carefully examined her arguments, the defendant’s responses, and the actual documents
submitted to the EEOC. We deny plaintiffs request for these admissions and make the
following comment:

lt appears that if defendant were to deny either or both of the above requests to
admit, plaintiff would attempt to impeach the answers with the deposition testimony of
Reed and Bordelon, and/or the position statement itself. In the interest of putting this issue
to rest, we will try to short-circuit additional inquiry right now. Despite plaintiff's contentions
to the contrary, we do not believe that either Reed’s or Bordelon’s depositions conclusively
admit either of these statements. Reed admits that plaintiff had asked her some time in
late 1998 whether plaintiff's promotion delays were because of her race. Reed also
testified that in early 1999 she thought that plaintiff might file a charge of discrimination,
and that she shared this belief with Bordelon some time after that. Bordelon, for his part,
admits that as of some time in February 1999, it was clear that plaintiff was complaining
of race discrimination, and his position statement reflects that plaintiff complained to him
about race discrimination in February, 1999. Even if Bordelon and/or Reed knew plaintiff
was complaining of race discrimination earlier than January 1999, there is no evidence that
others at defendant — such as those who completed her performance evaluation - were
aware that plaintiff believed her failure to be promoted was because of her race.”

A defendant's written statement to the EEOC is intended to communicate its

position regarding a recently filed charge of discrimination. The EEOC does not require

? We note that Reed testified that she did meet with several of plaintiff's supervisor's
about plaintiff's promotion concerns in 1998, but there is no evidence that Reed mentioned
plaintiff's concerns vis-a-vis her race.


plaintiff needs this information so she can assess whether her theory that minority
employees were promoted at a slower rate than White employees is correct. Despite the
fact that defendant may have produced pieces of this information in answering other
discovery requests, we do not believe it has produced hire and promotion information for
every individual, and we order it to do so.

Interrogatory 8: Plaintiff seeks identification of every team under the supervision of
plaintiff's supervisors that functioned without a project leader between June 1, 1997 and
December 31, 1999. Plaintiff argues that it was defendant's decision not to provide her
team with a project leader that led to her performance and workload-management issues,
which resulted in her being removed as team leader. She speculates that her team was
the only one to operate without a project leader and the only one with a Black team leader;
she wants to know if all the teams led by White team leaders had project leaders.
Defendant argues that this request asks for information regarding its business judgment,
which is not discoverable.

If in fact plaintiff's was the only team to function without a project leader, and she
was the only Black team leader, such information may be relevant.® We grant this request,
but make a limiting instruction: we order defendant to identify any teams that functioned
without a project leader, but plaintiff is not entitled to additional discovery on the scope or

purpose of any of the identified teams. We can envision requests from the plaintiff that she

5 We take note of defendant's objection that its staffing decisions are business
decisions not reviewable by the Court. Although we are ordering defendant to answer this
interrogatory, we recognize that even the answer plaintiff is looking for may not be very
probative of discrimination. In any event, we recognize that the Court may not second-
guess defendant's staffing decisions.


at issue. These requests are denied.

Request to Admit 14: This request asks the defendant to admit or deny whether certain
individuals listed on the document Bordelon submitted to the EEOC were promoted to 2
Vice President (“2VP”) after the plaintiff filed her charge of discrimination. Plaintiff claims
that this request is relevant both to whether defendant had any Black managers in
plaintiff's group before she filed her charge and also goes to defendant's credibility.*
Since this is not a pattern and practice case, the number of Black managers in plaintiff's
group is not relevant; in any event, the Court has reviewed numerous documents listing
various employees’ promotion dates and is well able to determine whether these dates
were before or after plaintiff's promotion in September, 1999. As to whether the
defendant's argument that it has a three-year promotion track is credible, plaintiff sets forth
at least three arguments disputing this claim, including referencing defendant's own
records that allegedly show many officers who were promoted in less than three years. We
do not believe an admission regarding whether certain individuals were promoted before
or after plaintiff's charge of discrimination is relevant to whether any employees were
promoted in less than three years. Plaintiff has obtained discovery from defendant on the
length of the promotion track for various employees; this information is much more relevant

to her claims. Thus, we deny this request.

