Powers v. Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center

Nature of the Filing

The provided text is a letter motion submitted by the defendants for a pre-motion discovery conference under Local Civil Rule 37.2 and Judge Schofield’s individual rules. It is not a court order and does not state that the court ruled on any of the requested relief.

Discovery Requests and Deposition Notices

The defendants sought a protective order, which is a court order limiting or relieving a party from responding to discovery. They asked to be relieved from responding to two sets of requests for admissions served on October 16 and October 23, 2020, and to quash three notices for depositions of organizational witnesses under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 30(b)(6).

The defendants argued that the requests for admissions did not satisfy the formal requirements of Rule 36 and improperly sought broad, cumulative, duplicative, disproportionate, or previously obtained information. They said the first set contained 44 items concerning an ablation machine and that information responsive to an earlier interrogatory had already been provided.

The defendants also argued that the amended deposition notices disregarded the court’s October 8, 2020, order. According to the letter, that order required the parties to narrow topics for an information-technology witness and required a revised notice limited to topics relevant to the claims. The defendants contended that the notices instead sought medical information and information about the substance of records that the court had directed the plaintiff to obtain through depositions of fact witnesses. They asked the court to find that the plaintiff had forfeited the right to take the organizational deposition and to quash the notices.

Ethicon Subpoena

The defendants separately asked the court to quash an amended subpoena to testify and produce documents served on non-party Ethicon, Inc. The subpoena set a deposition for November 2, 2020, and was served on October 23, 2020. The defendants argued that the notice was insufficient and did not allow enough time for them or Ethicon to seek relief under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 45 or to meet and confer.

The defendants further argued that no claim asserted that the ablation device used by Dr. Sofocleous and manufactured by Ethicon was defective. They contended that the subpoena sought publicly available information, information obtainable from Dr. Sofocleous, and broad information about his relationship with Ethicon. They also argued that Ethicon had no witness with personal knowledge of Ms. Zak’s medical condition or the liver ablation performed by Dr. Sofocleous on April 10, 2017.

Requested Sanctions and Fees

The defendants requested sanctions and an award of attorney’s fees. They argued that these remedies were warranted to deter what they characterized as excessive and improper discovery, particularly because less than one month remained for fact discovery.

Disposition

The provided text contains no ruling by Judge Lorna G. Schofield. It does not grant, deny, dismiss, or otherwise resolve the defendants’ requests. The classification is therefore based on the fact that this filing is not a ruling.