Barry v. O'Grady et al

Filing 30

ORDER - Defendant Shaw shall respond to Plaintiffs Interrogatories Nos. 10, 16, and 23 by July 10, 2014. Signed by Magistrate Judge Terence P. Kemp on 6/30/2015. (agm)

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF OHIO
EASTERN DIVISION
Teresa Barry,

:

Plaintiff,
v.

:
:

Case No. 2:14-cv-2693

:

JUDGE EDMUND A. SARGUS, JR.
Magistrate Judge Kemp

James P. O’Grady, et al.,
Defendants.

:

ORDER
This order is intended to reflect the results of a discovery
conference held to address Defendant Shaw’s response to
Plaintiffs’ Interrogatories Nos. 10, 16, and 23.

By way of brief

background, Defendant Emily Shaw is the Court Administrator for
the Franklin County Municipal Court.

The interrogatories at

issue asked her to provide information about “concerns expressed
by anyone” at the Municipal Court about the “attitude of conduct”
of other defendants, including Judge James P. O’Grady and Chief
Probation Officer Michael Roth (Interrogatories 10 and 16) and
about any complaints made by Plaintiff Teresa Barry concerning
inappropriate conduct or comments made by any Judge other than
Defendant O’Grady.

Ms. Shaw has agreed to respond to that last

interrogatory, so only the other two are at issue.
Ms. Shaw’s current responses to these two interrogatories
are as follows:
Interrogatory 10: “Without waiving this Objection,
Defendant Shaw agrees to respond as to her awareness of
any complaints by FCMC employees that Defendant Judge
O’Grady made sexually inappropriate remarks about women
and/or harassed or retaliated against employees who had
complained about his conduct.”

Interrogatory 16: “Without waiving this Objection,
Defendant Shaw agrees to respond as to her awareness of
any complaints by FCMC employees who transferred to the
Probation Department from the Judicial side that they
experienced harassment or retaliation while in the
Probation Department for complaints they had made about
judges.”
Plaintiff takes issue with these responses, saying that, as
her counsel understood the discussion at the discovery
conference, the answer to Interrogatory 10 would include comments
that could be viewed as demeaning toward women - not just
“sexually inappropriate remarks” - and also would include
complaints that Defendant O’Grady harassed or retaliated against
other Municipal Court employees regardless of whether such
harassment or retaliation was based on the type of conduct (or
the actual conduct) involved in this case.
The Court agrees that such complaints might be relevant, for
discovery purposes, to the extent that they may show a pattern of
harassment of or retaliation against Municipal Court employees
for taking issue with how Judge O’Grady treated them.

Whether

such evidence would be admissible at trial is not, of course, the
issue here, but given the complaint’s broad scope, alleging a
conspiracy to retaliate against Plaintiff, the existence of other
complaints and Judge O’Grady’s response to them - if, indeed,
there were others - might be probative of Plaintiff’s claims.

To

that extent, Defendant Shaw shall provide the information sought
as Plaintiff has clarified it.

The responses to all three

interrogatories shall be provided by July 10, 2014.

/s/ Terence P. Kemp
United States Magistrate Judge

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