Parker v. Bursor
- Tarnofsky
- 1:24-cv-00245
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Parker v. Bursor, Judge Tarnofsky denied defendants’ request to pause discovery while their dismissal motion was pending.
The defendants must proceed with discovery, and the parties must follow the court-ordered discovery schedule. The pending motion to dismiss and strike was not decided in this order.
What happened
In Parker v. Bursor, the defendants asked the court to pause discovery while their motion to dismiss and strike the complaint was pending. They argued that discovery would be extensive and burdensome and that the case might be dismissed or narrowed.
The court concluded that the defendants’ motion was unlikely to eliminate the entire complaint and that some claims would probably continue. Because those remaining claims would still require full discovery, the court denied the request to pause discovery.
Judge Robyn F. Tarnofsky ordered the parties to follow the discovery deadlines in their proposed case-management plan, using the plaintiff’s proposed deadlines where the parties disagreed. The parties had to file a joint discovery-status update by August 30, 2024, and complete discovery by November 29, 2024; the May 28, 2024, case-management conference was canceled.
The detailed version
- Parker v. Bursor · No. 1:24-cv-00245
- Tarnofsky
- May 22, 2024
Background
The defendants asked the court to stay, or pause, discovery while the court considered their motion to dismiss and strike the complaint. They argued that the expected discovery would be voluminous because of the complaint’s broad claims, and that proceeding immediately would be burdensome if the pending motion dismissed or significantly narrowed the case. They also argued that delaying discovery would not substantially prejudice Angelica Parker.
Court’s Analysis
The court explained that a discovery stay requires good cause and that the party seeking the stay has the burden of showing that it is warranted. Courts consider the scope and burden of the requested discovery, the prejudice to the opposing party, and the strength of the underlying motion to dismiss. The court agreed that the likely discovery would be extensive, but it found that the pending motion was unlikely to result in dismissal of the entire complaint. Because some claims would likely survive and would still require full discovery, the court did not find a sufficient basis to pause discovery.
Ruling and Case Schedule
The court denied the defendants’ application for a stay of discovery. The parties were ordered to complete discovery under the deadlines in their proposed case-management plan and Rule 26(f) report. Where the parties disagreed about deadlines because of the stay request, the court adopted Parker’s proposal. The parties had to file a joint update on the status of discovery by August 30, 2024, and complete all discovery by November 29, 2024. The court canceled the May 28, 2024, initial case-management conference and stated that it would issue a separate order setting a settlement conference for September 2024.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.