Forte Construction Corp. v. Distinctive General Contracting LLC

Background

The parties submitted a joint letter asking for an extension of deposition deadlines and the court’s intervention in disputes about topics for a deposition under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 30(b)(6), which allows a party to question an organization through a designated representative. Although the letter was not labeled a motion to compel or a motion for a protective order, the court treated it as a pre-motion request for a protective order seeking to strike deposition topics.

The court noted that the parties’ letter was two pages but included a 10-page attachment containing substantive arguments. The court said this circumvented its three-page limit for letter motions, but ruled on each dispute.

Deposition-topic rulings

- Topic 3—Forte’s compensation from the project owner: The court granted the request to strike this topic. It agreed that the relevant damages calculation was the difference between the cost of completing the subcontract work and the unpaid subcontract balance, rather than Forte’s compensation from the owner of the overall project. - Topic 8—Surface Solutions’ bids: The court denied the request to strike this topic. It found that the bids could be relevant to whether the scope of work changed and affected Forte’s damages, even though later signed subcontracts superseded earlier representations. - Topic 10—Forte and the defendant’s negotiations: The court granted the request to strike this topic. It found that the subcontract controlled and that Forte’s representative’s understanding of unambiguous terms was irrelevant because the defendant did not identify an ambiguity. - Topic 11—Forte and Surface Solutions’ negotiations: The court granted in part and denied in part the request to strike this topic. The topic was limited to whether the scope of work differed, whether there were related price differences, when the Surface Solutions subcontract was made compared with termination of the defendant’s subcontract, and permissible questions related to Topic 8. The court found no reason that the timeline or completion date of the work was relevant. - Topic 19—Performance of the concrete finishing: The court granted in part and denied in part the request to strike this topic. The topic was limited to the extent of the completion work Surface Solutions performed and Forte’s payments for that work. The court excluded questions about the timing of completion and found it overly burdensome to require Forte to educate a representative about all details of Surface Solutions’ work methods. - Topic 35—Surface Solutions’ schedule and timeline: The court granted in part and denied in part the request to strike this topic. Questions about the agreed or actual completion date were excluded, but questions about when the Surface Solutions subcontract was executed and when Surface Solutions began working were allowed. - Topic 39—Surface Solutions’ out-of-scope work: The court granted the request to strike this topic. It found the information irrelevant to a dispute concerning the defendant’s termination for in-scope work and completion costs. The court also stated that out-of-scope work should not be included in Forte’s damages, if any.

Deposition deadline

The court granted the parties’ request to extend the deposition deadline. Although the parties requested an extension from March 21, 2025, to April 25, 2025, the court set May 7, 2025, because of the short delay in resolving the disputes. The court warned that no further extensions, regardless of circumstance, would be granted. It directed the Clerk of Court to close Docket No. 40.