## Facts

- Plaintiffs filed a wrongful death action in 2001 against roughly 80 defendants; the matter was provisionally designated a complex case and assigned to a complex litigation department.
- Defendants served special interrogatories seeking identification of documents; plaintiffs responded with boilerplate objections asserting attorney–client privilege and work-product protection without specific identification or support.
- Several defendants moved to compel further interrogatory responses; the trial court granted the motion and treated privileges as waived based on plaintiffs’ failure to provide an adequate “privilege log” by a set date.
- In a later complex case-management order, the trial court required plaintiffs to make early unilateral disclosures concerning medical experts and exposure/causation showings, effectively requiring a one-sided pretrial evidentiary showing.
- Plaintiffs filed two petitions for writ of mandate challenging (1) the interrogatory/privilege ruling and (2) the case-management order; the Court of Appeal consolidated the petitions and stayed the challenged orders.

## Issues

1. Whether a trial court may deem attorney–client and work-product protections waived because a party did not provide a “privilege log” in response to special interrogatories seeking identification of documents.
2. Whether a complex-case management order may require unilateral, early disclosure of plaintiffs’ medical experts and opinions, contrary to statutory procedures requiring mutual and simultaneous expert exchange.
3. Whether the trial court’s compelled discovery rulings and related sanction approach were within its discovery and complex-case management authority.
4. Whether the case should be reassigned to a different trial judge.

## Decision

- The Court of Appeal granted the petitions in part and denied them in part.
- The court upheld the trial court’s authority to compel further, more specific interrogatory responses where plaintiffs relied on boilerplate objections.
- The court annulled the portion of the discovery order that deemed attorney–client and work-product protections waived based solely on failure to submit a “privilege log” for interrogatories.
- The court annulled the unilateral expert disclosure component of the complex case-management order as conflicting with the statutory expert exchange scheme.
- The court denied the request to reassign the matter to a different judge.

## Legal Principles

- Writ review is appropriate when a discovery order threatens disclosure of privileged material, because post-disclosure appellate remedies are inadequate.
- A statutory “privilege log” requirement applies to document inspection demands, not to interrogatories; however, a court may require interrogatory responses to be sufficiently specific and not merely boilerplate.
- Forced waiver of attorney–client privilege or work-product protection is not an appropriate sanction where the privilege was timely invoked and the asserted defect is a failure to provide a log-like description.
- Complex-case management authority permits efficiency measures, but it does not allow orders that conflict with statutes governing expert disclosure, including requirements of mutual and simultaneous expert exchange.
- A court cannot impose a one-sided, pretrial prima facie evidentiary showing outside established statutory mechanisms for testing evidentiary sufficiency.

## Conclusion

The Court of Appeal limited trial-court discretion in complex litigation by prohibiting privilege waiver as a sanction for not providing a “privilege log” in interrogatory responses and by invalidating unilateral, early expert disclosure requirements that contradict California’s statutory expert exchange procedures, while otherwise permitting orders compelling more specific discovery responses and declining reassignment.


Hernandez v. Superior Court, 112 Cal. App. 4th 285, 4 Cal. Rptr. 3d 883 (Cal. Ct. App. 2003)