Court Opinion

ID: 9554894
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-10 15:01:29.512852+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:37:30.656847
License: Public Domain

United States Court of Appeals
                             For the Eighth Circuit
                         ___________________________

                                 No. 22-2731
                         ___________________________

                               Angela Dawn Cantrell

                        lllllllllllllllllllllPlaintiff - Appellant

                                           v.

               Coloplast Corp.; Coloplast Manufacturing US, LLC

                       lllllllllllllllllllllDefendants - Appellees
                                        ____________

                     Appeal from United States District Court
                          for the District of Minnesota
                                  ____________

                               Submitted: May 9, 2023
                               Filed: August 10, 2023
                                   ____________

Before COLLOTON, WOLLMAN, and BENTON, Circuit Judges.
                       ____________

WOLLMAN, Circuit Judge.

      Coloplast Corporation and Coloplast Manufacturing US, LLC (collectively,
Coloplast) manufacture and market Restorelle L, a surgical mesh device. Angela
Cantrell sued Coloplast for injuries allegedly caused by implantation of Restorelle L
mesh. After excluding portions of Cantrell’s expert opinions and testimony, the
district court1 granted summary judgment in favor of Coloplast. On appeal, Cantrell
argues that the district court erred in excluding her expert’s opinion on specific
causation and in granting summary judgment on her negligent design claim. We
affirm.

       The scheduling order required that Cantrell disclose her expert witnesses by
May 20, 2021, and that the parties complete discovery by August 31, 2021. The order
instructed the parties to submit a signed report from each expert witness at the time
of disclosure stating “all opinions to be expressed and the basis and reasons therefor,”
as required by Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(a)(2)(B).

       Cantrell timely disclosed the expert opinion of William Gold, M.D., whose
three-sentence specific causation analysis opined that the Restorelle L design was the
cause of Cantrell’s symptoms and injuries. Coloplast moved to exclude Dr. Gold’s
opinions and testimony, arguing that they lacked a sufficiently explained account of
how his conclusions were based on a scientifically accepted methodology, such as a
differential diagnosis. Cantrell’s response in opposition to this motion was filed on
December 20, 2021, attached to which was a supplemental declaration by Dr. Gold
that included a lengthy specific causation analysis, including a differential diagnosis.

       The district court concluded that Dr. Gold’s supplemental declaration was
untimely and therefore refused to consider it. The court found his original report
lacking because it did not set forth the reasons for his opinions as required by Rule
26(a)(2)(B)(i). Because the failure to provide this reasoning was neither substantially
justified nor harmless, the court granted Coloplast’s motion to exclude Dr. Gold’s
specific-causation testimony. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 37(c)(1) (“If a party fails to provide
information or identify a witness as required by Rule 26(a) or (e), the party is not

      1
       The Honorable Wilhelmina M. Wright, United States District Judge for the
District of Minnesota.

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allowed to use that information or witness to supply evidence on a motion, at a
hearing, or at a trial, unless the failure was substantially justified or is harmless.”).
The absence of admissible specific-causation testimony precluded Cantrell from
proving her negligent design claim and resulted in the court’s grant of Coloplast’s
motion for summary judgment.2

       We conclude that Dr. Gold’s supplemental declaration was untimely because
it was submitted after the deadlines for disclosure of expert reports and completion
of all discovery. See Williams v. TESCO Servs., Inc., 719 F.3d 968, 976 (8th Cir.
2013). Cantrell argues that these deadlines did not apply because the court’s
scheduling order required the parties to “fully supplement all discovery responses
according to Rule 26(e).” Rule 26(e)(2) requires that an expert’s supplement “be
disclosed by the time the party’s pretrial disclosures under Rule 26(a)(3) are due.”
Rule 26(a)(3)(B), in turn, states that, “Unless the court orders otherwise, these
disclosures must be made at least 30 days before trial.” Cantrell maintains that she
therefore had until thirty days before trial to disclose Dr. Gold’s supplemental
declaration. She ignores the caveat that Rule 26’s default timing provision applies
only if the court does not order otherwise. Here, the court set deadlines in its
scheduling order, those deadlines superseded the default rules, and Cantrell failed to
meet those deadlines.

       The district court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to consider Dr. Gold’s
untimely supplemental declaration. Wagner v. Hesston Corp., 450 F.3d 756, 758 (8th
Cir. 2006) (standard of review). Cantrell concedes that Dr. Gold’s declaration was
not based on previously unknown or unavailable information. Although she asserts
that the declaration merely clarified the methodology that Dr. Gold had used in his
original report, the original report contains no mention of that methodology. The

      2
       The parties agree that California law applies to Cantrell’s negligent design
claim and that California law requires expert testimony on specific causation.

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untimeliness of the supplemental declaration was not harmless, as allowing it would
have required reopening discovery to allow Coloplast to depose Dr. Gold and
possibly to supplement its own experts’ reports. See Williams, 719 F.3d at 976. We
thus conclude that the district court acted well within its “broad discretion in
maintaining compliance with discovery and pretrial orders.” See id.

       The district court also did not abuse its discretion when it decided to exclude
Dr. Gold’s report and declaration without considering lesser sanctions. “Under Rule
37(c)(1), exclusion occurs automatically by operation of the rule; the rule permits, but
does not require, the imposition of an alternative sanction on a party’s motion.”
Vanderberg v. Petco Animal Supplies Stores, Inc., 906 F.3d 698, 705 (8th Cir. 2018)
(emphasis added). Cantrell did not move for a lesser sanction. She nevertheless
argues that the district court was required to consider lesser sanctions, particularly
because exclusion here led to the grant of Coloplast’s motion for summary judgment.
She relies on Heartland Bank v. Heartland Home Finance, Inc., 335 F.3d 810 (8th Cir.
2003), in which the district court excluded certain evidence, followed by our remand
for further consideration of sanctions. There, however, the court considered sanctions
under both its inherent power and Rule 37, id. at 815, so its choice of sanction was
not limited by Rule 37’s requirements. Moreover, although the district court
specifically determined that sanction in the form of judgment was inappropriate, id.
at 814, we concluded that exclusion of the evidence “was tantamount to a dismissal
of [the] claims.” Id. at 817. Heartland does not negate the structure of Rule 37(c)(1)
sanctions, which requires exclusion unless a party moves for an alternative.

        In the absence of admissible evidence establishing causation, Cantrell could
not establish an element essential to her case. See Brady v. Calsol, Inc., 194 Cal.
Rptr. 3d 243, 246 (Cal. Ct. App. 2015) (causation as element of claim). The judgment
is affirmed.
                        ______________________________

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