3 Plaintiff's mention of credibility in this instance seems to refer only to her argument
that defendant's claim that it has a three year management promotion track is not credible.
Elsewhere in her requests to admit, plaintiff argues that defendant was not credible when
it submitted certain information to the EEOC. If plaintiff is arguing that this request is
relevant to credibility in that sense, we do not see the relevance and thus uphold our denial
of this request.


defendants to submit such statements, nor does it require that they be verified. Further,
such statements are often used as a starting point for additional investigation by the EEOC
investigator. We don’t know if plaintiff raised Bordelon’s alleged omissions or
misstatements to the EEOC or what type of discovery was conducted there. Although
some of the information Bordelon submitted to the EEOC may not be in the format plaintiff
believes would most help her case, her own comments about what is missing or inaccurate
demonstrate that she already has the information necessary to make arguments in support
of her position. We caution the plaintiff about continuing to argue that Bordelon submitted
false information to the EEOC unless she has undisputable proof (as opposed to
speculation based on generalized deposition testimony), in support of her contentions.
This caution applies to her other discovery requests concerning the EEOC discussed below
as well.

Requests to Admit 11 -12: These requests also deal with Bordelon’s submissions to the
EEOC; specifically, they ask whether Bordelon received a certain one page document
request from the EEOC investigator and whether he submitted a particular document,
presumably in response. Both of the documents speak for themselves, and plaintiff has
already deposed Bordelon about their contents and whether the EEOC modified its request
after talking to Bordelon. There is no evidentiary advantage to be gained by requiring the
defendant to answer these questions again, but we note that defendant is estopped from
denying the existence or authenticity of the documents, or arguing that it did not receive
the first one or produce the second. This Court is well aware of the parties’ arguments
regarding the alleged significance (or lack thereof) of these documents and what they say,
and it will be able to adjudge their relevance and admissibility at trial should they be placed

5


agree that many of plaintiff's requests are duplicative of information she already has or
irrelevant to her claims, we will not fault her for the tenacity with which she has pursued this
case. Now however is the time for the parties to evaluate and focus on the information
they already have, as we believe that most of the information relevant to plaintiff's claims
(whether it helps her case or not), has been produced. Discovery would be a never-ending
process if courts allowed parties to investigate every comment, issue, or speculation raised
at depositions or allowed parties to tailor their discovery based on their own belief of what
the truth is or should be.*

That said, although defendant asks that we grant a protective order with regard to
plaintiffs two most recent sets of discovery requests, it then states that it will attempt to
answer some of them. Further, plaintiff has withdrawn some of her requests; all that
remain are nine interrogatories and one document request, each of which we will review
individually.

lronically, several of the current requests by the plaintiff appear to be some of the
most relevant of the many she has propounded. Whether this is because she has become
better able to focus on the major issues or because she finally received predicate
information she needed from the defendant does not matter.

Interrogatories 1 -2: These interrogatories ask for hire and promotion information for
particular Black employees of defendant who were promoted to 2TM VP, and also asks

whether they were on the technical or management track at defendant. Presumably,

‘ Engaging in discovery that relentlessly pursues every tangent can also have the
unintended consequence of clouding the Court's ability to differentiate between the major
or important issues — which might be worthy of additional discovery — and those that are
only of minimal significance.


Minute Order Form (06/97)

United States District Court, Northern District of Illinois

Name of Assigned Judge Sitting Judge if Other i
or Magistrate Judge Donald E. Walter than Assigned Judge Michael T. Mason
CASE NUMBER 01 C 2290 DATE 6/10/2002
CASE Stallings-Daniel vs. The Northern Trust Co.
TITLE
[In the foltowing box (a) indicate the party filing the motion, e.g., plaintiff, defendant, 3rd party plaintiff, and (b) state briefly the nature

MOTION: of the motion being presented.]

