In Mancia v. Mayflower Textile Servs. Co., 2008 WL 4595275 (D. Md. Oct.15, 2008), class action plaintiffs in a Fair Labor Standards Act case pursued motions to compel claiming that defendants' responses to discovery were "wholly inadequate," as defendants had responded to discovery using non-particularized, boilerplate objections. At the outset, Judge Grimm notes that that the use of such broad objections violates FRCP 33(b)(4) and 34(b)(2) (requiring that parties state objections to discovery requests with specificity), and likely also violates FRCP 26(g), which requires that a party conduct "reasonable inquiry" before objecting to discovery.Rule 26(g): The Duty to Conduct "Reasonable Inquiry" when Responding to DiscoveryRule 26(g) has been in the spotlight lately, most recently as central to the discovery sanctions in the Qualcomm v. Broadcom litigation. Judge Grimm notes that Rule 26(g) is "one of the most important, but apparently least understood or followed" rules.

Plaintiffs are to provide completed Plaintiff Fact Sheets and Class Representative Fact Sheets, including the production of any documents responsive to the fact sheets. Fact Sheet Responses to information requests are deemed interrogatory responses pursuant to FRCP 33 and may be treated as such at time of trial, under the order. Responses have to set forth all information known or reasonably ascertainable to the party and/or their counsel.

It must include the following:(i) a complete statement of all opinions the witness will express and the basis and reasons for them; (ii) the data or other information considered by the witness in forming them; (iii) any exhibits that will be used to summarize or support them; (iv) the witness's qualifications, including a list of all publications authored in the previous 10 years; (v) a list of all other cases in which, during the previous four years, the witness testified as an expert at trial or by deposition; and (vi) a statement of the compensation to be paid for the study and testimony in the case.Id.V. Discovery (Other Than Required Initial Disclosures)Interrogatories in federal court are limited to 25. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 33(a)(1). The Tennessee Rules of Civil Procedure do not contain a limit on the number of interrogatories.

The magistrate judge ordered RTI to respond to the contention interrogatories for the third time. Almost five months after Mediatrix’s production, RTI objected to it and sought leave to serve additional interrogatories on Mediatrix, which would exceed the twenty-five interrogatories allowed under Fed. R. Civ. P. 33(a)(1). RTI later claimed that responses to the requested interrogatories were necessary for RTI to respond to Mediatrix’s contention interrogatories.

Employ Rule 33(d). If your case is pending in federal court, Rule 33(d) allows you, in lieu of answering an interrogatory, to give the requesting party an opportunity to inspect your books and records to create their own summary of the information.If you force the opposing side to make a trip to review your books and records, depending on the importance of the information, the requesting party may give up the trip.By making the information available, rather than objecting, the opposing side may realize this is not a smoking gun issue.Many states have a rule similar to FRCP 33(d).5. Waiver.Some courts require parties to bring discovery disputes to the court’s attention within 30 days.If your opponent missed the deadline, it could have waived the issue.

[3] Advisory Comm. on Civil Rules, Judicial Conf. of the U.S., Draft Minutes of the Apr. 11-12, 2013 Meeting of the Advisory Committee on Civil Rules (Apr. 2013) at 151.[4] Fed. R. Civ. P. 33(b)(4) (“The grounds for objecting to an interrogatory must be stated with specificity.”).

[3] Advisory Comm. on Civil Rules, Judicial Conf. of the U.S., Draft Minutes of the Apr. 11-12, 2013 Meeting of the Advisory Committee on Civil Rules (Apr. 2013) at 151. [4] Fed. R. Civ. P. 33(b)(4) (“The grounds for objecting to an interrogatory must be stated with specificity.”).

Additional depositions are permitted with leave of court in Rules 30 and 31, but the court can consider proportionality factors from 26(b). FRCP Rule 33 still limits interrogatories to 25, and additional interrogatories are permitted only to the extent consistent with the relevance and proportionality concepts in Rule 26(b)(1) and (2). Changes to Rule 16 will reduce delays at the beginning of litigation by limiting the time to issue the scheduling order to the earlier of either 90 days (not 120 days) after service or 60 days (not 90 days) after any defendant has appeared. Also, the scheduling order may include Federal Rule of Evidence 502 agreements, which further the Courts’ encouragement of non-waiver and claw-back agreements to facilitate discovery. Rule 34 adds a requirement that a response to a document request must state with specificity the grounds for objecting to the request, banning the previous practice of “boilerplate” objections.

itial burden of establishing that the discovery sought satisfies the scope of permitted discovery under Rule 26(b)(1). See, e.g., Gruenbaum v. Werner Enter., Inc., 270 F.R.D. 298, 302 (S.D. Ohio 2010); Morrison v. Philadelphia Hous. Author., 203 F.R.D. 195, 196 (D. E.D. Pa. 2001). When establishing that discovery was within the permitted scope simply required a party to satisfy a broad notion of relevance, the burden on the party seeking to compel discovery was light. However, if the party seeking to compel must now also satisfy the requirements of proportionality, the movant likely carries a heavier burden. Additionally, the considerations governing proportionality under Rule 26(b)(1) have been incorporated into the standard for limiting discovery under Rule 26(b)(2)(C)(iii). Proportionality now permeates the Federal Rules, with reference to the concept now added to the rules governing the duration of depositions (FRCP 30(d)(1)) and the ability to serve more than 25 interrogatories (FRCP 33(a)(1)).File Generic Objections at Your Own Risk Prior to the amendments, many courts had already rejected the use of generic or boilerplate objections in discovery responses. See, e.g., Mancia v. Mayflower Textile Svcs. Co., 253 F.R.D. 354, 364 (D. Md. 2008); Novelty, Inc. v. Mtn. View Mktg, Inc., 265 F.R.D. 370, 375 (S.D. Ind. 2009); Buonauro v.City of Berwyn, 2011 WL 2110133, at *1-2 (N.D. Ill. May 25, 2011); Gonzalez v. ETourandTravel, Inc., 2014 WL 1250034, at *4 (D. M.D. Fla. Mar. 26, 2014); Fed’l Trade Comm’n v AMG Svcs., Inc., 2015 WL 5097526, at *9 (D. Nev. Aug. 28, 2015); Duracore Pty Ltd. v. Applied Concrete Tech., Inc., 2015 WL 4750936, at *6 (D. W.D. Ky. Aug. 11, 2015); Douty v. Rubenstein, 2015 WL 4163093, at *2 (D. S.D.W.V. Jul. 9, 2015). The amendments reflect the prevailing attitude on objections, at least with regard to responses to document requests. Rule 34(b)(2)(B) now requires that objections be stated with “specificity” and Rule 34(b)(2)(C) now requires an affirmative

This article is for general information purposes and is not intended to be and should not be taken as legal advice. [1] Fed. R. Civ. P. 33(b)(4); See Weidenhamer v. Expedia, Inc., 2015 (W.D. Wa.); Manica v. Mayflower Textile Services Co., 253 F.R.D. 354, 358 (D. Md. 2008). [2] See Mitchell v. National R.R. Passenger Corp., 208 F.R.D. 455, 458 at n.4 (D.D.C. 2002); Nagele v. Electronic Data System Corp., 193 F.R.D. 9