City and County of San Francisco v. Purdue Pharma L.P.

DISCUSSION

22 A. Motion to Compel Production of Nine Additional Custodians 23 Defendants have asked the Court to compel Plaintiff to produce documents from nine 24 additional custodians. See Dkt. 463 at 6. Defendants claim the custodians’ prescribing practices 25 are “especially relevant” to Plaintiff’s allegations because an understanding of their prescribing 26 27 behavior, their internal communications, and their views on citywide policy go directly to causation. See id. at 1-2; Dkt. 470. Indeed, Defendants argue that the request for additional custodians was triggered by Plaintiff’s own “red flag” analysis of Walgreens’ prescriptions, which shows that Plaintiff’s own providers wrote thousands of “flagged” prescriptions and, therefore, contributed to the harm. See Dkt. 463 at 2. Upon hearing the Court’s comments at oral argument, Defendants asked for leave to further meet and confer with Plaintiff to narrow their requests. See Dkt. 470. Therefore, the Court DENIES Defendants’ request as stated, without prejudice, and orders the Parties to meet and confer on the issue. If the Parties cannot resolve the issue by March 12, 2021,…