Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-casd-3_16-cv-02372/USCOURTS-casd-3_16-cv-02372-1/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 442
Nature of Suit: Civil Rights Employment
Cause of Action: 42:2000e-2sx Job Discrimination (Sex)

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16-CV-2372-CAB(WVG) 

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 

U.S. EQUAL EMPLOYMENT 

OPPORTUNITY COMMISSION, 

Plaintiff,

v. 

PC IRON, INC. d/b/a PACIFIC COAST 

IRON, INC., 

Defendant.

 Case No.: 16-CV-2372-CAB(WVG) 

ORDER FOLLOWING DISCOVERY 

CONFERENCE 

The Court convened a telephonic discovery conference on October 5, 2017 and 

heard argument on multiple discovery disputes. Attorney Ross Poole appeared for 

Defendant, attorney Connie Liem appeared for Plaintiff EEOC, and attorney Mehrdad 

Bokhour appeared for Intervener Elsa Perez. Having heard argument and considered the 

parties’ written submissions, the Court rules as set forth below.1

                                               

1

 The Clerk of Court is directed to file the parties’ written submissions. 

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1. CEO Anderson’s Physical Presence at Intervener Perez’s Deposition 

In light of Plaintiff’s counsel’s representations describing Perez’s recent and 

ongoing medical issues, which impact her physically and mentally, the Court finds it 

appropriate to establish reasonable accommodations in order to allow Perez’s deposition 

to occur such that all parties’ interests are protected. The Court accordingly enters the 

following conditions and terms upon the taking of Perez’s deposition pursuant to its 

authority under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(c)(1)(B) & (E).2

 Should Defendant 

continue to wish to depose Perez, the following terms and conditions shall govern: 

 a. Anderson shall arrive before Perez’s arrival at the facility where the 

deposition is to be taken. Anderson shall occupy a room other than the room where Perez’s 

deposition is to be taken and close the door. Anderson shall remain in that room with the 

door closed for the duration of the time Perez is on the premises. 

 b. The room in which Anderson will remain shall be equipped with one-way 

videoconferencing equipment that streams both the audio and video of the deposition to 

Anderson in real time with sufficient quality and clarity to allow both Anderson and 

counsel to meaningfully participate. 

 c. Defense counsel may wear a telephone-connected headset with a direct link 

to Anderson, who may communicate with counsel via headset. Defense counsel may take 

as many breaks he deems necessary to confer with Anderson—both via headset and in 

person outside of the deposition room. 

                                               

2

 The Rules expressly permit the Court to order that a “deposition be taken by telephone or 

other remote means.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 30(b)(4); see also Kaseberg v. Conaco, LLC, 2016 

U.S. Dist. LEXIS 111767, at *15-18 (S.D. Cal. Aug. 19, 2016) (Bartick, J.) (permitting 

videoconference deposition to save expense on travel costs); Lopez v. CIT Bank, N.A., 2015 

U.S. Dist. LEXIS 176575, at *5 (N.D. Cal. Dec. 18, 2015) (same); Balu v. Costa Crociere 

S.P.A., 2011 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 85299, at *4 (S.D. Fla. Aug. 3, 2011) (noting “depositions 

are now readily taken inexpensively by internet video (e.g., Skype) or through somewhat 

more expensive, but still efficient, video conferencing facilities.”). 

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 d. The cost of the accommodations above shall be borne by Plaintiff EEOC, 

Intervener Perez, or both. The EEOC and Perez may allocate the costs amongst themselves 

in whatever fashion they agree. 

Defendant’s argument that Anderson is being excluded from the deposition is 

unfounded. With the above electronic accommodations, Anderson will be “virtually” 

present in the deposition room as closely as practicality and the competing circumstances 

allow. He may listen to Perez’s testimony as though he were in the same room. He may 

visually observe Perez as though he were in the same room. He may communicate with 

his attorney as though he were sitting next to counsel. And counsel may leave the 

deposition room and confer with Anderson if necessary. 

