Court Opinion

ID: 9847282
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 03:57:07.905167+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:17:05.962254
License: Public Domain

Chief Judge Mallard
concurring.
I concur in the foregoing opinion but consider it appropriate that the distinction between written interrogatories and depositions be made. A deposition may consist of answers to written interrogatories as well as oral questions. Under Rule 33, written interrogatories may only be addressed to parties, and these interrogatories are not depositions. I quote from Wright & Miller, Federal Practice & Procedure: Civil, § 2131, which shows the distinction made in the Federal rules and which should be made in our rules between the written interrogatories mentioned in Rule 31 and the written interrogatories mentioned in Rule 33:
“Rule 31 specifies the procedure to be followed in taking depositions by means of written questions. Prior to 1970 these were referred to as ‘depositions on written interrogatories.’ As the Advisory Committee pointed out in connection with the 1970 amendments:
Confusion is created by the use of the same terminology to describe both the taking of a deposition upon ‘written interrogatories’ pursuant to this rule and the *570serving1 of ‘written interrogatories’ upon parties pursuant to Rule 33. The distinction between these two modes of discovery will be more readily and clearly grasped through substitution of the word ‘questions’ for ‘interrogatories’ throughout this rule.”