Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-cand-5_14-cv-01358/USCOURTS-cand-5_14-cv-01358-7/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 442
Nature of Suit: Civil Rights Employment
Cause of Action: 28:1441 Petition for Removal - Employment Discrimination

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Case No.: 5:14-cv-01358-EJD

ORDER DENYING PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR LEAVE TO AMEND THE COMPLAINT; 

DENYING PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION

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United States District Court

Northern District of California

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

SAN JOSE DIVISION

PIYUSH GUPTA,

Plaintiff,

v.

INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS 

MACHINES CORPORATION (IBM),

Defendant.

Case No. 5:14-cv-01358-EJD 

ORDER DENYING PLAINTIFF’S 

MOTION FOR LEAVE TO AMEND 

THE COMPLAINT; DENYING 

PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR 

RECONSIDERATION

I. INTRODUCTION

On August 5, 2014, this court issued a Case Management Order (“CMO”) which, inter 

alia, provided a deadline by which the parties could amend their pleadings according to Federal 

Rule of Civil Procedure 15. See Docket Item No. 18. That deadline expired in early October, 

2014, and the parties proceeded to litigate this case based on Plaintiff Piyush Gupta’s (“Plaintiff”)

original complaint. To that end, Defendant International Business Machines Corporation (“IBM”)

served interrogatories during discovery, one of which requested that Plaintiff “state all facts” that 

support the allegation that IBM denied him a reasonable accommodation. See Decl. of Mitchell F. 

Boomer, Docket Item No. 86, at Ex. X. Plaintiff responded with the following statement: “It took 

an inordinately long time for IBM to approve Plaintiff’s request for business class air travel, his 

request for ergonomic furniture was never fulfilled.” Id. IBM also asked Plaintiff to “state all 

facts” supporting his claim that IBM failed to engage in a timely, good faith interactive process. 

In response, Plaintiff stated: “Plaintiff asked for an ergonomic office, which IBM never set up.” 

Id. 

Case 5:14-cv-01358-EJD Document 94 Filed 12/17/15 Page 1 of 4
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Case No.: 5:14-cv-01358-EJD

ORDER DENYING PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR LEAVE TO AMEND THE COMPLAINT; 

DENYING PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION

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IBM eventually moved for summary judgment on all claims. This court granted that 

motion in part, but denied it with respect to two claims: the second claim for failure to engage in a 

timely, good faith interactive process and the third claim for failure to provide a disability 

accommodation. As noted, Plaintiff stated during discovery that these two claims were based on 

the allegations that IBM took an “inordinately long time” to approve his accommodation requests 

and that his request for ergonomic furniture was “never fulfilled” or “never set up.” Nothing 

more. 

At the Final Pretrial Conference on December 17, 2015, Plaintiff made an oral motion for 

leave to amend his complaint under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15 in order to assert that, in 

addition to those allegations previously disclosed, IBM failed to accommodate his disability and 

failed to engage in the interactive process by not offering him disability benefits. IBM opposed 

the motion, and the court indicated it would deny it. The court has now thoroughly examined this 

issue and found no basis to modify its oral ruling. Accordingly, Plaintiff’s motion will be denied, 

again, for the reasons explained below. 

II. DISCUSSION

At the outset, the court must first frame the issue before it. Though Plaintiff’s counsel

referenced Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15 during argument, Plaintiff’s request for leave to 

amend is unquestionably governed by Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 16 and properly construed 

as a motion to amend the CMO.

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 This is so because the deadline for amendment to the pleadings 

has long since expired. Johnson v. Mammoth Recreations Inc., 975 F.2d 604, 607-608 (1992).

Under Rule 16, a party seeking to amend a scheduling order must demonstrate sufficient “good 

cause” for the relief. Fed. R. Civ. Proc. 16(b)(4) (“A schedule may be modified only for good 

cause and with the judge’s consent.”). Diligence on the part of the moving party is the focus of 

 

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To the extent Plaintiff’s counsel was relying on Rule 15(b), the court finds such reliance 

misplaced. “Rule 15(b) allows a court to revise pleadings to conform to the case as it actually was 

litigated at trial.” See Crawford v. Gould, 56 F.3d 1162, 1168 (9th Cir. 1995) (emphasis added). 