Counsel’s concerns over his potential inability to conduct the deposition with 

Anderson speaking in his ear is also unfounded. Even if Anderson were in the same room, 

counsel would necessarily break from questioning to confer with Anderson if Anderson 

were to whisper in his ear. Counsel would not forge on with questioning with Anderson 

whispering to him; he would take a break and listen to Anderson. Thus, there is no 

meaningful difference with respect to this concern between Anderson being in the same 

room or in another room while communicating with counsel. The conditions above allow 

Anderson full and meaningful participation in Perez’s deposition while also providing 

some accommodations for Perez. 

Defendant’s argument that the Court’s Order will set a precedent for excluding 

Anderson from trial in this case is also unfounded. This Court’s Order applies to the limited 

context of Perez’s deposition. This Order in no manner binds The Honorable Cathy A. 

Bencivengo at trial. As defense counsel acknowledged, the environment of a deposition is 

materially different than inside a courthouse, where a judicial officer provides oversight 

and possibly comfort to Perez. Simply stated, this Court’s Order has zero bearing on 

whether Anderson will or will not be able to attend the trial in this case, which is a wholly 

separate proceeding than a deposition. 

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2. Depositions of Angel Lopez and Anjelea Lopez

The Court is satisfied that Angel Lopez and Anjelea Lopez are properly subject to 

deposition in this case. Based on the detailed discussion with the parties on the record, 

Plaintiff’s objection to these depositions is OVERRULED. 

3. (a) Plaintiff’s Request for Production of Documents (Set One) No. 4—

Anderson’s Notes; 

(b) Plaintiff’s Request for Production of Documents (Set One) No. 4—

Defendant’s Financial Records From 2011 and 2012; and 

(c) Plaintiff’s Request for Production of Documents (Set Two) No. 18—PC 

Iron’s Current Financial Records 

The Court declines to entertain these untimely discovery disputes. The Court’s 

Chambers Rules clearly require that such disputes be presented to the Court for 

consideration within 30 days of the disputes arising. This requirement is also reiterated in 

the Scheduling Order issued in this case. (Doc. No. 11 at ¶ 7 (“All disputes concerning 

discovery shall be brought to the attention of the Magistrate Judge no later than thirty (30) 

days following the date upon which the event giving rise to the discovery dispute 

occurred.”).) Additionally, Plaintiff’s counsel is counsel of record on several cases pending 

before the Court, one of those cases is well into the discovery process, and that case has 

included a discovery dispute before this Court.3

 Plaintiff’s counsel should have been 

                                               

3

 At the April 14, 2017 Case Management Conference in this case, the Court advised the 

parties to immediately meet and confer once disputes arise and bring them to the Court’s 

attention quickly if meet and confer efforts did not resolve the dispute. Moreover, 

Plaintiff’s counsel in this case is also lead counsel in U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity 

Commission v. CJMBS Pharmacies, Inc. et al., 16-CV-2410-MMA(WVG). When counsel 

participated in the March 23, 2017 Case Management Conference in that case, the Court 

concluded by expressly advising the parties: “If you bring a dispute to me that’s more than 

30 days old, then I’m not going to entertain it.” Accordingly, Plaintiff’s counsel has 

personally been on notice that failure to comply with the Court’s 30-day deadline would 

lead to the result the Court reaches today. It is immaterial that the Court did not expressly 

warn Plaintiff’s counsel in the instant case. The Court had expressly warned counsel a few 

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familiar with the 30-day submission policy in the Chambers Rules and expressly stated in 

the Scheduling Order in this case. Counsel should also have been aware that the Court 

would not consider untimely disputes given the express admonition to that affect in the 

CJMBS Pharmacies case. Counsel nonetheless elected to not comply with the Court’s 

explicit rules and orders, failed to heed the Court’s admonition, and assumed the risk that 

the Court would follow through and enforce its rules. 

