Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-almd-3_10-cv-00219/USCOURTS-almd-3_10-cv-00219-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
James Beacher
Defendant
Macon County Board of Education
Defendant
Venesia McClaney
Plaintiff
Gwendolyn T. Moore
Defendant

Document Text:

IN THE DISTRICT COURT OF THE UNITED STATES FOR THE

MIDDLE DISTRICT OF ALABAMA, EASTERN DIVISION

VENESIA McCLANEY, )

)

Plaintiff, )

) CIVIL ACTION NO.

v. ) 3:10cv219-MHT

) (WO)

MACON COUNTY BOARD OF )

EDUCATION; GWENDOLYN T. )

MOORE; and JAMES BEACHER, )

)

Defendants. )

OPINION AND ORDER

The issue before the court is whether some of the

parties to this litigation should be allowed to file a

motion for summary judgment over two months after the

deadline for dispositive motions established earlier by

the court in a pretrial scheduling order issued pursuant

to Rule 16 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. For

the reasons that follow, the answer is no.

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I.

Because dates and deadlines are important in the

resolution of the matter before the court, the following

chronological background is provided:

March 11, 2010: Plaintiff Venesia McClaney filed

this lawsuit against the following defendants: (1) the

Macon County Board of Education; (2) Gwendolyn T. Moore,

the former superintendent of the Macon County School

System; and (3) James Beacher, a former teacher in the

school system. McClaney asserts the following federal

claims: (1) sex discrimination and retaliation, based on

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended (42

U.S.C. §§ 1981a, 2000e though 2000e-17) and the

Fourteenth Amendment (as enforced through 42 U.S.C.

§ 1983); and (2) interference and retaliation under the

Family and Medical Leave Act (29 U.S.C. § 2601-2654).

She also charges them with the following state claims:

(1) invasion of privacy and (2) assault and battery.

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April 7: Pursuant to Rules 16 (“Pretrial

Conferences; Scheduling; Management”) and 26 (“Duty to

Disclose; General Provisions Governing Discovery”) and

Form 52 (“Report of the Parties' Planning Meeting”) of

the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, the parties

submitted a planning report recommending a trial date of

February 14, 2011, and that dispositive motions should be

filed not later than 90 days before the pretrial

conference. Because this case arises out of the Eastern

Division of the Middle District of Alabama, the trial

will take place at the federal courthouse in Opelika,

Alabama, the division’s seat. For 2011, the court will

hold trials in Opelika on only three dates: February 14,

June 6, and November 7.

April 9: Pursuant to Rule 16, the court entered a

uniform-scheduling order adopting the parties’

recommendation that the trial be set for February 14,

2011, and that dispositive motions be filed 90 days before

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1. The requirement that the parties file dispositive

motions no later than 90 days before the pretrial

conference is a uniform one of all the district judges of

this court. The basis for the requirement, as explained

on the court’s website, is as follows:

“Litigants before the Court are entitled

to careful consideration of the issues

by the Court. In order to give

non-movants a reasonable time to respond

and movants time to reply, final

submission is approximately a month

after the dispositive motion is filed.

The Court must have sufficient time to

fully and properly consider issues

raised on a motion for summary judgment.

The deadlines established in the Court’s

scheduling order insure achievement of

these purposes. The judges try to

resolve summary judgment motions in

advance of pretrial hearings. Neither

moving the summary judgment deadline to

the cutoff of discovery nor cutting off

discovery at the earlier summary

judgment deadline would be appropriate.

Any attorney viewing a case as one

appropriate for summary judgment should

schedule discovery to allow the deadline

to be met. Setting the dispositive

motion deadline prior to the end of

discovery also recognizes the realities

of litigation. Often factual issues

which should be developed for trial are

not necessary for resolution of summary

judgment issues. If summary judgment is

(continued...)

4

the pretrial conference. 1

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1. (...continued)

denied, a discovery cut-off after the

time for filing dispositive motions

allows discovery to proceed without the

necessity of a motion to reopen

discovery. The court encourages lawyers

to conduct discovery in a manner

consistent with "just, speedy and

inexpensive" procedures. See Federal

Rules of Civil Procedure, Rule 1.”

Attorney FAQ, United States District Court--Middle

Alabama (Jan. 3, 2011), Frequently Asked Questions

http://www.almd.uscourts.gov/faqs/attorney_faq.htm#rule

16.

5

The court also set the pretrial conference for January 14,

2011. The uniform-scheduling order also provided that any

objections to the order must be filed within 14 days from

the date of the order. 

April 23: Under the uniform-scheduling order, this

was the deadline for filing objections to that order. No

objection was filed.

October 16: Under the uniform-scheduling order, this

was the deadline for filing dispositive motions. No such

motion was filed.

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December 22: The defendants filed a motion for leave

to file an untimely motion for summary judgment.

December 27: The defendants filed a motion for

summary judgment.

December 28: The plaintiff filed a motion to strike

the defendants’ summary-judgment motion as untimely.

December 29: The court held an on-the-record

conference call to discuss the pending motions with

counsel for all parties.

II.

The issue presented in the pending motions is whether

defense counsel should be allowed to file a motion for

summary judgment over two month after the deadline for

filing dispositive motions. A district court is required

to issue a scheduling order that limits “the time to join

other parties, amend the pleadings, complete discovery,

and file motions.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 16(b). “This order

controls the course of the action ...,” Fed. R. Civ. P.

