Consigli & Associates, LLC v. Maplewood Senior Living, LLC
- Jed Rakoff
- 1:20-cv-07712
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 10
Consigli v. Maplewood: Judge Schofield denied Maplewood’s reconsideration motion and directed the parties to address deficiencies in Consigli’s deposition testimony.
Maplewood Senior Living, LLC and Consigli & Associates, LLC were directly affected. Maplewood’s reconsideration motion was denied, while the parties were required to address deficiencies in Consigli’s corporate-witness testimony.
What happened
Consigli & Associates, LLC v. Maplewood Senior Living, LLC concerned Maplewood’s request to reconsider an order granting Consigli’s request to quash a subpoena to Alliant Insurance Services, Inc. The subpoena sought records about project insurance, bonds, and related costs.
Maplewood argued that reconsideration was justified because Consigli’s corporate witnesses could not explain those costs during depositions. Consigli had opposed the subpoena based mainly on its timing, after discovery had closed.
Judge Lorna G. Schofield denied Maplewood’s motion. She said Maplewood had not identified matters or controlling decisions that the court had overlooked, but also found that Consigli had not complied with its obligations for corporate-witness testimony. The parties were ordered to meet and confer about correcting those deficiencies.
The detailed version
- Consigli & Associates, LLC v. Maplewood Senior Living, LLC · No. 1:20-cv-07712
- Jed Rakoff
- Mar. 23, 2022
Background
Maplewood Senior Living, LLC asked the court to reconsider its March 14, 2022 order granting Consigli & Associates, LLC’s request to quash a subpoena served on Alliant Insurance Services, Inc. The subpoena sought limited categories of documents concerning the actual costs of Consigli’s payment and performance bonds, its Contractor Controlled Insurance Program, its Subguard insurance policy, and related communications.
Consigli had argued that the subpoena was served too close to the end of fact discovery and had a return date after the discovery deadline. Maplewood argued that it had only recently learned that Consigli’s corporate witnesses could not explain the actual costs involved. Maplewood relied on Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 30(b)(6), which requires an organization to designate witnesses to testify about information known or reasonably available to the organization on specified subjects.
Motion for Reconsideration
Maplewood argued that its belief that Consigli’s corporate witnesses would testify about the insurance and bond costs was reasonable because its deposition notice listed related subjects. Maplewood also submitted excerpts from depositions of Matthew Burger and Douglas Renna, which Maplewood said showed that the witnesses could not clearly explain premiums, risk-related amounts, loss funds, administrative costs, or other components of the costs.
The motion asked the court to reconsider its March 14 order, deny Consigli’s request to quash the subpoena, and allow Maplewood to obtain the requested discovery. The court’s ruling states that a reconsideration motion must identify matters or controlling decisions that counsel believes the court overlooked, as required by Local Civil Rule 6.3.
Ruling
Judge Lorna G. Schofield denied Maplewood’s motion for reconsideration. The court stated that Maplewood had presented the contents of its Rule 30(b)(6) notice for the first time and had not identified matters or controlling decisions that the court had overlooked.
At the same time, the court stated that the deposition excerpts showed Consigli had not complied with its obligations under Rule 30(b)(6). The parties were directed to meet and confer by March 25, 2022, about how Consigli would remedy the deficiencies in its corporate-witness testimony. If they could not resolve the dispute, they were ordered to file a joint letter by March 28, 2022, explaining their respective positions.
Read the full 10-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.