Levi Strauss & Co. v. Connolly
- Virginia Demarchi
- 5:22-cv-04106
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 5
In Levi Strauss & Co. v. Connolly, Magistrate Judge Demarchi ordered Connolly to provide discovery and deemed Levi Strauss’s admission requests admitted.
David James Connolly must provide the ordered discovery, while Levi Strauss & Co. receives the required documents, interrogatory answers, and admissions deemed admitted.
What happened
In Levi Strauss & Co. v. Connolly, Levi Strauss asked the court to address David James Connolly’s failure to properly respond to requests for documents, written questions, and admissions.
The court found that Connolly’s responses were late or incomplete, that he had not produced responsive documents, and that he had not answered several written questions under oath. The court also found that his 74 requests for admission were deemed admitted because he did not timely respond.
Magistrate Judge Demarchi ordered Connolly to produce responsive documents, provide written statements if he had no responsive documents, and answer all written questions separately and fully under oath. The court also ruled that Levi Strauss’s requests for admission were deemed admitted.
The detailed version
- Levi Strauss & Co. v. Connolly · No. 5:22-cv-04106
- Virginia Demarchi
- July 13, 2023
Background
Levi Strauss & Co. served David James Connolly with requests for production of documents, interrogatories (written questions), and requests for admissions on December 19, 2022. After Levi Strauss complained that Connolly had not responded, Connolly filed a document that the court treated as his discovery responses. Levi Strauss then filed a discovery-dispute letter challenging the adequacy and timeliness of those responses. The court resolved the dispute without a hearing.
Connolly did not deny that he refused to follow the court’s required process for resolving the discovery dispute. He referred to his earlier responses and said that he had answered questions where possible. He also pointed to information available on a website or from other public sources.
Court’s Analysis
The court held that Connolly’s responses to the document requests did not comply with Rule 34 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. The responses were untimely, did not clearly identify specific objections, and did not clearly state which documents would be produced. Connolly had not produced any documents. The court ruled that the public availability of documents did not relieve him of the obligation to identify, collect, and produce responsive documents within his possession, custody, or control. Because Connolly did not timely object and offered no excuse, the court ruled that any objections to the document requests were waived.
For the interrogatories, the court found that some responses fairly answered the questions, but Connolly had not fairly answered Interrogatories Nos. 4–9, 11, 13–14, and 16. He also had not answered any interrogatory under oath. The court ruled that any untimely objections to the interrogatories were waived. It explained that Connolly could not satisfy his discovery obligations by referring to affidavits or other filings. For Interrogatories Nos. 5, 6, 13, and 14, he could choose to identify business records instead of providing answers only if finding the answers in those records would impose substantially the same burden on Levi Strauss as on him. Any answers had to be made under oath or in an unsworn declaration meeting the requirements of 28 U.S.C. § 1746.
Levi Strauss served 74 requests for admissions. Connolly did not dispute that he failed to respond within the required 30 days. Under Rule 36, an admission request is deemed admitted when the responding party does not timely serve an answer or objection. The court therefore ruled that Levi Strauss’s requests for admissions were deemed admitted.
Order
The court ordered Connolly to:
- Produce all documents responsive to Levi Strauss’s document requests by July 31,
- 2. Serve by July 21, 2023, a written response clearly stating if he had no responsive documents for a particular request.
- Answer all of Levi Strauss’s interrogatories separately and fully, in writing, and under oath by August 4, 2023.
The court also ordered that Levi Strauss’s requests for admissions were deemed admitted. It directed Connolly to provide discovery responses and documents to Levi Strauss’s counsel rather than filing them with the court. The court noted that Connolly was proceeding without a lawyer and encouraged him to seek assistance through the court’s available resources.
Read the full 5-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.