Opinion
January 16, 1986
Appeal from the Supreme Court, Broome County (Ellison, J.).
Plaintiff commenced this action by service of a summons with notice, followed by a 25-page complaint which contained 90 separate paragraphs and sought injunctive relief and treble damages for alleged violations of the State's Donnelly Antitrust Act (General Business Law § 340), which prohibits the unreasonable restraint of trade. Shortly after answering, certain defendants served disclosure demands, including written interrogatories, a demand for witnesses' names and addresses, a notice of deposition and a notice of discovery and inspection. The written interrogatories were contained in a 31-page document and consisted of some 200 questions. The remaining defendants served a lengthy demand for a bill of particulars which consisted of 63 numbered demands. Plaintiff moved for a protective order vacating, conditioning or limiting defendants' demands. Special Term effectively denied plaintiff's motion, directing it to respond to the disclosure demands to the best of its ability. Plaintiff appeals.
The trial court is vested with broad discretion in supervising disclosure (see, e.g., Nitz v Prudential-Bache Sec., 102 A.D.2d 914; Maggio v State of New York, 88 A.D.2d 1087). This discretion must be exercised in light of the court's broader duty to facilitate the resolution of civil actions (Plattsburgh Distrib. Co. v Hudson Val. Wine Co., 108 A.D.2d 1043) and based upon the well-settled principle that the disclosure provisions of the CPLR are to be interpreted liberally, with the test being one of usefulness and reason (Allen v Crowell-Collier Pub. Co., 21 N.Y.2d 403, 406).
The parties are in agreement that this is a complex case. Special Term concluded that although defendants' demands were lengthy and searching, to the point of being "intimidating", they were "necessary and proper given the breadth of plaintiff's allegations". The court also found no reason to require defendants to submit to depositions prior to receiving plaintiff's response to the disclosure demands, thereby rejecting plaintiff's claim that it was entitled to priority of disclosure. Our review of the record reveals no abuse of discretion by Special Term and, therefore, its order should be affirmed.
Order affirmed, with costs. Mahoney, P.J., Kane, Casey, Weiss and Levine, JJ., concur.