DOCKET ENTRY:

(1) Oo Filed motion of [ use listing in “Motion” box above.]

(2) im Brief in support of motion due

(3) Qo Answer brief to motion due. . Reply to answer brief due.

(4) aq Ruling/Hearing on set for at

(5) oO Status hearing[held/continued to] [set for/re-set for] on set for at

(6) im] Pretrial conference[held/continued to] [set for/re-set for] on set for at :

(oO) Oo Trial[set for/re-set for] on at

(8) oO [Bench/Jury trial] [Hearing] held/continued to at

(9) Oo This case is dismissed [with/without] prejudice and without costs[by/agreement/pursuant to]

OOFRCP4(m) (General Rule 21 CIFRCP41(a)(1) CI FRCP41(a)(2).

(io) =f [Other docket entry] For the reasons stated in the attached Memorandum Opinion and Order,
plaintiffs motion to compel [64-1] and defendant’s motion for protective order [71-1] are granted in part
and denied in part. Enter Memorandum Opinion and Order.

(11) ff [For further detail see order attached to the original minute order.}

No notices required, advised in open court.
No notices required. number of notices
Noti iled by judge’s staff. !
v lotices mailed by judge’s sta! JUN 1 1 2002
Notified counsel by telephone. inrohederes
Docketing to mail notices. WW
Mail AO 450 form. f vA deputy las
Copy to judge/magistrate judge. i
pi! 40/2002
courtroom SOs ua ot dote'mailed notice |
KF deputy's KF
initials art
UL .Date/time recti¥ed in
central Clerk’s Office ‘malling deputy inials



responsive answers (we suspect a little of both). However, without the identity of the
author, we cannot fault plaintiff for not obtaining some of the information she requests. We
order defendant to answer interrogatory 11, except for parts c and d, since those
subsections cover information unrelated to the comment.® Similarly, we order defendant
to answer interrogatory 13.

Interrogatory 14: We agree with defendant that the information plaintiff seeks about Don
Cavelli’s employment at Northern Trust is not relevant to her claim; she admits she already
has the information she needs to try to prove Cavelli’s hostility towards her, and his
subsequent assignments at defendant are not relevant.

Interrogatory 15: In interrogatory 15, plaintiff seeks the identity of the individual who added
a paragraph to her performance review that she claims not to have seen before, and other
information about the drafts of the review. Defendant has already testified that it does not
know who wrote the final paragraph and states that to its knowledge, plaintiff participated
in every version of her review. There is nothing to be gained from ordering the defendant
to provide these answers again, so this request is denied.

Request to Produce 3: Plaintiff seeks the eligibility requirements for two different bonus
awards, one of which she received one-month prior to her first complaints of discrimination.
The eligibility requirements for the award plaintiff received — the NTRS award — are
relevant to her claims and must be produced; the requirements for the SIP award are not

relevant and do not have to be produced.

® That is, plaintiff was aware of Foote’s removal from a team leader position even

before she saw the comment on her performance appraisal that Foote was “counseled out
of TL”.

11


be provided with the purpose of all identified teams, the number of team members, etc.,
in order to try to demonstrate that the other teams without project leaders were much
different than plaintiff's team; we will not entertain requests to discover whether such
speculation is true.

Interrogatory 9: Plaintiff has simplified this interrogatory to focus on the details surrounding
Darrin Foote’s removal from one team leader position, his placement in another, and his
eventual move to a technical position. We are not going to parse through depositions to
determine whether the plaintiff could have or should have asked this question; it is relevant
to defendant's anticipated identification of Foote as a White employee similarly situated to
plaintiff, and thus we order that it answer this interrogatory as amended by plaintiff in her
April 23, 2002 brief.

