Garcia et al v. County of San Diego et al

Filing 71

ORDER Granting in Part and Denying in part 66 Joint Motion for Discovery Dispute No.1 and Denying 67 Joint Motion for Discovery Dispute No. 2. The parties shall have until 9/22/2017 to complete the deposition of PMK(s) offering testimony respons ive to Area of Designation No. 36, as limited by this order, only. All other PMK depositions remain subject to the 8/31/2017 deadline. Defendants shall provide a declaration from the County responsive to Area of Designation No. 37 on or before 9/15/2017. Signed by Magistrate Judge Nita L. Stormes on 8/31/2017. (mpl)

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

9

SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

10
11

SHEILA GARCIA, et al.,

Case No.: 15cv189-JLS (NLS)
Plaintiffs,

12
13

v.

14

ORDER GRANTING IN PART AND
DENYING IN PART JOINT
MOTION FOR DISCOVERY
DISPUTE No. 1 AND DENYING
JOINT MOTION FOR DISCOVERY
DISPUTE No. 2

COUNTY OF SAN DIEGO, et al.,

15

Defendants.

16
17

[ECF Nos. 66 & 67]

18
19

This case arises from the actions of employees of Defendant County of San Diego

20

(“County”), the San Diego Health and Human Services Agency, and the County’s

21

Polinsky Children’s Center (“Polinsky”) during and following the removal of Minor

22

Plaintiffs Cassandra Garcia, C.N.G., and C.J.G. from their home and parents. In the

23

parties’ joint motion for determination of Discovery Dispute No. 1, Plaintiffs seek to

24

compel County to produce Persons Most Knowledgeable (“PMKs”) for deposition on

25

two topics listed in Plaintiff’s April 21, 2017 PMK deposition notice. ECF No. 66-1 at 3.

26

By way of the joint motion for determination of Discovery Dispute No. 2, Plaintiffs seek

27

to compel County to produce a PMK for deposition pursuant to a PMK deposition notice

28

served after the close of fact discovery. ECF No. 67-1 at 5-6. For the reasons explained
1
15cv189-JLS (NLS)

1

below, the joint motion for determination of Discovery Dispute No.1 [ECF No. 66] is

2

GRANTED IN PART and DENIED IN PART and the joint motion for determination

3

of Discovery Dispute No. 2 [ECF No. 67] is DENIED.

4

Relevant Background

5

This case arose out of a child welfare investigation of the Garcia family performed

6

by County social workers during January of 2013. As a result of the investigation,

7

Plaintiffs C.N.G., and C.J.G. were removed from their home and admitted to Polinsky.

8

ECF No. 1 ¶ 24. The next day, Plaintiff Cassandra Garcia, who had been receiving

9

inpatient psychiatric treatment at a local hospital, was discharged from the psychiatric

10

facility by County social workers and transported to Polinsky. Id. ¶ 26. All three

11

children are alleged to have been subjected to physical examination and testing at

12

Polinsky without the knowledge or consent of their parents. Id. ¶¶ 25, 27, 28. The

13

children remained at Polinsky for seventeen days and were not fully reunited with their

14

mother until about July of 2013. Id. ¶ 32.

15

Plaintiffs allege in the instant lawsuit that the Garcia children should not have been

16

removed from their parents, that the individual defendant social workers misrepresented

17

material facts to the Juvenile Court so they could continue to detain the children, and that

18

Polinsky failed to provide adequate physical and mental care or sufficient security to the

19

Garcia children. ECF No. 66-1 at 2. Plaintiffs also assert that the physical examinations

20

of the children at Polinsky violated the law. Id. at 2-3. The complaint alleges various

21

constitutional claims against the individual defendants as well as a claim against the

22

County under Monell v. Dep’t of Soc. Servs. of the City of New York, 436 U.S. 658

23

(1978), challenging the lawfulness of the County’s policies, procedures, practices, and

24

customs.

25

Legal Standard

26
27
28

Rule 30(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure provides that, by way of a
notice or subpoena:
a party may name as the deponent a public or private corporation, a
2
15cv189-JLS (NLS)

1
2
3
4
5
6

partnership, an association, a governmental agency, or other entity and must
describe with reasonable particularity the matters for examination. The
named organization must then designate one or more officers, directors, or
managing agents, or designate other persons who consent to testify on its
behalf; and it may set out the matters on which each person designated will
testify. A subpoena must advise a nonparty organization of its duty to make
this designation. The persons designated must testify about information
known or reasonably available to the organization. This paragraph (6) does
not preclude a deposition by any other procedure allowed by these rules.