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16(d), and may be modified only “for good cause and with

the judge’s consent.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 16(b)(4). A

district court retains “broad discretion in deciding ...

whether to consider untimely motions for summary

judgment.” Enwonwu v. Fulton-Dekalb Hosp. Auth., 286 Fed.

Appx. 586, 595 (11th Cir. 2008) (internal quotations marks

and citation omitted). Under Rule 16(b)(4), the party

seeking to extend a deadline bears the burden of

demonstrating good cause for modifying the uniformscheduling order; otherwise, a party’s lack of diligence

and failure to notify the court of delays “would render

scheduling orders meaningless.” Sosa v. Airprint Sys.,

133 F.3d 1417, 1419 (11th Cir. 1998). The court finds

that the defendants have failed to demonstrate good cause

for why they did not request a modification to the

scheduling order until over two months (December 22, 2010)

after the deadline for dispositive motions (October 16,

2010). 

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Counsel for the defendants contends that she missed

the October 16 dispositive-motion deadline because two of

the defendants, Moore and Beacher, were terminated after

the filing of this lawsuit and were uncooperative in

providing discovery to her. The court rejects defense

counsel’s excuse for several reasons. 

First, while Superintendent Moore’s contract was

terminated after the filing of this lawsuit, it was

terminated on June 30, 2010, long before the October 16

dispositive-motion deadline. And while Beacher’s contract

was terminated on October 26 and thus after the deadline,

he was still terminated over two months before defense

counsel filed her extension request. But more

importantly, defense counsel’s representations during the

December 29 conference call reflect that her difficulty

in getting information from both Moore and Beacher began

in late spring or early summer, long before both the

October 16 dispositive-motion deadline and the December

22 date on which she filed her extension request. Thus,

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2. During the December 29 conference call, defense

counsel emphasized that her problem with Moore and

Beacher did not arise until after the 14 days she had to

object to April 9 scheduling order. The court is not

quite sure what she means by this representation. If she

(continued...)

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as August, then September, and eventually October rolled

around, defense counsel did nothing even though,

throughout the summer and early fall, she knew that she

did not have the information she contends she needed from

Moore and Beacher to prepare her case and file a

dispositive motion. Despite this long-standing difficulty

she did not ask for a hearing with the court to discuss

her problem, nor did she file a timely extension request

when it became clear that she could not meet the

dispositive-motion deadline. Simply put, defense counsel

has no excuse for allowing the October 16 dispositivemotion deadline to pass in silence. In any event, defense

counsel has offered no reason whatsoever for waiting six

months after Superintendent Moore was terminated and over

two months after Beacher was terminated to file her motion

to extend the dispositive-motion deadline.2

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2. (...continued)

is suggesting that she believed she could not request an

extension of any scheduling-order deadline after 14 days,

her belief is belied by, first, the fact that she did, in

fact, file an extension request and, second, the

provision in Rule 16(b)(4) that allows for timely

modifications of a scheduling order for “good cause.”

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Second, the uniform-scheduling order provides that:

“Absent stated unforeseen and unavoidable circumstances

beyond the control of the movant, ... ‘eleventh hour’

extension requests and motions will be denied outright.”

Scheduling order (doc. no. 14), at § 15(B). If

foreseeable eleventh-hour extension requests are

inexcusable, a foreseeable extension request that comes

over two months after a deadline is even more inexcusable.

As already explained, defense counsel’s problems were

clearly foreseeable months before the October 16

dispositive-motion deadline, and, in any event, defense

counsel has offered no excuse for waiting an additional

two months after the deadline to file her extension

request.

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Third, it appears that plaintiff’s counsel would be

prejudiced if the court were to allow the requested

extension. The pretrial conference is less than a month

away, and the trial is less than two months away.

Plaintiff’s counsel credibly notes that he would now have

to divert his activities away from trial preparation as

well as other office matters in order to address, at this

late time in the case proceedings, defense counsel’s

summary-judgment motion. Moreover, because the court’s

next Opelika trial term is not until June 6, 2011, a

continuance to allow more trial-preparation time to the

plaintiff would mean that the plaintiff would have to wait

an additional four months before her claims could be heard

and, if her claims have merit, before she could receive

the monetary and injunctive relief to which she would be

entitled. 

Fourth and finally, while, during the December 29 onthe-record conference call, defense counsel candidly

admitted she deserved “a shellacking,” she could not come

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3. Nor would allowing the late summary-judgment

motion necessarily obviate the need for a trial. Defense

counsel admitted, during the December 29 conference call,

that it was likely that some part of the litigation would

still survive summary judgment. Thus, this case is

likely to go to trial even if the court were to consider

the defendants’ untimely summary-judgment motion.

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up with a sanction that would vindicate the October 16

deadline as well as ameliorate the plaintiff’s prejudice.

She said that the school board has no money either to pay

a sanction to the court or to pay plaintiff’s attorney for

any additional expense he might incur as a result of this

significant interruption of the orderly progress of this

litigation.3

***

For the foregoing reasons, it is ORDERED that 

(1) Defendant Macon County Board of Education,

Gwendolyn T. Moore, and James Beacher’s motion

for leave to file for summary judgment (doc. no.

21) is denied.

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(2) Defendants Macon County Board of Education,

Moore, and Beacher’s motion for summary judgment

(doc. no. 22) is denied as untimely.

(3) Plaintiff Venesia McClaney’s motion to strike

(doc. no. 30) is denied as moot. 

DONE, this the 3rd day of January, 2011. 

 /s/ Myron H. Thompson 

UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

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