Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caed-1_22-cv-00701/USCOURTS-caed-1_22-cv-00701-7/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 360
Nature of Suit: Other Personal Injury
Cause of Action: 28:1332 Diversity-Personal Injury

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

MATTHEW PETERSON, et al.,

Plaintiffs,

v.

THOMSON INT’L, INC.,

Defendant.

Case No. 1:22-cv-00701-JLT-CDB

ORDER GRANTING DEFENDANT’S 

MOTION FOR EXTENSION OF CASE 

MANAGEMENT DATES

(Doc. 47)

Pending before the Court is Defendant’s motion for a nine-month extension of all case 

management dates, supporting memorandum and attorney declaration, filed April 26, 2023. 

(Docs. 48-50). Plaintiffs filed an opposition with supporting declaration. (Docs. 53-54). The 

Court convened the parties for a motion hearing on May 11, 2023. The Court has considered the 

arguments made by the parties in their filings and supplemented during the motion hearing, and 

for the reasons set forth on the record during that hearing and further below, the Court makes the 

following rulings.

Introduction

Defendant argues a nine-month extension of discovery, pretrial motion and trial dates is 

warranted because it has transmitted 33 document requests to various third parties, including the 

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Food and Drug Administration, various public health 

agencies, and numerous of the Plaintiffs’ medical providers, all of which remain outstanding. 

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Defendant proffered during the motion hearing that its experience through litigating similar 

claims in other courts is that some of the public health agencies have taken up to eight months to 

respond to similar record requests. Defendant maintains that it timely transmitted the record 

requests after receiving disclosure authorizations from Plaintiffs – a process that was protracted 

and required Court intervention to resolve. (See Docs. 35-36, 39). Defendant maintains it would 

suffer significant prejudice without the requested extensions, arguing, for instance, that “it is 

impossible to take meaningful depositions without complete records” and that Defendant could 

not adequately prepare for trial without the records. (Doc. 47 at 5).

Plaintiffs generally argue that Defendant has not met its burden of demonstrating good 

cause for such a lengthy extension, that Defendant through lack of diligence is responsible in part 

for its discovery challenges, and that Plaintiffs are amenable to a more “modest” two-month 

extension. (Doc. 53 at 4-5).

Legal Standard

Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 16, a scheduling order “may be modified only for 

good cause and with the judge’s consent.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 16(b)(4). “Rule 16(b)'s ‘good cause’ 

standard primarily considers the diligence of the party seeking the amendment.” Johnson v. 

Mammoth Recreations, Inc., 975 F.2d 604, 609 (9th Cir. 1992). If the moving party is unable to 

reasonably meet a deadline despite acting diligently, the scheduling order may be modified. Id. 

If, however, the moving party “‘was not diligent, the inquiry should end’ and the motion to 

modify should not be granted.” Zivkovic v. So. Cal. Edison Co., 302 F.3d 1080, 1087 (9th Cir. 

2002) (quoting Johnson, 975 F.2d at 609).

In addition to focusing on the good cause standard of Rule 16, the district court must also 

consider the following factors when ruling on a motion to amend the scheduling order: “1) 

whether trial is imminent, 2) whether the request is opposed, 3) whether the non-moving party 

would be prejudiced, 4) whether the moving party was diligent in obtaining discovery within the 

guidelines established by the court, 5) the foreseeability of the need for additional discovery in 

light of the time allowed for discovery by the district court, and 6) the likelihood that the 

discovery will lead to relevant evidence.” Morris v. Sutton, No 1:17-cv-01488-AWI-SAB, 2019 

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WL 2994291, *4 (E.D. Cal. July 9, 2019) (quoting City of Pomona v. SQM N. Am. Corp., 866 

F.3d 1060, 1066 (9th Cir. 2017)).

Analysis

First, the Court concludes Defendant has demonstrated sufficient good cause that the 

Court may grant the requested modification to all case management dates. Defendant has acted 

diligently: it consulted with Plaintiffs to seek voluntary authorizations for document disclosures, 

retained a third-party vendor to assist in obtaining the documents, and generally acted in a timely 

fashion. 

Plaintiffs’ counterarguments that Defendant has not acted with diligence are unpersuasive. 

While the Court agrees with Plaintiff that Defendant’s sparse motion papers standing alone failed 

to adequately demonstrate diligence sufficient to warrant a nine-month extension (Doc. 53 at 3-4), 

Defendant sufficiently supplemented the record during the motion hearing to establish good 

cause, as set forth above. In particular, Defendant represented that it has taken public health 

agencies in other litigations up to eight months to return the types of records at issue in this case. 

Plaintiffs have identified any material delay or lack of diligence by Defendant in connection with 

seeking to obtain these and the other records that have been requested but not yet received from 

third parties.

Plaintiffs’ other arguments implicating Defendant’s lack of diligence (id. at 5-6) are more 

akin to general complaints regarding Defendant’s lack of responsiveness and cooperation in 

conducting discovery – those complaints do not evidence a lack of diligence on the part of 

Defendant in connection with seeking the outstanding discovery it maintains warrants the 

requested extensions.

The Court also has considered the City of Pomona factors and concludes, on balance, they 

favor granting the extensions. The only additional prejudice or harm Plaintiffs claim they may 

suffer if Defendant’s motion is granted is a nine-month delay in seeking recovery for injuries that 

were sustained almost three years ago. Although the Court shares Plaintiffs’ preference for a 

speedier disposition of the case, Plaintiffs do not articulate, for instance, tangible prejudice such 

as increased costs or substantial alterations to litigation strategy that other courts find weighs 

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against granting motions to modify the case schedule. E.g., Morris, 2019 WL 2994291, *5. See 

Keiper v. Victor Valley Transit Auth., 2016 WL 11651894, *4 (C.D. Cal. May 19, 2016) (“The 

Court agrees that Plaintiffs would suffer some prejudice if the Court [extends] the instant 

action.... However, the Court is unpersuaded by Plaintiffs argument that they will be prejudiced 

by the delay in their recovery of damages, as it presumes that the plaintiffs will prevail on their 

claims.”).

The Court also balances the prejudice Defendant would suffer in being required to 

complete discovery within the next week without the benefit of having a significant number of 

outstanding medical and other records that are important to exploring and developing Plaintiffs’ 

claims for relief.

Conclusion and Order

Accordingly, it is HEREBY ORDERED that Defendant’s motion (Doc. 47) is 

GRANTED.

It is FURTHER ORDERED that the Scheduling Order (Doc. 19) remains in full force and 

effect with the following amendments:

Discovery Deadlines:

Non-Expert Discovery Cut-off: February 19, 2024

Expert Disclosure Deadline: March 4, 2024

Rebuttal Expert Disclosure Deadline: March 18, 2024

Expert Discovery Cut-off: April 15, 2024

Non-Dispositive Motion Deadlines:

Filing Deadline: April 29, 2024

Hearing Deadline: June 5, 2024, at 8:30 a.m., Bakersfield, CA

Dispositive Motion Deadlines:

Deadline to Meet & Confer: June 10, 2024

Filing Deadline: June 24, 2024

Hearing Deadline: August 6, 2024, at 8:30 a.m., Fresno, CA

/ / /

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Pre-Trial Conference:

Joint Pretrial Statement Filing Deadline: September 20, 2024

Pre-Trial Conference Date: October 7, 2024, at 1:30 p.m., Fresno, CA

Jury Trial: December 3, 2024, at 8:30 a.m., Fresno, CA

IT IS SO ORDERED.

Dated: May 12, 2023 ___________________ _

UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE

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