Caraballo v. City of New York
- Edgardo Ramos
- 1:18-cv-10335
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 5
In Caraballo v. City of New York, Judge Ramos ordered a discovery conference and required the parties to meet and confer, without deciding the requested production.
David Caraballo and the defendants, including the City of New York and individual defendants, were required to participate in a discovery conference and meet and confer beforehand.
What happened
In Caraballo v. City of New York, David Caraballo’s attorney asked the court to address disputes about information and documents requested from the defendants.
Caraballo sought disciplinary and investigation files involving individual defendants, police officers’ photographs and memo books, original digital files of photographs depicting his injuries, and information about NYPD-sanctioned employee fights. The letter said the defendants had refused some requests or agreed to provide only limited materials.
Judge Edgardo Ramos did not decide whether the defendants had to produce the requested materials. He ordered the parties to appear for a conference on April 2 at 10:30 a.m. and to meet and discuss the discovery disputes beforehand.
The detailed version
- Caraballo v. City of New York · No. 1:18-cv-10335
- Edgardo Ramos
- Mar. 2, 2020
Background
The document is a letter from Gregory P. Mouton, Jr., who represented plaintiff David Caraballo. The letter asked the court to hold a pre-motion conference and direct the defendants to provide documents and information that Caraballo had requested in discovery. The letter stated that meeting and discussing the disputes informally would be futile because, according to Caraballo’s attorney, the City of New York routinely refused certain discovery in civil-rights cases without a court directive.
Discovery Requests
The requested materials included:
- Unredacted indexes and summaries from the Civilian Complaint Review Board, the Civilian Complaint Database, the Internal Affairs Bureau, the Department Advocate’s Office, and the NYPD Chief of Department’s Office. - Underlying files from disciplinary investigations involving the individual defendants, including files from the Department Advocate’s Office and the Chief of Department’s Office. - Recent, labeled photographs of the individual defendants. - Original digital files of photographs depicting Caraballo’s injuries, rather than thumbnails embedded in other documents. - Unredacted memo-book entries for the individual defendants’ work tour during which Caraballo was arrested. - Information and documents concerning investigations into NYPD employee “smoker” fights, including investigations involving individual defendants.
The letter said the defendants had refused to provide some underlying files, offered only closing reports for certain investigations, and disputed the relevance of information about the employee fights. The letter also stated that at least one individual defendant, Mangano, had participated in one of those fights.
Court’s Action
Judge Edgardo Ramos endorsed the submission and ordered the parties to appear for a conference on April 2 at 10:30 a.m. He also ordered the parties to meet and confer about the discovery disputes before that conference.
The opinion text does not state that the court granted or denied any specific request to compel production. It therefore does not resolve whether any of the requested documents or information must be produced. The ruling is a discovery-management order rather than a decision on the underlying claims.
Read the full 5-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.