Weng v. Kung Fu Little Steamed Buns Ramen, Inc.

Background

The parties asked to amend the court-approved joint pretrial order (JPTO), which sets out the evidence and witnesses expected at trial. The defendants asked to add Roger Mwalumogo and Chulan Ma as witnesses. The plaintiffs asked to include Guangli Zhang’s deposition testimony.

Legal standard

Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 16(e), a court may modify a pretrial order only to prevent “manifest injustice.” The court explained that it has substantial discretion in applying that standard. The relevant considerations include actual prejudice or surprise, whether the prejudice can be corrected, disruption to an orderly trial, and the noncompliant party’s bad faith or willfulness. Prejudice to the party seeking the change is also relevant.

Court’s reasoning

The court found that adding Mwalumogo and Ma would not seriously disrupt the trial because their combined testimony was expected to last no more than 30 minutes. The plaintiffs would have time to prepare cross-examination and rebuttal because the witnesses would testify during the defendants’ case. Their proposed testimony concerned actions allegedly taken by Lianhua Weng and Chengbin Qian, whom the plaintiffs had already identified as trial witnesses. The court therefore found that any prejudice to the plaintiffs would be minimal.

The court also found that including Zhang’s deposition testimony would cause negligible prejudice to the defendants. Zhang was already on the plaintiffs’ witness list, and the defendants had attended and questioned him at his deposition. The defendants could review the deposition transcript, and using deposition testimony would not disrupt the trial. Excluding it, the court said, would hinder the plaintiffs’ ability to present their case concerning Zhang.

Disposition

Judge Loretta A. Preska GRANTED the requests to modify the JPTO. The JPTO was amended to state that the defendants planned to call Roger Mwalumogo and Chulan Ma and that the plaintiffs intended to introduce Guangli Zhang’s deposition testimony. The court also directed the parties to confer and provide a list of names and places the jurors could expect to hear about before jury selection began.