Lopez v. Wetzel
3:21-cv-01819
| M.D. Penn. | May 6, 2024Background
- Six inmates, including George Lopez, originally brought a joint pro se civil rights lawsuit alleging unconstitutional prolonged solitary confinement and resulting psychological harm by Pennsylvania Department of Corrections staff.
- The plaintiffs' experiences, locations, and resulting harms were factually distinct, making collective litigation procedurally challenging and discordant.
- Motions were filed by some inmates (led by Lopez) to sever the joint case, while others objected; the court eventually ordered the claims be severed into separate lawsuits for each plaintiff.
- Following the severance, Lopez moved to compel production of records including his own grievances and incident reports/statistical data regarding suicides of other death row inmates in solitary confinement.
- Defendants claimed some of Lopez’s requested records did not exist, others were moot as they had already been produced or would be; for third-party inmate information (suicides), they raised privacy and relevance objections.
- The court now rules on these motions to compel while considering the applicable scope and limits of federal discovery rules.
Issues
| Issue | Plaintiff's Argument | Defendant's Argument | Held |
|---|---|---|---|
| Compel production of Lopez's grievance records | All his grievances are relevant and should be produced. | Some grievances do not exist; others have been or will be produced. | Denied; cannot compel production of non-existent documents. |
| Compel production of other inmates' suicide records | Incident reports/statistics are relevant to Lopez's claims about solitary confinement harms. | Requests implicate privacy/security; reports about others are irrelevant/overbroad. | Denied; individual reports denied on privacy grounds, but parties must explore sharing aggregate statistical data. |
Key Cases Cited
- Marroquin-Manriquez v. I.N.S., 699 F.2d 129 (3d Cir. 1983) (court decisions concerning discovery scope are reviewed for abuse of discretion)
- Farmers & Merchs. Nat’l Bank v. San Clemente Fin. Group Sec., Inc., 174 F.R.D. 572 (D.N.J. 1997) (magistrate judges have broad discretion in discovery rulings)
- Morrison v. Philadelphia Housing Auth., 203 F.R.D. 195 (E.D. Pa. 2001) (moving party has initial burden to show discovery relevance)