order shall not apply to any of the 93 above-referenced plaintiffs whose claims may have been voluntarily dismissed under Judge Armstrong's January 22, 2007 Order (Doc. #592).
IT IS SO ORDERED.