Hickman v. Mead ( 2019 )

1 2 3 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 4 DISTRICT OF NEVADA 5 6 PATRICK HICKMAN, Case No.: 2:18-cv-00404-GMN-NJK 7 Plaintiff(s), Order 8 v. (Docket No. 132) 9 KENNETH MEAD, et al., 10 Defendant(s). 11 Pending before the Court is Defendant Kenneth Mead’s motion to stay discovery. Docket 12 No. 132. Defendant Jessica Walsh filed a joinder to Defendant Mead’s motion. Docket No. 133. 13 Plaintiff failed to respond by the deadline to do so. See Docket. That failure “constitutes a consent 14 to the granting of the motion.” Local Rule 7-2(d). Additionally, for the reasons stated below, the 15 Court GRANTS Defendant’s motion. 16 The Court has broad discretionary power to control discovery. See, e.g., Little v. City of 17 Seattle, 863 F.2d 681, 685 (9th Cir. 1988). “The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure do not provide 18 for automatic or blanket stays of discovery when a potentially dispositive motion is pending.” 19 Tradebay, LLC v. eBay, Inc., 278 F.R.D. 597, 601 (D. Nev. 2011). Discovery should proceed 20 absent a “strong showing” to the contrary. See, e.g., Turner Broadcasting Sys., Inc. v. Tracinda 21 Corp., 175 F.R.D. 554, 556 (D. Nev. 1997). The case law in this District makes clear that requests 22 to stay all discovery may be granted when the: (1) pending motion is potentially dispositive; (2) 23 potentially dispositive motion can be decided without additional discovery; and (3) Court has taken 24 a “preliminary peek” at the merits of the potentially dispositive motion and is convinced that the 25 plaintiff will be unable to state a claim for relief. See Kor Media Group, LLC v. Green, 294 F.R.D. 26 579, 581 (D. Nev. 2013).1 27 1 Conducting the preliminary peek puts the undersigned in an awkward position because 28 the assigned district judge who will decide the motion to dismiss may have a different view of its merits. See Tradebay, 278 F.R.D. at 603. The undersigned’s “preliminary peek” at the merits of 1 The Court finds that all of the standards are met; therefore, a stay of discovery is 2|| appropriate. Accordingly, the motion to stay discovery including Plaintiff’s deposition, Docket No. 132, is GRANTED. If the resolution of the motion to dismiss does not result in the dismissal A! of this case, the parties must file a joint proposed discovery plan and scheduling order no later than 5| 14 days after the issuance of the order resolving the motion to dismiss. 6 IT IS SO ORDERED. 7 Dated: October 18, 2019 Nancy J. Koppe“ 9 United Statés.Magistrate Judge 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 that motion is not intended to prejudice its outcome. See id. As a result, the undersigned will not discuss the merits of the pending motion to dismiss here. Still, the undersigned has carefully 28] reviewed the arguments in the motion to dismiss and later briefing.