Sanctions Warranted for Defendant’s “Purposefully Sluggish” Discovery Efforts and Failure to Produce “Usable” or “Reasonably Accessible” Documents
In re Seroquel Prods. Liab. Litig., 244 F.R.D. 650 (M.D. Fla. 2007)
In this opinion, United States Magistrate Judge David A. Barker considered Plaintiffs’ motion for sanctions based on the failure of defendant AstraZeneca (“AZ”) to timely comply with various discovery obligations.
In April 2007, Plaintiffs had filed a motion to compel completed production of various items listed in the case management order (“CMO”) entered January 2007. (For a summary of the related opinion discussing the CMO, click here). The motion was denied without prejudice by the court, to allow the parties to confer “in good faith and in extenso” on the issues raised in the motion to compel. At the same time, the court scheduled an evidentiary hearing on the motion, warning the parties:
ANY PARTY WHOSE CONDUCT NECESSITATES THE EVIDENTIARY HEARING SHOULD EXPECT THE IMPOSITION OF SANCTIONS FOR ANY UNREASONABLE OR INAPPROPRIATE CONDUCT OR POSITION TAKEN WITH RESPECT TO THESE MATTERS.
(Capitals and bold in original.)
The evidentiary hearing was ultimately canceled after the parties filed a Joint Statement of Resolved Issues and Notice that a Hearing is Not Required. Plaintiffs agreed to the Joint Statement and Notice based on AZ’s representations that it would correct the faults described by Plaintiffs in their original motion to compel. When the corrections were not made, Plaintiffs filed this motion for sanctions.