AMENDED IN SENATE APRIL 11, 2019

CALIFORNIA LEGISLATURE— 2019–2020 REGULAR SESSION

96

CHAPTER 208

Statutes of 2019

[ Approved by Governor August 30, 2019. Filed with Secretary of State August 30, 2019. ]

Introduced by Senator Umberg

February 20, 2019

An act to amend Section 2031.280 of the Code of Civil Procedure, relating to discovery.

Vote: majority   Appropriation: no   Fiscal committee: no   Local program: no

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL’S DIGEST

The Civil Discovery Act permits a party to a civil action to obtain discovery, as specified, by inspecting documents, tangible things, land or other property, and electronically stored information in the possession of any other party to the action. The Civil Discovery Act requires any documents produced in response to an inspection demand to be produced as they are kept in the usual course of business, or be organized and labeled to correspond with the categories in the demand.

This bill would eliminate the option to produce documents as they are kept in the usual course of business, thereby requiring all documents or category of documents produced in response to a demand for inspection, copying, testing, or sampling to be identified with the specific request number to which the documents respond.

The people of the State of California do enact as follows:

SECTION 1.

Section 2031.280 of the Code of Civil Procedure is amended to read:

2031.280.

(a) Any documents or category of documents produced in response to a demand for inspection, copying, testing, or sampling shall be identified with the specific request number to which the documents respond.

(b) The documents shall be produced on the date specified in the demand pursuant to paragraph (2) of subdivision (c) of Section 2031.030, unless an objection has been made to that date. If the date for inspection has been extended pursuant to Section 2031.270, the documents shall be produced on the date agreed to pursuant to that section.

(c) If a party responding to a demand for production of electronically stored information objects to a specified form for producing the information, or if no form is specified in the demand, the responding party shall state in its response the form in which it intends to produce each type of information.

(d) Unless the parties otherwise agree or the court otherwise orders, the following shall apply:

(1) If a demand for production does not specify a form or forms for producing a type of electronically stored information, the responding party shall produce the information in the form or forms in which it is ordinarily maintained or in a form that is reasonably usable.

(2) A party need not produce the same electronically stored information in more than one form.

(e) If necessary, the responding party at the reasonable expense of the demanding party shall, through detection devices, translate any data compilations included in the demand into reasonably usable form.