Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-azd-2_10-cv-02024/USCOURTS-azd-2_10-cv-02024-5/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 370
Nature of Suit: Other Fraud
Cause of Action: 28:1332 Diversity-Fraud

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WO 

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF ARIZONA 

Liberty Life Insurance Company,

Plaintiff, 

v. 

Eric L. Myers, et al., 

Defendants. 

No. CV 10-2024-PHX-JAT 

ORDER

 Pending before the Court is Defendant Eric L. Myers’ Motion Seeking Ruling by 

Judge Teilborg Regarding the Court’s Rule 16 Scheduling Order (Doc. 236). Plaintiff 

Liberty Life has filed a Response (Doc. 238) and Defendant has filed a Reply (Doc. 241). 

 Defendant requests that the Court deny Plaintiff’s use of three items of discovery 

because Defendant contends that these three items were “sought” after the February 29, 

2012, discovery deadline. (Doc. 236 at 2). 

I. BACKGROUND 

 On December 12, 2010, in the Rule 16 Scheduling Order, the Court set the 

discovery deadline for September 30, 2011. (Doc. 52 at 2). In that Order, this Court made 

it clear that, 

the Court will not entertain discovery disputes after the close of 

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discovery barring extraordinary circumstances. Therefore, the 

parties shall complete all discovery by the deadline . . . (complete 

being defined as including the time to propound discovery, the 

time to answer all propounded discovery, the time for the Court 

to resolve all discovery disputes, and the time to complete any 

final discovery necessitated by the Court’s ruling on any 

discovery disputes). Thus, “last minute” or “eleventh hour” 

discovery which results in insufficient time to undertake 

additional discovery and which requires an extension of the 

discovery deadline will be met with disfavor, and may result in 

denial of an extension, exclusion of evidence, or the imposition 

of other sanctions. 

(Id. at 3 n. 3). On October 24, 2011, in response to the parties’ Motion to Extend 

Discovery and Disclosure Deadlines (Doc. 160), the Court moved the discovery deadline 

back to February 29, 2012. (Doc. 164 at 2). 

 Defendant wants the Court to deny Plaintiff the use of Defendant’s account 

records from Bank of America, the indemnification agreement between Eric Myers, 

Brooke Myers Wilson, Erin Myers Stoloff, and Kirsten Anne Reggiano and any 

communications leading to the execution of the indemnification agreement, and the 

deposition of Robert Comeau. (Doc. 236 at 2). 

II. The Bank of America Account Records 

 Liberty Life first served Bank of America with its subpoena duces tecum (the 

“Subpoena”) for Defendant’s account records on January 7, 2011. On January 24, 2011, 

Defendant added to his motion to stay discovery (Doc. 67) and objected to the Subpoena 

arguing that his account records were not relevant to any claims. (Doc. 76 at 1). On 

February 25, 2011, the Court denied Defendant’s motion to stay discovery and ordered 

Defendant to respond to any outstanding discovery within twenty days of the order. (Doc. 

87). Evidently this Order by the Court was not clear enough. Almost one year later, on 

January 31, 2012, with the request for the account information still outstanding, Plaintiff 

sent a letter to Defendant inquiring about the Subpoena. (Doc. 238-1 at 3). On February 

21, 2012, the parties conducted another hearing before the Court regarding the Subpoena. 

The Court again overruled Defendant’s objections and explicitly ordered Bank of America 

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to respond to the Subpoena. (Doc. 214). On February 23, 2012, Plaintiff sent a copy of 

the order to Bank of America to produce documents responsive to the Subpoena. Bank of 

America’s responsive documents were received by Plaintiff on March 9, 2012. 

 Defendant proffers no argument why he did not comply with this Court’s order in 

February 2011 (Doc. 87) denying his motion to stay discovery and therefore his addition 

to his motion to discovery (Doc. 76) (arguing against the Subpoena). The Order explicitly 

instructed Defendant to respond to any outstanding discovery within twenty days of the 

order. (Doc. 87). Instead, Defendant continued to object to the discovery request until the 

Court had to deny the objection a second time. (See Doc. 214). Defendant’s actions were 

the overwhelming reason the account records were not turned over prior to the discovery 

deadline. Accordingly, the Court denies Defendant’s motion to suppress the account 

records. 

III. The Indemnification Agreement 

 Similar to the Bank of America records, the sole reason the Indemnification 

Agreement (the “Agreement”) was not turned over prior to the discovery deadline was 

Defendant’s actions. Plaintiff requested the Agreement on January 30, 2012. Defendant 

objected to the request and appeared telephonically before the Court to argue his objection 

on February 21, 2012. The Court overruled Defendant’s objection to producing the 

Agreement. (Doc. 214). Apparently this did not make it clear to Defendant to 

immediately produce the Agreement. Defendant continued to object on other grounds to 

production. Defendant appeared before the Court again on March 6, 2012, arguing why 

he should not have to produce the Agreement. For the second time, the Court overruled 

Defendant’s objections and ordered him to produce the Agreement. (Doc. 222). 

Defendant turned over the Agreement on March 6, 2012. 

 For the same reasons the Court denied Defendant’s request regarding the account 

records, the Court denies Defendant’s request to suppress the Indemnification Agreement. 

Defendant’s actions were the reason the account records were not turned over prior to the 

discovery deadline. 

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IV. Robert Comeau Deposition 

 Defendants Donald and Joan Myers disclosed that they intended to call Robert 

Comeau as an expert witness at trial on December 2, 2011. Plaintiff’s counsel waited over 

two months, until February 16, 2012, to schedule Mr. Comeau’s deposition. The first 

available date for the deposition was March 5, 2012, five days after the deadline. 

Contrary to Defendant’s argument that this item of discovery was not “sought” until after 

the deadline, Plaintiff tried to address the deposition prior to the deadline. However, 

under the definition of complete that this Court made both parties aware of in the Rule 16 

Scheduling Order, Plaintiff failed to ensure that discovery was complete prior to the 

discovery deadline. Accordingly, the Court grants Defendant Eric L. Myer’s request to 

deny Plaintiff the use of this item of discovery. 

V. CONCLUSION 

 Based on the foregoing, 

IT IS ORDERED denying in part and granting in part Defendant Eric L. Myer’s 

Motion Seeking Ruling Re: the Rule 16 Scheduling Order (Doc. 236). Specifically, the 

Court denies Defendant’s request to deny Plaintiff the use of the account records and the 

Indemnity Agreement. The Court grants Defendant’s request to deny Plaintiff the use of 

the Robert Comeau deposition. 

 Dated this 11th day of February, 2013. 

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