Shaw v. International Business Machines
Filing
108
ORDER granting in part and denying in part Defendant's motion for attorneys' fees, Doc. 77 . Signed by Judge Nanette Laughrey on 6/22/2015. (Hatting, Elizabeth)
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
WESTERN DISTRICT OF MISSOURI
CENTRAL DIVISION
VALERIE SHAW,
Plaintiff,
v.
INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS
MACHINES CORPORATION,
Defendant.
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Case No. 2:14-cv-04236-NKL
ORDER
Pending before the Court is Defendant International Business Machine
Corporation’s (“IBM”) motion for attorneys’ fees pursuant to the Court’s order of March
26, 2015, Doc. 77. IBM’s motion is granted in part and denied in part.
I.
Background
This case was originally filed in the Northern District of Illinois on November 22,
2013. It was transferred to the Western District of Missouri on September 2, 2014. On
February 13, 2015, the Court held a teleconference with the parties regarding a discovery
dispute. IBM stated that Plaintiff Valerie Shaw had not yet filed her Rule 26 disclosures
or provided answers to IBM’s interrogatories or requests for production of documents.
The Court ordered Ms. Shaw to make her Rule 26 disclosures no later than March 1 and
provide all other documents and responses to IBM’s discovery requests no later than
March 13. The Court also explained how discovery was conducted and referred Ms.
Shaw to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, explaining their availability on the internet
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and at any law school library. Ms. Shaw resides in the Chicago area. The Court informed
Plaintiff that if she failed to comply with the Court’s order the case would be dismissed.
[Doc. 70].
On March 3, 2015, Ms. Shaw filed a motion for extension of time stating that she
had plans to travel out of the country from March 9 through 18 and would be unable to
meet the Court’s discovery deadlines. On March 5, the Court denied Ms. Shaw’s motion
and stated that she was required to comply with the prior deadlines.
On March 24, the Court held another teleconference with the parties regarding the
discovery dispute. During the teleconference, Ms. Shaw explained that she had been
unable to comply with her discovery obligations due to her travels and stated that she had
not received notice of the Court’s March 5 order denying her motion for extension of
time. The Court found, based on ECF technology and the surrounding circumstances,
that the ECF email notification regarding the March 5 denial of the motion was delivered
to the email address confirmed by Ms. Shaw during the teleconference. Ms. Shaw also
admitted during the teleconference that she never contacted the Court to find out whether
her motion had been granted. Due to Ms. Shaw’s refusal to provide basic discovery to
IBM as required by the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, even after she was ordered to
do so, the Court stated that it would either require her to pay IBM’s attorneys’ fees for the
time spent enforcing the February 13 order or dismiss her case without prejudice. Ms.
Shaw stated that she did not want her case to be dismissed. Therefore, the Court ordered
her to pay reasonable attorneys’ fees incurred by IBM to obtain and enforce the Court’s
February 13 discovery order. The Court stated that Ms. Shaw had until April 6 to
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produce all discovery requested by IBM and complete her Rule 26 disclosures, or her
case would be dismissed without prejudice.1
Following the teleconference, IBM filed this motion, accounting for its time spent
enforcing the Court’s February 13 order and requesting $9,631.50 in attorneys’ fees. Ms.
Shaw filed suggestions in opposition to IBM’s motion, stating that she should not be
required to pay the fees because she did not receive notice that her motion for extension
of time had been denied and had made every reasonable attempt to produce discovery in
the case. She also noted that as a lay person, complying with her discovery obligations
had been a challenge.
II.
Discussion
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 37(b) states that when a party violates a court
order requiring disclosure or discovery, “the court must order the disobedient party . . . to
pay the reasonable expenses, including attorney’s fees, caused by the failure, unless the
failure was substantially justified or other circumstances make an award of expenses
unjust.” Under this rule, the Court is required to order Ms. Shaw, the party in violation of
the Court’s discovery order, to pay IBM’s attorneys’ fees, unless to do so would be
unjust.
The Court has wide discretion in imposing sanctions under Rule 37.
See
Carmody v. Kansas City Bd. Of Police Com’rs, 713 F.3d 401, 405 (8th Cir. 2013) (“That
‘discretion to fashion a remedy or sanction’ is ‘wide,’ but ‘narrows as the severity of the
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As of the date of this order, Ms. Shaw has still not fully responded to IBM’s discovery
and was given another extension to do so, without objection by IBM.