Interrogatory 10: Plaintiff wishes to know the identity of every individual who has claimed
plaintiff has a gambling problem. As plaintiff has refused to produce her tax returns so that
defendant could confirm or deny this alleged problem, we deny plaintiff's request to
discover the source of the comment.

Interrogatories 11, 13: In these interrogatories, plaintiff seeks the identity of the individuals
who made handwritten and typed notations about or relevant to plaintiff and her
employment on several produced documents. Although defendant has repeatedly
indicated that it will attempt to identify the authors of the comments, it has not yet done so;
it also argues that it should not have to respond to additional questions about the
documents because plaintiff should have obtained the information through deposition
testimony. Again, without parsing the depositions line by line, we cannot determine
whether the plaintiff failed to ask the right questions or the defendant failed to give

10


Requests to Admit 15 - 17: These requests focus again on the accuracy of Bordelon’s

submission to the EEOC as well as facts regarding when certain individuals were promoted
to 2VP. We have read the parties’ arguments and have also reviewed for a second time
Bordelon’s affidavit, submitted in support of defendant’s response to plaintiff's motion to
reconsider our denial of her request for electronic discovery. Bordelon’s affidavit sets forth
in detail his interaction with the EEOC during its investigation of plaintiffs claims. He
provides copies of all correspondence from the EEOC, including its document requests,
and explains the various conversations he had with the investigator, during which certain
requests were modified. Considering this information as well as plaintiff's own arguments,
we can find no evidence that Bordelon submitted false or misleading information to the
EEOC. Further, plaintiff had an opportunity to depose Bordelon on the subject of his
EEOC submissions. We see no relevance in requiring the defendant to continue
answering requests to admit on this subject. Further, we reiterate our caution to the
plaintiff regarding any continuation of this line of argument. These requests are denied.
Request to Admit 20: This requests asks defendant to speculate on whether Bordelon
knew that certain information he was submitting to the EEOC would not be relevant to its
investigation. This request is vague and calls for a legal conclusion about the EEOC and
thus is denied.

Defendant’s Motion for Protective Order

Defendant filed a motion for protective order asking that we relieve it from
responding to plaintiff's sixth set of interrogatories and sixth set of document requests. In
its memo, defendant accuses plaintiff of embarking on a campaign to “harass, annoy and

oppress” defendant by filing irrelevant and overbroad discovery requests. Although we

7


testified generally that she had had discussions with employees about Alexander's
communication style; she implies that Alexander was not always an effective
communicator. Plaintiff speculates that information about Alexander's alleged failure to
communicate could explain the complaints made about plaintiffs Valuations Team and
show that Vicino knew it was Alexander's fault, and not plaintiff's, that the team was having
problems. We are not convinced from Vicino’s deposition that such “complaints” would
ever have been memorialized into written documents or that such documents would be
relevant. Further, plaintiff has evidence of Vicino’s knowledge ‘of Alexander's
communication issues in the deposition itself. This request is denied.

Plaintiff's Fourth Request to Admit

Requests to Admit 5 - 6: This dispute concerns plaintiff's contention that attorney Richard
Bordelon purposefully omitted from defendant's response to plaintiffs EEOC charge the
fact that plaintiff had complained of race discrimination internally prior to receiving a
negative performance review some time in February, 1999. Indeed, a large number of
plaintiff's document requests center on her attempt to demonstrate that Bordelon knowingly
submitted false or misleading information to the EEOC. Plaintiff has redrafted these two
requests, and asks that defendant admit or deny that: 1) “Terri Reed informed Richard
Bordelon prior to February 1, 1999 that plaintiff said words to the effect that she believed
defendant had delayed her promotion because of her race”; and 2) “Richard Bordelon
knew atthe time that he submitted defendant's EEOC position statement to the EEOC, that
plaintiff said words to the effect that she believed defendant had delayed her promotion
because of her race to Terri Reed prior to February, 1999.” (sic) As we discuss below,

before addressing each of plaintiff's requests that concern the EEOC submissions, we