7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15

Fed. R. Civ. P. 30(b)(6). As with all forms of discovery, Rule 30(b)(6) notices and
subpoenas are subject to the relevancy limitations of Rule 26. Under Federal Rule of
Civil Procedure 26(b)(1), a party:
may obtain discovery regarding any nonprivileged matter that is relevant to
any party’s claim or defense and proportional to the needs of the case,
considering the importance of the issues at stake in the action, the amount in
controversy, the parties’ relative access to relevant information, the parties’
resources, the importance of the discovery in resolving the issues, and
whether the burden or expense of the proposed discovery outweighs its
likely benefit.

16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28

Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(1). Information need not be admissible to be discoverable. Id.
District courts have broad discretion to determine relevancy for discovery purposes. See
Hallett v. Morgan, 296 F.3d 732, 751 (9th Cir. 2002); see also Haghayeghi v. Guess?,
Inc., 168 F. Supp. 3d 1277, 1280 (S.D. Cal. 2016) (noting that relevancy is broadly
construed). “District courts also have broad discretion to limit discovery to prevent its
abuse.” Eclipse Grp. LLP v. Target Corp., No. 15cv1411-JLS (BLM), 2017 WL
2231316, at *2 (S.D. Cal. May 19, 2017) (citing Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(2), which instructs
courts to limit discovery where the party seeking the discovery “has had ample
opportunity to obtain the information by discovery in the action” or where the proposed
discovery is “unreasonably cumulative or duplicative,” “obtain[able] from some other
source that is more convenient, less burdensome, or less expensive,” or where it “is
outside the scope permitted by Rule 26(b)(1)”).
3
15cv189-JLS (NLS)

1

“The 2015 amendments to Rule 26(b)(1) emphasize the need to impose ‘reasonable

2

limits on discovery through increased reliance on the common-sense concept of

3

proportionality.’” Roberts v. Clark County Sch. Dist., 312 F.R.D. 594, 603 (D. Nev.

4

2016). The fundamental principle of amended Rule 26(b)(1) is “that lawyers must size

5

and shape their discovery requests to the requisites of a case.” Id. Discovery and Rule

6

26 is intended to provide parties with “efficient access to what is needed to prove a claim

7

or defense, but eliminate unnecessary or wasteful discovery.” Id. This requires active

8

involvement of federal judges to make decisions regarding the scope of discovery. Id.

9

Discussion

10

1. Discovery Dispute No. 1

11

In their first motion, Plaintiffs seek to compel County to produce PMK witnesses

12

to testify as to Area of Designation Nos. 36 and 37 from their April 21, 2017 PMK

13

deposition notice. ECF No. 66-1 at 2, 5, 8.

14

a. Area of Designation No. 36

15

Area of Designation No. 36 requests testimony on the following topics:

16

Any and all policies, procedures, practices and customs of the County
of San Diego, including its Health and Human Services Agency, regarding
counseling (informal and/or formal), reprimands, and/or discipline of any
manner that may be given to, and/or be received by any County employees
and/or agents, including law enforcement, social workers, supervisors,
managers, doctors, nurses and/or agents (such as to any of the individually
named Defendants) concerning their conduct, actions, and/or inaction during
a child abuse and neglect investigation, such as the subject incident which
involved the Garcia family, in January 2013 to March 25, 2014, and
thereafter to present.

17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24

Id. at 5. Plaintiffs argue this information is necessary for Plaintiffs to determine what

25

options were available to the County for disciplining its social workers. Id. at 6.

26

Plaintiffs submit that during Defendant Jesus Salcido’s deposition he admitted that he did

27

not document many of his contacts with the Garcia family, contrary to the County’s

28

policy requiring all contacts to be documented. Id. Despite this breach, his supervisors
4
15cv189-JLS (NLS)

1

testified that Mr. Salcido was not counseled, reprimanded, or disciplined. Id. at 6-7. In

2

light of this evidence, Plaintiffs contend they are entitled discover what, if any,

3

disciplinary options the County has available for breaches of its policies and practices or

4

if the County, in fact, has no mechanisms in place to ensure that its social workers follow

5

the County’s policies and practices. Id. at 7. Plaintiffs assert this information is relevant

6

both to their claims against the Defendant social workers as well as to their Monell

7

claims. Id. In particular, Plaintiffs pled that the County had a “policy of acting with

8

deliberate indifference in failing to correct the wrongful conduct of other employees

9

failing to provide the Constitutional protections guaranteed to individuals, including

10

those under the First, Fourth, and Fourteenth Amendments, when performing actions

11

related to child abuse and neglect, and dependency type proceedings.” ECF ¶ 73n.

