Opinion ID: 550881
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Reopening of Discovery.

Text: 40 Sil-Flo, Inc. next contests the district court's decision to deny its motion to reopen discovery. In moving to reopen, the plaintiffs claimed that they had only recently learned of Noble Resource's use of Sil-Flo, Inc.'s proprietary processes and that they required additional time for discovery to investigate and formulate an additional claim for improper use of proprietary information. The district court denied the motion to reopen discovery in a minute order. 41 In considering this issue, we note that the district court has wide discretion in its regulation of pretrial matters. Doelle v. Mountain States Tel. & Tel., 872 F.2d 942, 947 (10th Cir.1989). We review the court's decision precluding the reopening of discovery for an abuse of discretion. Id.; Smith v. United States, 834 F.2d 166, 169 (10th Cir.1987). Under this standard, a trial court's decision will not be disturbed unless the appellate court has a definite and firm conviction that the lower court made a clear error of judgment or exceeded the bounds of permissible choice in the circumstances. United States v. Ortiz, 804 F.2d 1161, 1164 n. 2 (10th Cir.1986). 42 We have identified previously several relevant factors in reviewing decisions concerning whether discovery should be reopened. These include: 43 1) whether trial is imminent, 2) whether the request is opposed, 3) whether the non-moving party would be prejudiced, 4) whether the moving party was diligent in obtaining discovery within the guidelines established by the court, 5) the foreseeability of the need for additional discovery in light of the time allowed for discovery by the district court, and 6) the likelihood that the discovery will lead to relevant evidence. 44 Smith, 834 F.2d at 169. In this case, the discovery deadline had been extended several times, over the defendant's objections, to accommodate the plaintiffs. The record suggests that the plaintiffs did not make diligent use of the long period the court originally provided for discovery, and the matters they sought to investigate further (relating to the improper use of a trade secret) primarily involved entities which were not parties to the lawsuit. Consequently, we conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying the plaintiffs' motion to reopen discovery. 45