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IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF ARIZONA 

Guarantee Company of North AmericaUSA,

Plaintiff,

v.

Falcone Brothers & Associates 

Incorporated, et al.,

Defendants. 

No. CV-18-00157-TUC-FRZ

ORDER

 Plaintiff and Defendants Falcone Brothers, Mr. & Mrs. Gaetano Falcone, and Mr. 

& Mrs. Salvatore Falcone (the “Limited Defendants”) submitted a joint Case 

Management Report that attests the parties have very limited, if any, genuine factual or 

legal disputes in this case. See Doc. 26 at pgs. 2–4. The Limited Defendants claim that 

they need more time to analyze the Amended Complaint before they can completely 

agree to that posture. Id. However, the deadline to file an Answer has already passed. See

Doc. 25.

 Further, the Limited Defendants claim that because they “have still not filed their 

Answer to the Amended Complaint,” they do not have to comply with the Mandatory 

Initial Discovery Pilot Project. See id. at pg. 7. This assertion is incorrect. See Doc. 4 

(General Order 17-08) (“Parties must file answers, counterclaims, crossclaims, and 

replies within the time set forth in Rule 12(a)(1)-(3) even if they have filed or intend to 

file a motion to dismiss or other preliminary motion.... In cases removed from state court, 

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the responses must be filed within 30 days of removal....”). 

 The joint Case Management Report also states that Plaintiff “requests that the 

Court set a settlement conference to assist the parties entertaining the possibility of 

settlement[, and that] the Limited Defendants agree.” See Doc. 26 at pg. 6. 

 Finally, the parties have agreed to certain pretrial deadlines. See id. at pgs. 7–8. 

 Accordingly, IT IS ORDERED that Plaintiff’s Motion for Entry of Default (Doc. 

25) is DENIED.1

 IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that this matter is referred to U.S. Magistrate Judge 

Eric J. Markovich pursuant to LRCiv 83.10 for a settlement conference. Within seven 

days, the parties shall contact Judge Markovich’s Chambers to agree on a mutually 

amenable date. 

 IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that the following deadlines shall govern this action: 

Completion of Discovery — February 15, 2019; 

Pretrial Disclosure of Fact Witnesses — November 30, 2018; 

Plaintiff’s Expert Disclosure — January 15, 2019; 

Defendants’ Expert Disclosure — February 1, 2019; 

Plaintiff’s Rebuttal Expert Disclosure — February 15, 2019; 

Filing Dispositive Motions — March 26, 2019; and 

Lodging a Proposed Joint Pretrial Order — April 12, 2019 (or 30 days after 

any non-dispositive ruling on a dispositive motion). 

Dated this 17th day of October, 2018. 

 1 See, e.g., Wendt v. Pratt, 154 F.R.D. 229, 230 (D. Minn. 1994) (“Where a defendant appears 

and indicates a desire to contest an action, a court may exercise its discretion to refuse to enter 

default, in accordance with the policy of allowing cases to be tried on the merits.”) (citing Lee v. 

Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employees, 139 F.R.D. 376 (D.Minn.1991), citing 10 Charles 

A. Wright, Arthur R. Miller & Mary K. Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure § 2682, at 411 (2d ed. 

1983)). 

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