DAVID H. HENNESSY, Magistrate Judge.
Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1)(A), by order of reference (Docket #69), this matter was referred to me for a ruling on Plaintiff Infinity Fluids, Corp.'s ("Infinity") Motion to Enforce Court's Discovery Orders and Motion for Sanctions (Docket #68). Defendant General Dynamics Land Systems, Inc. ("GDLS") filed an Opposition (Docket #71), followed by Infinity's Reply (Docket #76), and GDLS's Sur-Reply (Docket #83).
Infinity's discovery motion—its third filed in the span of under nine months—relates to two orders previously issued by this court. On December 17, 2014, pursuant to the first such motion, I ordered GDLS to provide to Infinity a supplementary document production, which was to include certain information pertaining to the GDLS Trade Study and GDLS Heating Application, to the express exclusion of information concerning the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle project generally. (Docket #36 at pp. 1-2). Infinity's second motion, which sought enforcement of the December 17, 2014 order (
Despite Infinity and GDLS's somewhat sprawling arguments contained, respectively, in the original motion papers and Opposition, the scope of this dispute appears to have been narrowed by the fact that, concurrent with the filing of its Opposition on August 3, 2015, GDLS furnished to Infinity a supplemental document production. (
Infinity contends that GDLS has failed to provide it with information necessary to Infinity's understanding of accounting data concerning the GDLS Heating Application and Trade Studies. Accordingly, Infinity now requests (1) accounting information relating to work that was performed pursuant to Contract Line Item Number ("CLIN") 0007
The first category requires some brief background. GDLS asserts that after providing the Little Affidavit,
Concerning Infinity's request for subCLINs, the Little Affidavit makes clear that all costs under the SDD-2 Contract were billed at the CLIN (as opposed to subCLIN) level. (Docket # 62-1 ¶¶ 9-10).
In light of the above, I find that GDLS has furnished to Infinity all information it possesses relevant to Infinity's calculation of damages arising from the SDD-2 Contract, and, per the court's May 1, 2015 order, has satisfactorily explained the non-existence of any additional pertinent information. Presumably frustrated with the reality that the documents responsive to its requests simply do not contain the information it seeks, Infinity is fishing for information that is unlikely to reveal anything "relevant to [Infinity's] claim . . . and [ ] proportional to the needs of the case."
The present dispute over salary and billing data touches upon such information pertaining to (1) GDLS's non-engineering personnel; and (2) several specifically-named GDLS employees. As to the former, GDLS has provided a spreadsheet "containing all hours billed by all GDLS employees and contractors from June 2008 to December 2011 on all charge codes involving work performed on the Heating Application or Trade Study," (Docket #71-1 ¶ 4) (emphasis added), as well as documents supporting the calculation of labor rates. (Docket #83-1 ¶ 6).
Infinity nonetheless contends that "GDLS refuses to provide billing information for all employees/contract workers that worked on the Heating Application and related Trade Studies." (Docket #68 at p. 11). It refers to an email exchange in which GDLS refused to provide a "finalized listing of employees, their time and descriptions of job codes for accounting, marketing, administrative, purchasing, etc. that referenced or reported working on ECS/heating application job codes." (Docket #68-3 at p. 3). The crux of Infinity's justification for its pursuit of these materials is that, without them, Infinity is "without information to understand if such non-engineering employees billed to the relevant charge codes." (Docket #76 at p. 3).
Initially, although GDLS has not provided an affidavit explicitly stating that the only GDLS employees who billed for the EFV project were engineers, the record suggests this to be the case, (
Infinity also references by name thirteen individuals whom it asserts it has identified as part of the Trade Study Assessment and for whom it does not have billing or salary information. (Docket #76 at p. 3). Nowhere, however, does Infinity indicate the basis for its belief that these individuals were part of the "Trade Study Team," stating only that it "has located several other individuals who were part of the 2010 Heater Concept Trade Study Assessment for whom GDLS has provided no information regarding the hours billed or salary earned." (
Infinity's Reply provides that it is seeking "incentive fee documents for all periods of the SDD-2 contract." (Docket #76 at p. 8). It first asserts that GDLS's production in this regard is "selective" and "piecemeal" (
This court's May 1, 2015 order directed GDLS to serve an affidavit "outlining which information or documents [sought in several of Infinity's document requests] could not be produced, or do not exist, and why." (Docket #59 at p. 3). As noted, GDLS provided in response the Little Affidavit, which later was supplemented by the Radlick and Vrbensky Affidavits (Docket #71-2, 71-3). Infinity argues on Reply
The court is satisfied that the Little and Radlick Affidavits satisfy the court's directive that GDLS identify information that does not exist or cannot be produced, and explain why this is the case; to borrow a phrase from Infinity's brief, to "attest to the completeness of the information provided." (Docket #68 at p. 14). Most salient is the following statement by Mr. Radlick: "GDLS has now identified all six (6) Charge Codes . . . under which labor related to the Heating Application and Trade Study was billed, and has produced all WADs generated and labor billed pursuant to these Charge Codes during the relevant period." (Docket #71-2 ¶ 7). Because Infinity has not presented any credible argument to the contrary, its request for further amendment or supplementation to the Little Affidavit is denied.
After initially proposing various forms of sanctions for GDLS's alleged failure to provide discovery, Infinity in its Reply seeks attorneys' fees in connection with the instant motion. Ultimately, the exact nature of the sanction being sought is of no moment, because the court finds any such relief to be unwarranted. Although Infinity characterizes GDLS's actions as reflective of an attempt to flout its discovery obligations, the record simply fails to persuade the court that this is the case. As discussed above, GDLS's initial failure to incorporate into its discovery responses Charge Code REPL217401 may be attributed to reasonable error. And as GDLS points out, the mere fact that this code was identified by Infinity as potentially relevant does not necessarily make it so;
Infinity has not provided any authority supporting the imposition of a sanction here. The sole case cited in support,
For the foregoing reasons, Infinity's Motion to Enforce Court's Discovery Orders and Motion for Sanctions (Docket #68) is denied in its entirety. As indicated, the portion of the motion that seeks information regarding the individuals specifically named in Infinity's Reply (Docket #76 at p. 3) is denied without prejudice. Infinity is directed to submit within fourteen days the basis for its belief that the named individuals were part of the 2010 Heater Concept Trade Study Assessment.