Murphy v. Minnesota Department of Human Services

Background

The district court reviewed cross-objections to Magistrate Judge Becky R. Thorson’s December 6, 2019 order on the defendant’s request for relief concerning the plaintiffs’ late production of more than 10,600 pages of third-party documents. The plaintiffs produced the documents in June and August 2019, about one year after fact discovery closed in June 2018.

The defendant sought sanctions under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 37. The plaintiffs argued that their informal collection of third-party documents was not controlled by the fact-discovery deadlines and that the production was required by Rule 26(e), which addresses supplementation of discovery responses.

Magistrate Judge Thorson granted in part and denied in part the defendant’s request. She ordered that neither party could use the documents collected after the discovery cutoff at trial unless the district judge permitted their use for impeachment.

Objections

The plaintiffs did not challenge the general prohibition on admitting the documents into evidence. They objected that the prohibition was too broad and asked that the court retain discretion to allow a party to use a document to refresh a witness’s recollection. The defendant did not oppose that request, although she stated that she did not waive other objections to the fact or manner of using the documents.

The plaintiffs also sought clarification concerning documents relating to Named Plaintiff Dionne Swanson that were gathered and produced after June 15, 2018. The defendant agreed that documents created after that date could constitute proper supplementation but argued that documents created before June 15, 2018 and produced later were subject to the December order.

The defendant separately objected to the restriction on her use of the documents. She argued that Rules 37(b)(2) and 37(c)(1) did not authorize a sanction against a party that had complied with its discovery obligations. The plaintiffs responded that the Federal Rules allowed the court to issue just orders and supported excluding the late-produced documents from trial for both parties.

Court’s Analysis

The district court applied the deferential standard governing objections to a magistrate judge’s nondispositive order. Under that standard, the court could modify or set aside a portion of the order only if it was clearly erroneous or contrary to law.

The court held that Magistrate Judge Thorson’s decision to prohibit both parties from admitting the late-produced documents was neither clearly erroneous nor contrary to law. It explained that a district court has broad discretion to fashion an appropriate remedy or sanction and found nothing in the Federal Rules or relevant case law preventing a remedy from applying equally to both parties when the remedy is just and furthers the interests of justice.

The court granted the plaintiffs’ unopposed request to preserve discretion at trial to allow use of a document to refresh a witness’s recollection. It also clarified that a document relating to Dionne Swanson that was created before June 15, 2018 but not produced until 2019 was covered by the December order.

Disposition

Judge Donovan W. Frank granted the plaintiffs’ objection insofar as the court would retain discretion to decide at trial whether a party could properly use a late-produced document to refresh a witness’s recollection. The court denied the defendant’s objection. It affirmed Magistrate Judge Thorson’s December 6, 2019 order with the modification that the documents could be used only if the district judge permitted their use for impeachment or to refresh a witness’s recollection.