12

The County argues this request seeks irrelevant information and is unduly

13

burdensome. Specifically, the County argues that Plaintiffs did not plead a “failure to

14

discipline” theory of liability, so the request is not reasonably calculated to lead to the

15

discovery of relevant evidence. ECF No. 66-1 at 7. To the extent Plaintiffs seek to show

16

that Defendant Salcido should have been disciplined for violating County policy, the

17

County contends Plaintiffs seek inadmissible evidence of subsequent remedial measures.

18

Id. Coupled with the extensive discovery already sought by Plaintiffs, and the looming

19

August 31, 2017 deadline for completion of PMK depositions, the County argues that

20

requiring it to compile and produce additional documents and a PMK witness is unduly

21

burdensome. Id. at 7-8.

22

Having reviewed the allegations in the complaint and Plaintiffs’ request, the Court

23

finds that Designation No. 36 is relevant to Plaintiffs’ Monell claim (ECF ¶ 73n) and

24

proportional to the needs of the case. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(1). Plaintiffs’ argument

25

essentially is that the County either did not have disciplinary policies in place, or had a

26

custom of not enforcing them, so its social workers knew they would not get in trouble if

27

they did not comply with County rules and policies when dealing with cases of alleged

28

child abuse or neglect and dependency proceedings. That peace of mind that no
5
15cv189-JLS (NLS)

1

consequences would befall them is what Plaintiffs allege led the social workers in this

2

case to inflict the alleged constitutional violations on the Garcia family. Thus, deposition

3

testimony explaining what, if any, disciplinary policies the County had in place and

4

whether they were routinely enforced, would be relevant to this claim.

5

To the extent Plaintiffs also seek more specific information as to what discipline

6

should have been imposed upon Defendant Salcido or others, the fact that the answers

7

may be evidence of subsequent remedial measures and ultimately not admissible at trial

8

does not make them irrelevant for discovery purposes. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b)(1)

9

(“[i]nformation within this scope of discovery need not be admissible in evidence to be

10

discoverable”). That being said, evidence of what punishment should have been imposed

11

on the individual defendants after the fact has little bearing on their motivation to inflict

12

the alleged constitutional violations on the Garcia family. The Court, therefore, denies

13

Plaintiffs’ request to the extent it seeks specific information as to what discipline should

14

have been imposed upon the individual defendants.

15

As for the County’s undue burden argument, the Court is unpersuaded by the

16

County’s general argument that this case already has required too much discovery.

17

However, the Court finds that the request is overly broad in that it requests policy

18

information up to and including the present date. If Plaintiffs’ motivation is to show that

19

the lack of disciplinary policies, or enforcement of the same, motivated Defendants, then

20

policies that were put place after the events giving rise to the complaint are irrelevant.

21

The Court finds it appropriate to limit both the PMK deposition testimony and

22

accompanying document request to cover only those “policies, procedures, practices and

23

customs of County, including its Health and Human Services Agency, regarding

24

counseling (informal and/or formal), reprimands, and/or discipline of any manner that

25

may be given to, and/or be received by any County employees and/or agents, including

26

law enforcement, social workers, supervisors, managers, doctors, nurses and/or agents

27

(such as to any of the individually named Defendants), concerning their conduct, actions,

28

and/or inaction during a child abuse and neglect investigation, such as the subject
6
15cv189-JLS (NLS)

1

incident which involved the Garcia family, in effect between January 2013 and March

2

25, 2014.”

3
4

For the foregoing reasons, the joint motion as to Area of Designation No. 36 is
GRANTED IN PART and DENIED IN PART.

5

b. Area of Designation No. 37

6

Area of Designation No. 37 requests testimony on the following topics:

7

Any and all counseling (informal and/or formal), reprimands, and/or
discipline of any manner given to, and/or be received by any County of San
Diego employees, law enforcement, social workers, supervisors, managers,
and/or agents (including any doctors and nurses), and including any of the
individually named Defendants, in regards to the subject incident and the
Garcia Family, which this litigation concerns.

