Opinion ID: 2628016
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Did the Superior Court Abuse Its Discretion by Prohibiting Gibson from Deposing Lina and Smith?

Text: This court reviews a trial court's discovery rulings for abuse of discretion. [2] This court exercises its independent judgment when interpreting a civil rule. [3] Gibson argues that the Alaska Rules of Civil Procedure permitted the deposition of Lina and Smith, that deposing them would likely have led to discovery of admissible evidence, and that Gibson was prejudiced by the court's limitations. GEICO argues that Lina's and Smith's mental impressions were not relevant or likely to lead to relevant eviden[ce]. Gibson cites Civil Rule 30, which permits a party to depose any person without leave of court. Gibson does not mention Civil Rule 26(b). Civil Rule 26(b)(1) sets the default scope of discovery to any matter, not privileged which is relevant to the subject matter involved in the pending action. Gibson concedes that [t]he only issue of material fact to be litigated at trial was the extent of damages Gibson sustained in the 3/13/01 car wreck. Gibson argues that because Lina and Smith investigated her claims, their testimony is relevant to the issue of damages. GEICO takes the position that the adjustors' evaluations of Gibson's damages are irrelevant to Gibson's damages and therefore not within the scope of discovery. The court indicated as much, stating that it would manage this case as a . . . personal injury case to ascertain what the money damages are . . . [not as] a broad based bad faith case where we need to get into manuals and the heads of adjusters. Since Smith and Lina had no personal knowledge about the extent of Gibson's injuries, and insurer bad faith was not an issue, we are not persuaded that the court abused its discretion by determining that the information they could provide at deposition was not relevant to the subject matter involved in the pending action and therefore beyond the scope of discovery. [4] Civil Rule 26(b)(2) permits the court to limit the scope of discovery pursuant to a motion for a protective order like the one brought by GEICO. Discovery may be limited because evidence is unreasonably cumulative or duplicative, or . . . obtainable from some other source that is more convenient, less burdensome, or less expensive [5] or because the burden or expense of the proposed discovery outweighs its likely benefit, taking into account . . . the importance of the proposed discovery in resolving the issues. [6] Even if deposing the claims adjustors might have led to some information on damages, the likely benefit of such information seems small given the availability of medical records and testimony. Gibson does not assert that the adjustors possessed personal knowledge about her damages. Since the relevant information the adjusters had was obtainable from other sources and the bulk of their testimony was likely to be tangential to the issue of damages, a conclusion that the burden of the discovery outweighed its likely benefit would have been within the court's discretion.