Sacramento Birth Injury Lawyer Blog

(Please note: the names and locations of all parties have been changed to protect the confidentiality of the participants in this birth injury/personal injury case and its proceedings.)

Request For Sanctions

California Code of Civil procedure Section 2023 provides for monetary sanctions where there is a failure to respond to interrogatories, evasive responses and objections lacking substantial justification are misuses of the discovery process. It further specifies that misuses of the discovery process include, but are not limited to, the following: .... (2) Using a discovery method in a manner that does not comply with its specified procedures; ....(4) Failing to respond or to submit to an authorized method of discovery; (5) Making, without substantial justification, an non-meritorious objection to discovery; (6) Making an evasive response to discovery; ....(8) Making or opposing, unsuccessfully and without substantial justification, a motion to compel or to limit discovery; and (9) Failing to confer in person, by telephone, or by letter with an opposing party or attorney in a reasonable and good faith attempt to resolve informally any dispute concerning discovery...... C.C.P. Section 2023.

Plaintiffs propounded special interrogatories to obtain information from defendant regarding the relevant facts and witnesses in the present action. The discovery was not propounded to harass the defendant and was propounded in good faith in order to obtain relevant information in this tragic birth injury matter.

Continue reading " Family Sues Sacramento Hospital For Catastrophic Birth Injury, Part 6 of 6 " »

(Please note: the names and locations of all parties have been changed to protect the confidentiality of the participants in this birth injury/personal injury case and its proceedings.)

University's Assertion Of Boilerplate Objections Is Without Basis

In Greg Mannino v. Superior Court (1983) 142 Cal.App.3d 776, petitioner filed a personal injury action against real party in interest and propounded a six sets of special interrogatories. Real party filed a verified response after the date an answer was required and included numerous objections. Petitioner's subsequent motion to compel further answers was denied.

On appeal, the Court vacated the order denying motion to compel, holding that real party did not file on time and provided no reasonable excuse for the delay. Id. at 778-779. The court reasoned that the objections contained in the responses were based on relevancy, remoteness, vagueness, ambiguity and the claim that the interrogatories are too burdensome, stating that it does not require more than 60 days to raise these familiar complaints. Although the delay was short in this case, and it was the sixth set of interrogatories propounded to real party in interest, the court emphasized that the discovery process is subject to frequent abuse and, like a cancerous growth, can destroy a meritorious cause or defense when the party with the greater resources chooses to employ it in an unethical manner. Id.

In the instant birth injury matter, the objections made by University to the first seven special interrogatories propounded by plaintiff are without merit.

Continue reading " Brain-Injured Sacramento Boy Sues For Birth Injury, Part 5 of 6 " »

(Please note: the names and locations of all parties have been changed to protect the confidentiality of the participants in this birth injury/personal injury case and its proceedings.)

In the instant matter, plaintiffs are entitled to an order compelling University to further respond to plaintiffs' Special Interrogatories, Numbers One through Seven.

First, repeated attempts to meet and confer and to obtain the information from defendants have been unsuccessful. Plaintiffs received University's written responses to their first set of special interrogatories on May 16, 2002, after granting four extensions. Thereafter, in an attempt to meet and confer over the inadequacy of the responses, plaintiffs sent a letter to University outlining the alleged deficiencies in responses to Special Interrogatories, One through Seven.

Thereafter, although defendant agreed to provide further responses to the specified interrogatories, no response has been received as of the date of this motion. Moreover, most recent additional meet and confer attempts by counsel for plaintiffs have been met with silence. Because, as discussed in detail below, University has not provided further responses to plaintiffs' interrogatories after agreeing to do so, plaintiffs are entitled to an order compelling defendant University to provide further responses.

More importantly, the information being requested from University is directly relevant to the issue of negligence in this birth injury case.

Continue reading " Physicians From Sacramento Responsible For Child's Birth Injury, Part 4 of 6 " »

(Please note: the names and locations of all parties have been changed to protect the confidentiality of the participants in this birth injury/personal injury case and its proceedings.)

LEGAL ARGUMENT

Plaintiffs Are Entitled to an Order Compelling Responses To Special Interrogatories

Code of Civil Procedure section 2030(f) requires that a party to whom interrogatories have been propounded shall respond in writing under oath separately to each interrogatory by (1) an answer containing the information sought to be discovered, (2) an exercise of the parties option to produce writings, or (3) an objection to the particular interrogatory. Further, section 2030(f)(l) specifies that each answer in the response shall be as complete and straightforward as the information reasonably available to the responding party permits. If an interrogatory cannot be answered completely, it shall be answered to the extent possible.