The trial has not occurred in this case. 

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Case No.: 5:14-cv-01358-EJD

ORDER DENYING PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR LEAVE TO AMEND THE COMPLAINT; 

DENYING PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION

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United States District Court

Northern District of California

the inquiry. See Johnson, 975 F.2d at 609. If, and only if, the requisite good cause is shown, the 

court then turns to an examination of the relevant factors under Rule 15. Hood v. Hartford Life & 

Accident Ins. Co., 567 F. Supp. 2d 1221, 1224 (E.D. Cal. 2008); Johnson, 975 F.2d at 609 (“If that 

party was not diligent, the inquiry should end.”). 

Here, Plaintiff has not established good cause to amend the scheduling order to allow for 

an amendment to the complaint. This is so because Plaintiff did not reasonably explain why he 

failed to disclose sooner that his remaining claims were based in part on disability benefits as a 

potential accommodation. Such an explanation is especially important for the establishment of 

good cause for three important reasons. First, contrary to the representations of Plaintiff’s counsel 

at the hearing, it is not apparent from either the complaint or Plaintiff’s interrogatory responses 

that his disability accommodation and engagement claims ever contemplated potential disability 

benefits as a possible accommodation. Second, Plaintiff cannot deny he was aware of potential 

issues related to short-term disability benefits, given the fact he based another of his claims on

those very same benefits; in other words, the availability of disability benefits is not something

Plaintiff recently discovered. Third, the nature of Plaintiff’s claims required him to identify,

during this litigation and at some time prior to the eve of trial, the possible accommodations that 

would have been available during the interactive process. See Scotch v. Art Inst. of Cal., 173 Cal. 

App. 4th 986, 995 (2009).

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 Plaintiff did identify an accommodation, but disability benefits were

not it.

Under these circumstances, where Plaintiff was aware of a possible theory but failed to 

timely raise it or alternatively provide a good reason for not doing so, the court is unable to find 

that Plaintiff acted with diligence. See Kaplan v. Rose, 49 F.3d 1363, 1370 (9th Cir. 1994) (“Late 

 

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Plaintiff cited to Yeager v. Corrections Corporation of America, 944 F. Supp. 2d 913 (2013), at 

the hearing. That case does not support his position, however. To the extent it is relevant, the 

Yeager court rejected a defendant’s argument that the only way a reasonable accommodation can 

be identified by a plaintiff is through the defendant’s discovery responses. Importantly, the court 

had no quarrel with the proposition, as stated in Scotch, that the plaintiff must identify a 

reasonable, available accommodation during the litigation process. 

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Case No.: 5:14-cv-01358-EJD

ORDER DENYING PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR LEAVE TO AMEND THE COMPLAINT; 

DENYING PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION

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amendments to assert new theories are not reviewed favorably when the facts and the theory have 

been known to the party seeking amendment since the inception of the cause of action.”). Since a 

lack of diligence cannot be equated with a good cause finding under Rule 16, Plaintiff’s motion 

for leave to amend the complaint must be denied. 

Thus, for the purposes of clarity, the court emphasizes that the subject of the currentlyscheduled trial is two claims: (1) Plaintiff’s second claim for failure to engage in a timely, good 

faith interactive process, and (2) Plaintiff’s third claim for failure to provide a disability 

accommodation. Within neither of these two claims may Plaintiff assert a theory based on the loss 

of disability benefits as a potential accommodation. 

III. ORDER

Based on the foregoing, Plaintiff’s oral motion for leave to amend the complaint is 

DENIED. With that, there is no basis to revisit the in limine rulings. Plaintiff’s oral motion for 

reconsideration is also DENIED. 

IT IS SO ORDERED.

Dated: December 17, 2015

______________________________________

EDWARD J. DAVILA

United States District Judge

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