United States District Court, D. Arizona
ORDER
Honorable David Bury Judge.
On
August 9, 2018, when the Court denied Plaintiff's Motion
for Preliminary Injunction and granted him leave to file a
Fourth Amended Complaint, the Court noted that there were six
discovery motions pending. There are now ten.
On
December 5, 2017, the Court issued the scheduling Order in
this case, setting the deadline for completing discovery on
July 5, 2018. On July 2, 2018, the Plaintiff filed a Motion
to Enlarge Time for Discovery and for Dispositive Motions.
When the Court denied the Plaintiff's Motion for
Preliminary Injunction, it granted Plaintiff leave to file a
Fourth Amended Complaint and granted in part the request for
an extension of time to file dispositive motions and denied
in part, without prejudice, the request for an extension of
discovery.
The
Court notes that as screened, the Fourth Amended Complaint
essentially conforms the pleading to the discovery record.
The Court allowed the amendment to dismiss certain
Defendants[1] who lacked involvement in the claims,
update Plaintiff's allegations in Counts Four, Five, and
Six regarding the alleged unlawful seizure of his mail, and
expand the scope of his due process allegations in Count Six.
Plaintiff
seeks injunctive relief for the cancellation of his kosher
diet on July 25, 2016. He alleges a violation of the
Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA)
and breach of a settlement agreement in Merrick I,
CV 08-209 TUC AWT, which in part secured him the kosher diet.
On
March 19, 2018, Defendant Frame answered interrogatories
submitted by the Plaintiff in lieu of taking depositions.
Fed. R. Civ. P.31(a)(2)B). On April 13, 2018, Plaintiff filed
a Rule 33(a)(1) Motion for Leave to serve an additional 28
follow-up interrogatories on Defendant Frame. Plaintiff
originally tendered 22 interrogatories. “Unless
otherwise stipulated or ordered by the court, a party may
serve on any other party no more than 25 written
interrogatories, including all discrete subparts.”
“Leave to serve additional interrogatories may be
granted to the extent consistent with Rule 26(b)(1) and
(2).” The Court considers whether the additional
discovery is unreasonably cumulative or duplicative, can be
obtained from a more convenient source, less burdensome, or
less expensive; whether Plaintiff had ample opportunity to
obtain the information already, or if it is outside the scope
of relevant information. Fed. R. Civ. P.26(b)(2).
The
Court allows follow-up interrogatories, as follows:
Interrogatory #26.
Interrogatory # 27 in part as follows: Please explain
contradictory answers in response to Interrogatory 8,
“Yes, when ADC policy considered mail from on line pen
pal services to be contraband, ” and Interrogatory #8,
“I never seized any of Plaintiff's incoming mail
from an internet pen pal service, ” and Interrogatory
#10, “I never stopped Plaintiff from receiving mail
from an internet pen pal service.”
Interrogatory #30 in part as follows: Explain the
contradiction between Exhibit D, “contrabanded per Sgt.
Frame and legal services, ” with answer to
Interrogatory #7, “mailroom staff did not need my
authorization to determine whether or not a particular piece
of mail was contraband or not.”
Interrogatory #30.
The
remainder of the additional interrogatories proposed by the
Plaintiff are tendered because Defendant Frame did not answer
previous interrogatories. The Court will consider allegations
that Defendant failed to respond to discovery pursuant to the
motions to compel. Fed.R.Civ.P. 37. Plaintiff has filed three
motions to compel, two in excess of the page limit.
Defendants have filed a Motion for a Protective Order from
late discovery requests and a Motion to Compel. Plaintiff
files a Motion to Strike the Defendants' Reply in support
of the Motion for Protective Order.
The
Defendant has not responded to Plaintiff's Motions to
Compel that exceeded the page limit because the Court has not
yet granted leave for the motions to be filed. Plaintiff has
not filed a Response to the Defendants' Motion to Compel.
Instead, he objects to the Defendants' Motion for
Additional Time to file the Motion to Compel. The Court, over
the objection of the Plaintiff, grants Defendant leave to
file the Motion to Compel, which was filed prior to complying
with Local Rule 37.1. The Plaintiff has been served with the
letter setting forth the Defendants' disputed discovery.
Plaintiff has also been served with the Motion to Compel.
Briefing the motions to compel will afford the parties to
inform the Court as to any discovery disputes that the two
have resolved which may be withdrawn from the Court's
review. The extension of time is necessarily granted because
there are hundreds of pages filed briefing the discovery
disputes between the parties. These voluminous briefs shall
suffice to resolve all discovery disputes between the
parties.
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