8
9
10
11
12

ECF No. 66-1 at 8. In response to this topic, the County has offered, and remains willing

13

to provide, “a declaration from the County stating that no employee received discipline in

14

relation to this case.” Id. at 10. This is in addition to the previous deposition testimony

15

of several, if not all, of the individual defendants, wherein they confirmed that they

16

received no employer discipline as a result of their involvement in this case. Id.

17

Plaintiffs respond that they are it is entitled to a definitive statement, binding on the

18

County from its designated PMK, that no County employee or agent was counseled,

19

reprimanded, or disciplined for his or her actions with respect to the Garcia family. Id. at

20

9.

21

Plaintiffs do not explain, and the Court is at a loss to understand, why the proffered

22

declaration, coupled with the existing deposition testimony, is not sufficient to satisfy

23

Plaintiffs’ request. As discussed above, the Court finds evidence as to what discipline

24

should have been imposed upon the individual defendants to be irrelevant to Plaintiffs’

25

claims. To the extent Area of Designation No. 37 also might elicit marginally relevant

26

testimony about other individuals involved in these incidents, the Court finds that the

27

County’s proffered declaration would provide a satisfactory alternative to the burden and

28

expense of another PMK deposition after the close of fact discovery. See Roberts, 312
7
15cv189-JLS (NLS)

1

F.R.D. at 603 (noting that district courts are encourage to limit wasteful and unnecessary

2

discovery and apply common sense to discovery management). The Court, therefore,

3

DENIES Plaintiffs’ motion for a PMK deposition on Area of Designation No. 37, but

4

orders Defendants to provide a declaration, on behalf of the County and responsive to this

5

topic, on or before September 15, 2017.

6

2. Discovery Dispute No. 2

7

Discovery Dispute No. 2 relates to a PMK deposition notice sent after the close of

8

fact discovery. By joint motion dated July 13, 2017, the parties sought permission to

9

continue the PMK depositions of seven previously-disclosed designees until after the July

10

26, 2017 fact discovery deadline due to Plaintiffs’ counsel’s illness. ECF No. 60. This

11

Court granted the joint motion, authorizing the parties to “schedule Persons Most

12

Knowledgeable depositions in this matter up to and including August 31, 2017.” ECF

13

No. 61.

14

On July 28, 2017 – two days after the close of fact discovery – Plaintiffs’ counsel

15

served Defendants’ counsel with a Notice of Deposition of Person(s) Most

16

Knowledgeable for Defendant County of San Diego Regarding Funding, Juvenile Justice

17

Commission. ECF No. 67-1 at 3. Therein, Plaintiffs designated thirteen separate areas of

18

testimony and requested documents related to each category. Id. Defendants’ counsel

19

objected that the notice was untimely. Id. at 3-4. Plaintiffs argue the notice is timely

20

under this Court’s prior order. Id. at 4.

21

The Court finds that Plaintiffs’ PMK notice regarding the Juvenile Justice

22

Commission is untimely. The Court’s July 13, 2017 order only extended the deadline for

23

scheduling the seven already-noticed PMK depositions raised in the motion and noted in

24

the chart prepared by Plaintiffs’ counsel (ECF No. 56-3). It did not wholesale reopen

25

PMK discovery such that Plaintiffs could issue entirely new notices. If the Court’s order

26

was ambiguous on that point, it was only because Plaintiffs did not request permission to

27

notice additional PMK depositions after the close of fact discovery and the Court never

28
8
15cv189-JLS (NLS)

1

considered the possibility that Plaintiffs would attempt to do so. For these reasons,

2

Plaintiffs’ request is DENIED.

3

Conclusion

4

For the foregoing reasons, the joint motion for determination of Discovery Dispute

5

No.1 [ECF No. 66] is GRANTED IN PART and DENIED IN PART. The parties shall

6

have until September 22, 2017 to complete the deposition of PMK(s) offering testimony

7

responsive to Area of Designation No. 36, as limited by this order, only. All other PMK

8

depositions remain subject to the August 31, 2017 deadline. Defendants shall provide a

9

declaration from the County responsive to Area of Designation No. 37 on or before

10
11
12
13
14

September 15, 2017.
The parties’ joint motion for determination of Discovery Dispute No. 2 [ECF No.
67] is DENIED.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
Dated: August 31, 2017

15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
9
15cv189-JLS (NLS)