Here, all three RFP disputes are untimely. With respect to RFP No. 18, the parties 

did not notify the Court of its existence until 40 days after the 30-day deadline had expired 

on August 17, 2017.4

 With respect to the dispute over Defendant’s financial records from 

2011 and 2012, which Plaintiff claims are responsive to RFP No. 4, the parties first notified 

the Court of its existence 105 days after the 30-day deadline expired.5

 Finally, with respect 

                                               

weeks before the Case Management Conference in this case, counsel’s knowledge of the 

Court’s procedures transferred to the instant case, and that knowledge is properly imputed 

to Plaintiff through counsel. See generally Link v. Wabash R.R. Co., 370 U.S. 626, 633 

(1962); W. Coast Theater Corp. v. City of Portland, 897 F.2d 1519, 1523 (9th Cir. 1990) 

(“A plaintiff cannot avoid dismissal by arguing that he or she is an innocent party who will 

be made to suffer for the errors of his or her attorney. The established principle is that the 

faults and defaults of the attorney may be imputed to, and their consequences visited upon, 

his or her client.”) (citations omitted); see Irwin v. Dep’t of Veterans Affairs, 498 U.S. 89, 

92 (1990) (service on attorney constitutes notice to clients); Cmty. Dental Servs. v. Tani, 

282 F.3d 1164, 1168 (9th Cir. 2002) (“Under this circuit’s precedent, a client is ordinarily 

chargeable with his counsel’s negligent acts.”). 

4

 Defendant served its response to RFP No. 18 on July 13, 2017. The response 

unequivocally stated that Defendant would “not comply with this request” based on the 

objections specified in the response. Given this firm declination to provide the documents, 

the 30-day clock began to run on July 13, 2017 and expired on August 12, 2017. The 

parties first presented this dispute to the Court on September 21, 2017—40 days late—

through a joint telephone call to the undersigned’s chambers. 

5

 Defendant served its RFP No. 4 response on May 9, 2017. The RFP had asked for “all 

documents” related to Defendant’s claim that Perez was “laid off.” The RFP singled-out 

and specifically referenced paragraph 27 of Defendant’s Answer, which made no mention 

of financial records or low business volume as the basis for Perez’s layoff. Defendant 

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to the dispute over Anderson’s personal notes, the parties missed the 30-day deadline by 

four days.6

 Accordingly, all three disputes are untimely and, as such, the Court will not 

entertain them. 

 Lest one misconstrue this result as unjust or draconian, the assignment of blame 

rightfully rests with the party that chose to ignore the Court’s clearly-established and 

clearly-communicated rules and policies. If rules and orders are to mean anything, they 

must be enforced. This basic tenet of the practice of law is emphasized from the very 

beginning of attorneys’ careers in law schools across the country. Even before they are 

attorneys, law students are admonished to either strictly abide by deadlines or seek 

extensions from the courts. Common sense dictates that doing neither of these is not an 

option or a choice that will end well—especially when the judge expressly informs the 

attorneys of the consequences. Attorneys ignore court-imposed rules and deadlines at their 

                                               

accordingly had no reasonable expectation that this RFP requested financial documents. 

But Plaintiff, as the proponent of the RFP, surely knew what this RFP contemplated, as 

counsel now contends Defendant’s financial documents are indeed responsive. (See 

Plaintiff’s Discovery Statement at 7 (“Plaintiff also contends that Defendant’s financial 

records are responsive to RFP 4 because they reflect Defendant’s financial condition and 

low sale volume in late 2011-2012 . . . .”).) Thus, when Plaintiff received Defendant’s 

response to this RFP on May 9 and discovered the absence of financial records from 2011 

and 2012, the dispute arose, and the 30-day deadline began to run, on that date. 

Accordingly, the deadline expired on June 8, 2017. Plaintiff first raised the dispute with 

Defendant on September 7, 2017. The parties first presented this dispute to the Court on 

September 21, 2017—105 days late—through the same joint telephone call mentioned 

above. 

6

 Defendant served its response to RFP No. 4 on May 9, 2017. The 30-day timeline 

ordinarily would have begun to run on that day with respect to the dispute over Anderson’s 

notes. However, Plaintiff did not learn of the notes’ existence until Anderson’s deposition 

on August 18, 2017. Thus, the timeline began to run on that date and expired on September 

17, 2017. The parties first presented this dispute to the Court on September 21, 2017—4 

days late—through the same joint telephone call mentioned above. 