3


clerical processing, and that it had already given the plaintiff copies of all promotion
recommendations for individuals she identified as similar to her. In her response to
defendant's objection, plaintiff describes this request differently, asking for “[alll lists of
potential candidates for promotion that were generated by Tim Kaczmarek referenced in
Terri Reed’s deposition (see page 42 of Terri Reed’s deposition), not otherwise produced.
..” This is not the first time that the plaintiff has changed the scope or reasoning for an
already propounded request. She argues that she needs these documents to try to prove
her theory that others employed by defendant were promoted in less than three years.
We are not convinced that the records plaintiff seeks are either relevant or tailored to
discover the information she seeks. Indeed, other documents already in the plaintiff's
possession demonstrate that there were in fact certain employees who were promoted in
less than three years, and some whose promotion track was much longer.' We are not
going to expand the scope of discovery at this date. This request is denied.

Request 9: This request asks for all documents related to the creation and dissolution of
the ART team. Plaintiff contends that Vicino’s offer of a position as head of the ART team
was asham. We agree that these documents are relevant to plaintiff's claim of pretext and
order that they be produced.

Requests 13-14: These requests seek documents regarding one of plaintiff's supervisors,

Sharon Alexander. Specifically, plaintiff notes that her other supervisor, Kay Vicino,

' For example, plaintiff has a copy of a document submitted by Richard Bordelon
to the EEOC in response to its request for documents (bates numbers D000144, 145, 147,
148). Regardless of plaintiff's contention that this document contains misleading
information, it does provide the promotion histories for minority and non-minority individuals
in the Trust Systems department.


IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS
EASTERN DIVISION

SHIRLEY STALLINGS-DANIEL
Plaintiff,
No. 01 C 2290

v.
Judge Donald E. Walter

Mag. Judge Mason
POCKETED

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER JUN 1 1 2002

THE NORTHERN TRUST COMPANY,

Defendant.

wwe wee SSS SESS

Michael T. Mason, United States Magistrate Judge:

We hope we are nearing the end of the discovery disputes between these two
parties, and intend to use this opinion to finalize several outstanding discovery issues and
define the scope of another. In our March 18, 2002 order addressing one of the plaintiff's
motions to compel, we granted the defendant the opportunity to respond to several of
plaintiff's requests. Both parties have withdrawn some of their objections and requests in
the interest of judicial economy, and we thank them for doing so. Before us now are those
remaining discovery disputes on which the parties cannot agree, as well as defendant's
motion for a protective order regarding additional discovery propounded by the plaintiff.
We will address each request in turn.

Plaintiff's Fifth Request for Production of Documents

Request 6(c): Plaintiff's original request (as set forth in her March 11, 2002 motion), asked
for “all recommendations received by Kathy Fulton for 2" Vice President” as referenced
on page 43 of Terri Reed’s deposition. Defendant objected that Fulton was a Human

Resources assistant who merely received copies of promotion recommendations for


Plaintiff also argues that defendant has still not produced certain discovery pursuant
to our January 24, 2002 order. To the extent it has not yet done so, defendant must
produce: 1) a TSD organizational chart for 1999; 2) an unredacted copy of the so-called
“update discussion”; and 3) EEO-1 reports for officers in the TSD who were eligible to be
promoted to 2VP from 1993 to 1999.”

Discovery between the parties is now closed. If either party wishes to file any
additional discovery motions, it may do so only with leave of Court. As stated above,
plaintiff's motion to compel is granted in part and denied in part and defendant’s motion for

a protective order is granted in part and denied in part. It is so ordered.

ENTER:

A =e
MICHAEL T.' MASON
United States Magistrate Judge

Dated: June 10, 2002

” Our original order only specified that defendant produce “EEO data” reflecting
employees eligible for promotion; EEO-1 reports are the most accurate and efficient way
to compile and produce that information.

12