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sanction or remedy increases.’” (quoting Wegener v. Johnson, 527 F.3d 687, 692 (8th Cir.
2008))).
In this case, the Court must require Ms. Shaw to pay IBM reasonable attorneys’
fees due to her unreasonable failure to produce discovery as ordered by the Court on
February 13. This case was filed in November 2013. However, Ms. Shaw had not
complied with even her basic discovery obligation to make initial disclosures by February
2015. Due to Ms. Shaw’s status as a pro se litigant, the Court gave her two weeks
following the February 13 teleconference to make her initial disclosures and an additional
two weeks to respond to IBM’s discovery requests. The Court also informed Ms. Shaw
that due to the age of the case and the large delays in the discovery process, the case
would be dismissed if she did not comply with the Court’s order.
At the time the Court entered its February 13 order setting deadlines for Ms.
Shaw’s discovery responses, Ms. Shaw knew that she had international travel planned in
March. [Doc. 96, p. 5]. Her travel documents indicate that she booked her flight to
Panama on February 11, 2015. Id. Ms. Shaw did not mention these travel plans to the
Court during the teleconference on February 13 or say that she might have trouble
meeting the Court’s deadline due to her plans. Instead, she waited until a week before
her trip to request that the Court extend her deadlines. This request was not made until
March 3, two days after her initial Rule 26 disclosures were due. The Court denied Ms.
Shaw’s motion on March 5, two days after it was filed and four days before her
scheduled departure date. This gave Ms. Shaw four days to make a reasonable effort to
comply with the Court’s order while in the country. However, Ms. Shaw made no
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disclosures or responses before leaving the country on March 9 and made no disclosures
or responses between March 18, the date she returned, and March 26, the date the Court
held its second teleconference regarding the discovery disputes in this case. Based on
this record, the Court finds that Ms. Shaw did not make a good faith attempt to comply
with the Court’s orders regarding her discovery deadlines, even though the Court and
IBM have made unusual efforts to help her understand her responsibilities and choices
during this extended discovery dispute. Ms. Shaw did not provide, in a timely fashion,
even basic discovery information required by the Federal Rules. While she claims to be
unable to understand her obligations because she is pro se, Ms. Shaw has been very able
to respond during phone conferences to arguments made by IBM concerning their request
for relief and has sent voluminous discovery requests to IBM. Her difficulty with the
process seems to be selective.
Ms. Shaw claims that she did not receive notice of the Court’s order denying her
motion for extension of time.
However, the Court found during the March 26
teleconference that she did receive notice of the Court’s order through the ECF filing
system. The email did not bounce back as undeliverable, concrete evidence that she had
access in her own email if she chose to look. Further, if Ms. Shaw did not know how the
Court ruled, it was her obligation to make reasonable efforts to find out if the Court had
ruled on the motion and what the decision was. She did not even contact the Court to
find out whether the continuance had been granted, but rather decided for herself that she
did not have to produce the discovery as ordered. Finally, IBM emailed Ms. Shaw on
March 6 to notify her that based on the Court’s March 5 order, her discovery responses
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were still due on March 13. [Doc. 77-1]. It is clear that Ms. Shaw did not have good
cause for failing to comply with the Court’s February 13 order.
IBM requests that the Court order Ms. Shaw to pay $9,631.50 in fees. Taking into
account the tasks required to be performed by IBM’s counsel and the disparity of
resources, the Court finds the requested sanction is too high. The Court concludes that a
reasonable penalty under these circumstances is $2,000. This is substantially less than
the reasonable fees incurred by IBM to enforce the Court’s order, but hopefully enough
to ensure full compliance with the Court’s orders in the future.
III.
Conclusion
For the reasons set forth above, IBM’s motion for attorneys’ fees is granted in part
and denied in part. Ms. Shaw is ordered to pay IBM $2,000 in attorneys’ fees for its
expenses associated with enforcing the Court’s order of February 13, 2015.
/s/ Nanette K. Laughrey
NANETTE K. LAUGHREY
United States District Judge
Dated: June 22, 2015
Jefferson City, Missouri
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