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peril and at the peril of their clients. Indeed, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has long 

expressed and endorsed this basic concept in the practice of law: 

[T]he district court needs the authority to manage the cases 

before it efficiently and effectively. In these days of heavy 

caseloads, trial courts in both the federal and state systems 

routinely set schedules and establish deadlines to foster the 

efficient treatment and resolution of cases. Those efforts will be 

successful only if the deadlines are taken seriously by the parties, 

and the best way to encourage that is to enforce the deadlines. 

Parties must understand that they will pay a price for failure to 

comply strictly with scheduling and other orders, and that failure 

to do so may properly support severe sanctions and exclusions of 

evidence. 

Wong v. Regents of the Univ. of Cal., 410 F.3d 1052, 1060 (9th Cir. 2004) (emphasis 

added); see also Johnson v. Mammoth Recreations, Inc., 975 F.2d 604, 610 (9th Cir. 1992) 

(“A scheduling order is not a frivolous piece of paper, idly entered, which can be cavalierly 

disregarded without peril.”) (internal quotations and citation omitted). 

As the Ninth Circuit stated, Plaintiff’s counsel here risked paying a quite predictable 

price for failing to comply with the 30-day deadline she should have been aware of based 

on her experience with this Court, this Court’s Chambers Rules, and the Scheduling Order 

issued in this case. By not complying with these directives, she assumed the risk that 

today’s predictable result would follow and cannot credibly begrudge the Court for 

enforcing a rule that the Court has warned would be enforced in this manner. 

4. Plaintiff’s Request for Production of Documents (Set Two) No. 17—Employee 

Files of Vanessa Lopez 

Defendant’s objections are SUSTAINED. Defendant hired Vanessa Lopez roughly 

five to six years after Perez ceased working at PC Iron. The Court finds Lopez is not an 

appropriate comparator in this case given this remoteness between her employment and 

Perez’s employment. See Warkentine v. Soria, 152 F. Supp. 3d 1269, 1294 (E.D. Cal. 

2016) (stating that to “‘be considered similarly situated, the class of one challenger and his 

comparators must be prima facie identical in all relevant respects or directly comparable in 

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all material respects.’”) (quoting U.S. v. Moore, 543 F.3d 891, 896 (7th Cir. 2008)); see 

also Bryant v. Aiken Reg’l Med. Ctrs., Inc., 333 F.3d 536, 546 (4th Cir. 2003) (concluding 

that employee identified by defendant as similarly situated to plaintiff to rebut inference of 

discrimination in defendant’s failure to hire plaintiff, was not similarly situated to plaintiff 

where the employee “was not hired until several months after Bryant filed charges of racial 

discrimination”); Lee v. Kansas City So. Ry., 574 F.3d 253, 259 (5th Cir. 2009) 

(“Employees . . . who were the subject of adverse employment actions too remote in time 

from that taken against the plaintiff generally will not be deemed similarly situated.”); 

Tibbs v.Calvary United Methodist Church, 505 Fed. Appx. 508, 515-16 (6th Cir. 2012) 

(concluding that “comparators were not similarly situated in that there is no temporal nexus 

to the events here” when disciplinary decisions concerning comparators were seven months 

to two years removed from plaintiff’s termination); Swann v. US Foods, Inc., 2015 U.S. 

Dist. LEXIS 78665, at *27 (E.D. Va. June 17, 2015) (five to ten year span too remote); 

Hurst v. Dist. of Columbia, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 33623, at *21 (D. Md. Mar. 16, 2015) 

(five year span too remote); Epps v. First Energy Nuclear Operating Co., 2013 U.S. Dist. 

LEXIS 41140, at *60 (W.D. Pa. Mar. 25, 2013) (four-and-a-half-year span too remote). 

The parties shall proceed in a manner not inconsistent with this Order. 

IT IS SO ORDERED. 

DATED: October 11, 2017 

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