Lindsey Newell v. The Law Offices of Travis R. Walker, et al.

What the court wrote

Verbatim from the court's document (public domain). Ellipses mark omitted text; nothing is paraphrased.

1 Defendants filed an opposed motion for another extension of the discovery deadline. DE 81. Judge Middlebrooks denied the Motion, finding Defendants had “not shown they ha[d] acted with diligence” and had not established why the broad discovery they sought was needed. DE 84. Therefore, the discovery period expired on December 28, 2025. 2 After I notified Defendants of an apparent artificial intelligence hallucination in their response, DE 87, they withdrew their original response, DE 99, and an amended response. DE 100. These filings acknowledged that there were additional hallucinations in the original response. DE 99 at 1; DE 100 at 1 n.1. While the amended response contained replacements for many incorrect case citations, its substance did not materially differ from that of the original response. 3 Defendants also argue it was improper for Ms. Newell to notice depositions for the "person in charge of collections" instead of noticing 30(b)(6) depositions for corporate representatives of the Law Firm and FLC, specifying topics for questioning. DE 87 at 3. The case Defendants cite, Meraki Solar, LLC v. Rosenbalm, contradicts this conclusion. The Meraki court explained that a party is not required to take a 30(b)(6) deposition, nor does the availability of 30(b)(6) depositions prohibit parties from deposing agents of a corporate entity to investigate their personal knowledge. 2021 WL 12286635, at *2 (N.D. Fla. Oct. 29, 2021). Further, by the text of Rule 30, Ms. Newell was permitted to notice a witness by role rather than by name. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 30(b)(1) “If the name is unknown, the notice must provide a general description sufficient to identify the person or the particular class or group to which the person belongs.”).

Authorities cited in the passage: LLC v. Rosenbalm · Fed. R. Civ. P. 30(b)(1)