CLINICAL WOUND SOLUTIONS LLC, Plaintiff, v. NORTHWOOD, INC., Defendant No. 18 C 7916 United States District Court, N.D. Illinois, Eastern Division Signed October 14, 2020 Counsel Sandra Tee Kahn, Dickler, Kahn, Slowikowski & Zavell, Ltd., Arlington Heights, IL, for Plaintiff. Ethan Emery White, Emery Law, Ltd., Oak Brook, IL, for Defendant. Weisman, M. David, United States Magistrate Judge REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION *1 The case is before the Court on defendant's third motion to compel and for sanctions [104]. For the reasons set forth below, the Court recommends that the District Court dismiss this case with prejudice as a discovery sanction pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 37.[1] Background On May 17, 2019, defendant served its initial interrogatories and document production requests on plaintiff. At a status hearing on July 18, 2019, defendant told the District Court that plaintiff had yet to respond to those requests. (ECF 33.) The Court ordered plaintiff to serve its discovery responses by August 8, 2019. (Id.) Plaintiff failed to do so, and defendant filed a motion to compel. (See ECF 34.) On August 22, 2019, the District Court granted defendant's motion and ordered plaintiff “to produce a full and complete response to defendant's discovery requests” by September 12, 2019. (ECF 36.) Moreover, the Court awarded defendant the attorney's fees it incurred in “preparing the motion and appearing in court.” (Id.) On October 7, 2019, plaintiff served its response to defendant's interrogatories, but not plaintiff's document production requests. (ECF 41.) On November 21, 2019, defendant filed a second motion to compel and for sanctions. (See ECF 47.) On December 3, 2019, this Court entered and continued the motion to compel and ordered plaintiff to respond to defendant's requests to produce and serve amended responses to defendant's interrogatories by December 10, 2019. (ECF 56.) Further, the Court warned plaintiff that its “failure to comply with th[e] Order may result in a recommendation from this Court to the District Court that this case be dismissed with prejudice.” (Id.) On December 17, 2019, this Court granted defendant's second motion to compel and ordered plaintiff to provide defendant with amended responses with proper bates stamps and verified answers to its interrogatories by December 31, 2019. (ECF 61.) The Court entered and continued defendant's request for fees. On January 16, 2020, the Court granted defendant's request for fees and ordered plaintiff to pay defendant $2,046.85 by January 30, 2020. On January 22, 2020, defendant served its second set of interrogatories on plaintiff. On February 19, 2020, at plaintiff's request, the Court extended plaintiff's time to answer the interrogatories to March 20, 2020. (ECF 73.) On March 25, 2020, the Court again extended plaintiff's time to answer the interrogatories to April 17, 2020. (ECF 78.) Pursuant to the General Orders pertaining to the coronavirus, that date was extended to June 12, 2020. On July 7, 2020, defendant filed a status report stating that plaintiff had not yet responded to the second set of interrogatories. (See ECF 92.) On July 12, 2020, the Court ordered plaintiff “[to] answer all outstanding discovery by 8/12/2020.” (ECF 95.) *2 On August 26, 2020, the Court gave plaintiff “a final extension” of time to September 28, 2020, to respond to defendant's written discovery. (ECF 103.) Plaintiff failed to respond by that date. On September 30, 2020, defendant filed this motion. (ECF 104.). Discussion Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 37 empowers the Court to levy a variety of sanctions against a party who fails “to obey an order to provide or permit discovery,” including “dismissing the action or proceeding in whole or in part.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 37(b)(2)(A)(v). To dismiss a suit under that rule, “the court [must] find that the responsible party acted or failed to act with a degree of culpability that exceeds simple inadvertence or mistake,” i.e., that the party acted with “ ‘willfulness, bad faith, or ... fault.’ ” Ramirez v. T&H Lemont, Inc., 845 F.3d 772, 776 (7th Cir. 2016) (quoting Societe Internationale pour Participations Industrielles et Commerciales, S.A. v. Rogers, 357 U.S. 197, 212 (1958)). “[W]ilfulness and bad faith are associated with conduct that is intentional or reckless.” Long v. Steepro, 213 F.3d 983, 987 (7th Cir. 2000). “Fault” means “the sanctioned party was guilty of ‘extraordinarily poor judgment’ or ‘gross negligence’ rather than mere ‘mistake or carelessness.’ ” Ramirez, 845 F.3d at 776 (quoting Marrocco v. Gen. Motors Corp., 966 F.2d 220, 224 (7th Cir. 1992)). Plaintiff's conduct in this case, recited above, easily satisfies the definition of fault. Plaintiff ignored repeated orders to comply with discovery, even after it was sanctioned monetarily and warned that failure to comply could result in dismissal of this case. At a minimum, such conduct displays gross negligence, if not recklessness or intent. Plaintiff does not deny that it repeatedly violated the Court's orders. Rather, plaintiff asserts that dismissal is not warranted because defendant issued its second set of interrogatories after the discovery cutoff date. (See ECF 18 (setting September 30, 2019 as the discovery cutoff).) There are several problems with this argument. First, after setting that cutoff, Judge Wood referred the case to this Court for, inter alia, discovery supervision, and this Court has implicitly extended the deadline. Second, plaintiff did not object to the timeliness of the interrogatories until defendant filed this motion. Third, and most importantly, this argument completely ignores plaintiff's repeated violations of Court orders that occurred before defendant issued the second set of interrogatories. In short, plaintiff has been, at the very least, grossly negligent in complying with its discovery obligations and the orders of this Court. Accordingly, the Court recommends that the district court dismiss this suit with prejudice pursuant to Rule 37(b)(2)(A)(v). See Aura Lamp & Lighting, Inc. v. Int'l Trading Corp., 325 F.3d 903, 904-06 (7th Cir. 2003) (upholding sanction of dismissal given plaintiff's repeated failures to meet deadlines and a warning of possible dismissal); see also Watkins v. Nielsen, 405 Fed. App'x. 42, 43 (7th Cir. 2010) (upholding sanction of dismissal for plaintiff's failure to meet deadlines despite warning of dismissal). SO ORDERED. Footnotes [1] Because the motion for sanctions seeks dismissal of this case, a dispositive matter, the Court cannot rule on it but must issue a report and recommendation to the district court. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 72(b).