1 WO 2 3 4 5 6 IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 7 FOR THE DISTRICT OF ARIZONA 8 9 Industrial Park Center LLC, No. CV-22-01196-PHX-MTL 10 Plaintiff, ORDER 11 v. 12 Great Northern Insurance Company, et al., 13 Defendants. 14 15 Pending before the Court is Plaintiff Industrial Park Center LLC’s (“Industrial 16 Park”) motion to strike Defendant Great Northern Insurance Company’s (“GNIC”) reply 17 exhibits. The motion to strike is fully briefed.1 (Docs. 122, 123.) For the forthcoming 18 reasons, the Court denies Industrial Park’s motion (Doc. 122) but gives leave for Industrial 19 Park to file a sur-reply. 20 I. 21 On August 9, 2024, GNIC filed a motion for attorney’s fees (Doc. 116), which 22 included Exhibit B, an exhibit showing an itemized statement of time expended and fees 23 incurred by GNIC—with many line-item descriptions redacted. (Doc. 116-2.) Industrial 24 Park timely responded, arguing in part that GNIC cannot be awarded fees for work that has 25 no description. (Doc. 120 at 6-8.) Specifically, Industrial Park claims that over $24,000 of 26 the fees claimed by GNIC have “no description” or “the description is not sufficient for the 27 1 Industrial Park’s deadline to file a reply has passed, and as such, the motion is fully briefed. Furthermore, neither party requested oral argument on the motion to strike. After 28 considering the briefs, the Court has determined that oral argument is not necessary for its decisional process. 1 Court to conclude the fees are reasonable.” (Id. at 7.) GNIC then filed a reply and included 2 revised redacted invoices in Exhibit A, explaining that it still kept privileged information 3 redacted. (Id. at 8; Doc. 121-1.) 4 Shortly thereafter, Industrial Park filed a motion to strike asking the Court to strike 5 GNIC’s reply Exhibit A. (Doc. 122.) 6 II. 7 Industrial Park argues that new evidence may not be introduced within a reply 8 because it prejudices the non-moving party. (Doc. 122 at 3.) GNIC argues that Exhibit A 9 in the reply brief is not “new” evidence but the same Exhibit B that was previously 10 proffered with revised redacted information. (Doc. 123 at 2.) 11 Local Rule of Civil Procedure 7.2(m) authorizes the Court to strike “any part of a 12 filing or submission on the ground that it is prohibited (or not authorized) by a statute, rule, 13 or court order.” LRCiv. 7.2(m)(1). “The decision to grant or deny a motion to strike is 14 within the [C]ourt’s discretion.” Sunburst Minerals, LLC v. Emerald Copper Corp., 300 F. 15 Supp. 3d 1056, 1059 (D. Ariz. 2018). 16 Here, in its reply GNIC responded to Industrial Park’s arguments by attaching 17 Exhibit A. Reply Exhibit A does not provide completely new evidence—it is the same as 18 of the response Exhibit B—but also provides less descriptions redacted than before. 19 (Compare Doc. 116-2, with Doc. 121-1.) Industrial Park, however, is correct that it is 20 prejudiced because it did not receive a chance to respond and argue the reasonableness of 21 the Exhibit A entries. See LRCiv 54.2(e) (“The party seeking an award of fees must 22 adequately describe the services rendered so that the reasonableness of the charge can be 23 evaluated.”). Rather than strike GNIC’s reply exhibit, the Court will allow Industrial Park 24 an opportunity to file a sur-reply. See, e.g., Provenz v. Miller, 102 F.3d 1487, 1483 (9th 25 Cir. 1996) (“Where new evidence is presented in a reply to a motion for summary 26 judgment, the district court should not consider the new evidence without giving the non- 27 movant an opportunity to respond.” (cleaned up)). 28 …. 1 Il. 2 Accordingly, 3 IT IS ORDERED denying Industrial Park’s motion to strike (Doc. 122). 4 IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that Industrial Park may file a sur-reply to GNIC’s 5 || motion for attorneys’ fees (Doc. 116) no later than seven (7) days from the date of this || Order. 7 Dated this 18th day of October, 2024. 8 ° Wichal T. Hburde 10 Michael T, Liburdi 11 United States District Judge 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 _3-