Lopez v. Minnesota Vikings Football Club, LLC
- Paul Magnuson
- 0:17-cv-01179
- U.S. District Court · District of Minnesota
- 3
In Lopez v. Minnesota Vikings Football Club, LLC, Judge Leung granted the City Defendants’ motion to compel discovery and ordered Lopez to produce information and pay $2,965.
Plaintiff Anastacio Lemus Lopez was ordered to provide discovery and pay $2,965 to the City Defendants. The City Defendants obtained the compelled discovery and fee award. The order also canceled the scheduled hearing and warned of possible sanctions for noncompliance.
What happened
In Lopez v. Minnesota Vikings Football Club, LLC, the City Defendants asked the court to require Plaintiff Anastacio Lemus Lopez to provide information and documents during the case’s fact-gathering process. Lopez did not oppose the motion.
The court granted the motion. It ordered Lopez to provide contact information for two witnesses within three days; produce paystubs, purchase information, medical invoices, and complete responses to document requests within seven days; and pay the City Defendants $2,965 for costs and reasonable attorney fees. The court also canceled the scheduled hearing.
Magistrate Judge Tony N. Leung warned that failing to comply could lead to sanctions, including costs, fines, limits on evidence, striking pleadings, dismissal, or default judgment. The order concerned discovery and did not decide the underlying claims.
The detailed version
- Lopez v. Minnesota Vikings Football Club, LLC · No. 0:17-cv-01179
- Paul Magnuson
- Aug. 20, 2018
Background
The City Defendants—Janee Harteau, the City of Minneapolis, Russell Cragin, Anthony Rodin, Michael Grahn, Stephen McCarty, Gerald Moore, and Michael Angelo Fossum—filed a motion to compel discovery. A motion to compel asks the court to require a party to provide information or documents requested during litigation. Lopez filed no opposition.
The court noted that its Second Amended Pretrial Scheduling Order required fact discovery to be completed by September 1, 2018. The court had previously found good cause for a limited extension of pretrial deadlines and had cautioned Lopez’s counsel that it would not view future extension requests favorably.
Ruling
The court granted the City Defendants’ Motion to Compel. It ordered Lopez to provide the addresses and contact information for Kayla and Kevin Herrera, who had accompanied him to the Minnesota Vikings game where the alleged events occurred, within three days of the order.
The court also ordered Lopez, within seven days, to produce:
- Two years of paystubs preceding December 1, 2016; - Complete and unredacted purchase information related to production marked Amended Production000001-02; - Medical invoices for all damages claimed in the action; and - Complete responses, without objection, to the City Defendants’ second set of requests for production of documents, served May 1, 2018.
Fees and Other Orders
The court ordered Lopez to pay the City Defendants $2,965 for attorney fees, costs, and expenses incurred in bringing the motion. It found that amount reasonable, noting that Lopez had not objected. The court struck the August 22, 2018, motion hearing from its calendar and left prior consistent orders in effect.
The court stated that failure to comply with the order or another prior consistent order could result in appropriate remedies or sanctions. The listed possibilities included costs, fines, attorney fees and disbursements, waiver of objections, limits on witnesses or evidence, striking pleadings, dismissal with prejudice, and entry of all or part of a default judgment.
The order was signed by Magistrate Judge Tony N. Leung. It addressed discovery compliance and related fees, not the merits of the underlying claims.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.