Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caed-2_98-cv-01721/USCOURTS-caed-2_98-cv-01721-1/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 550
Nature of Suit: Prisoner - Civil Rights (U.S. defendant)
Cause of Action: 42:1983 Prisoner Civil Rights

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IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

WELVIE JOHNSON,

Plaintiff, No. CIV S-98-1721 GEB PAN P

vs.

SUZAN HUBBARD, et al.,

Defendants. ORDER

 /

Plaintiff is a state prisoner proceeding pro se with a civil rights action pursuant to

42 U.S.C. § 1983. On December 29, 2005, plaintiff filed a document styled “Motion to Obtain

Documents.” By this motion, plaintiff seeks a copy of the incident report regarding the assault at

issue in this action “or the assailant’s prison file.” (Plaintiff’s Motion, filed December 29, 2005,

at 2.) By order filed March 24, 2006, defendants were directed to respond to the motion within

fifteen days. Defendants have now filed an opposition to plaintiff’s motion. Defendants oppose

the motion on the grounds, inter alia, that it was filed well after the deadline set for completion of

discovery in this action and that plaintiff has failed to specify which, if any, previously served

discovery requests are at issue in the motion. 

On November 29, 1999, a scheduling order was issued in this action setting, inter

alia, a deadline of March 10, 2000 for completion of discovery in this action. Although other

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dates set in that scheduling order were subsequently vacated and reset, the discovery deadline

was never revised. Moreover, the record reflects that in 1999, plaintiff served defendant

Hubbard with a first request for production documents by which plaintiff in requests 1 and 2

thereof sought the incident report at issue in this motion. On September 30, 1999, defendant

Hubbard served on plaintiff responses to that request in which she objected to the first and

second requests on the ground, inter alia, that the requests sought confidential and privileged

information. (See Exhibit A to Defendants’ Opposition to Plaintiff’s Motion to Obtain

Documents, at 4.)

On November 22, 1999, plaintiff filed a motion to compel discovery responses. 

That motion was denied by order filed January 26, 2000, as “vague and conclusory and . . .

unsupported by any evidence that defendants have failed to provide adequate responses to

properly served discovery.” (Order filed January 26, 2000.) Plaintiff did not file any other

motion to compel further discovery responses.

In view of the foregoing, this court finds that plaintiff’s motion to obtain

documents, filed over six years after service of responses to any discovery request that arguably

included the document plaintiff now seeks, is untimely. For that reason, the motion will be

denied. 

On April 10, 2006, defendants filed timely objections to the court’s March 24,

2006 pretrial order. In light of the request in their pretrial statement to bifurcate the issue of

punitive damages, defendants object to that part of the pretrial order finding inapplicable a

separate trial of issues. Good cause appearing, defendants’ request for bifurcation of the issue of

punitive damages will be reserved for consideration by the district court at the trial confirmation

hearing set for April 13, 2007. 

In accordance with the above, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that:

1. Plaintiff’s December 29, 2005 motion to obtain documents is denied; and

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2. Defendants’ request for bifurcation of trial on the issue of punitive damages is

reserved for consideration by the district court at the trial confirmation hearing set for April 13,

2007. 

DATED: April 26, 2006.

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john1721.mtc

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