Discovery Deficiency Letter
(CA)

Summary

This Discovery Deficiency Letter (CA) is for use in civil litigation in California superior court, to facilitate compliance with California's meet and confer requirement (see Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 2016.040) when a party upon whom you have served discovery requests has either failed to respond or has given a response that is inadequate, incomplete, or otherwise deficient. This template includes practical guidance, drafting notes, and alternate clauses. For a full listing of key content covering fundamental civil litigation tasks throughout a California state court litigation lifecycle, see Civil Litigation Fundamentals Resource Kit (CA). Many of California's discovery-related motions require you to confer with the opposing party before filing a motion to compel. See, e.g., Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 2031.310(b)(2) (motion to compel further response to demand for inspection, copying, testing, or sampling) and Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 2033.290(b) (motion to compel a further response to request for admissions). You could send this letter after: • You have served a party with requests for production of documents, interrogatories, and/or requests for admission • The party has responded to those discovery requests (or has failed to) –and– • You have found the other party's response to be insufficient This letter contains a number of different sections and options depending on the inadequacies in the responding party's discovery responses. There are separate sections for interrogatories and for requests for production of documents. Within each of those categories, there are paragraphs that address a lack of a response, an incomplete response, an improper invocation of a privilege or other objection, and other problems. Pick and choose from among these sections as your specific situation requires. For practice notes on drafting discovery requests generally, see Document Requests: Drafting and Serving RFPs (CA) and Interrogatories: Drafting and Serving Interrogatories (CA). For a practice note on moving to compel discovery, see Motion to Compel Discovery: Making and Opposing the Motion (CA). For related templates, see Objections and Responses to Requests for Production of Documents (CA), Motion to Compel Response or Further Response to Request for Production of Documents or ESI (CA). For related checklists, see Document Requests: Drafting and Serving RFPs Checklist (CA).