Lastly, section 2030(1) provides that if the propounding party, on receipt of a response to interrogatories, deems that (1) an answer to a particular interrogatory is incomplete or evasive, (2) an exercise of the option to produce documents under paragraph (2) of subdivision (f) is unwarranted of the required specification of those documents is inadequate, or (3) an objection to an interrogatory is without merit or is too general, that party may move for an order compelling a further response.

In the instant birth injury matter, plaintiffs are entitled to an order compelling University to further respond to plaintiffs' Special Interrogatories, Numbers One through Seven. (See Part 4 of 6.)

Continue reading " Sacramento Boy Suffered Brain Injury At Birth, Part 3 of 6 " »

(Please note: the names and locations of all parties have been changed to protect the confidentiality of the participants in this birth injury/personal injury case and its proceedings.)

Contrary to defendant's objection as stated in their Special Interrogatory Responses, these individuals were not identified in the medical records in the possession of plaintiffs and/or their counsel. The medical records only identify Dr. Green and Dr. Brown as involved in the neonatal resuscitation and one labor/delivery nurse attending the birth. However, it has come out during depositions and through the course of discovery, through testimony of family and friends, that there was a resuscitation team as well as a great number of people in the room during the birth and the immediate post-birth period.

Also uncovered during the course of discovery is the fact that, according to University's own pediatric department rules and regulations, a neonatal team "would include a neonatal transport nurse and a NICU nurse, as well as the neonatologist or his/her designee." Further, University's women and infants services procedure manual specifies that an Advance Practice Nurse, Transitional RN or NICU Charge RN shall be present at every delivery. Thus, it is clear that there are individuals known to University who were present who are not identified or reflected in the McCoy records.

By letter dated June 16, 2002, defendant University indicated that it would provide further Responses to Plaintiffs' Special Interrogatories, Set One. Defendant agreed to provide supplemental responses on or before July 13, 2002. In addition, defendant agreed to extend plaintiffs time for filing a motion to compel further responses, up to and including July 27, 2002.

On or about July 16, 2002, after not having received any further responses to Plaintiffs' Special Interrogatories Set One, counsel for plaintiffs telephoned defense counsel Andy Stone in order to obtain a status of the responses. Mr. Stone informed plaintiffs' counsel that defense counsel Barbara Stein would be handling the responses and would give a status update by the end of business that day.

At the end of the day, having not received a call from Ms. Stein, plaintiffs counsel called her to again inquire as to the status of the responses. Plaintiffs' counsel left a message for Ms. Stein and her assistant that an update on the responses was necessary or plaintiffs would be forced to file a motion to compel further responses. Defense counsel did not respond.

Continue reading " Hospital In Sacramento Sued For Causing Birth And brain Injury, Part 2 of 6 " »

(Please note: the names and locations of all parties have been changed to protect the confidentiality of the participants in this birth injury/personal injury case and its proceedings.)

Memorandum of Points and Authorities in Support of Plaintiffs' Motion to Compel Answers to Special Interrogatories, and for Monetary Sanctions

INTRODUCTION

This is an action for medical negligence arising out of the birth of the minor plaintiff, John Smith, at University Hospital in Sacramento in April 2000 which resulted in severe neurologic injury to the minor. Plaintiffs allege that defendant University Medical Center ("University") and others carelessly and negligently managed the medical care of plaintiffs including but not limited to delivery and post-delivery care of minor plaintiff John Smith. As a result of defendant's negligence John Smith suffered severe brain injury, paresis and other neurological damage, resulting in impairment of mental and bodily function.

STATEMENT OF FACTS

Plaintiffs served their first set of Special Interrogatories on defendant University on February 28, 2002. University requested four extensions of time to respond to the interrogatories, all of which were granted by plaintiffs. After having an extended six weeks to answer, University served written responses on May 16, 2002. Defendant responded to Special Interrogatory, Numbers One through Seven, with an inadequate boiler plate objection, stating that defendant did not have to produce the information because it was equally available to plaintiffs.
Plaintiffs' counsel attempted to meet and confer with University with regard to their deficient responses to the special interrogatories by letter dated May 31, 2002. In their meet and confer correspondence, plaintiffs' counsel outlined each alleged insufficient interrogatory response, the answer given by University as well as the reason the answer was inadequate, and an explanation as to why the information requested in the interrogatories was relevant.

Continue reading " Sacramento Family Sues After Child Born With Brain Injury, Part 1 of 6 " »