AI Generated Opinion Summaries

This summary was computer-generated without any editorial revision. It is not official, has not been checked for accuracy, and is NOT citable.

Facts

• The plaintiffs filed a lawsuit against the University of New Mexico Board of Regents, operating as the University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center and University of New Mexico Hospital, along with unnamed defendants (John and Jane Doe 1, 2, & 3), alleging medical malpractice. The core issue arose from the plaintiffs' failure to name an expert witness to support their claims within the timeframe set by the court's scheduling order. Despite possessing all relevant medical records since June 1, 2017, the plaintiffs did not request deposition dates for essential witnesses until July 3, 2019, which was after the deadline for completing all discovery as per the scheduling order (para 3).

Procedural History

• [Not applicable or not found]

Parties' Submissions

• Plaintiffs-Appellants: Argued that the district court abused its discretion by excluding their expert witness and erred in granting the defendants summary judgment. They contended that the summary judgment was an unfairly harsh sanction for their failure to timely disclose an expert witness (paras 2-3).
• Defendants-Appellees: Sought summary judgment on the grounds that the plaintiffs failed to identify any qualified expert to testify that the medical care in question failed to meet the standard of care or caused the injuries alleged to a reasonable degree of medical probability (para 4).

Legal Issues

• Whether the district court abused its discretion by denying the plaintiffs' motion to extend the time for finding an expert witness.
• Whether the district court erred in granting the defendants' motion for summary judgment due to the plaintiffs' failure to name an expert witness to support their claims.

Disposition

• The Court of Appeals affirmed the district court's orders denying the plaintiffs' motion to extend the time for finding an expert and granting the defendants' motion for summary judgment for lack of an expert witness to support the plaintiffs' claims (para 1).

Reasons

• Judges Julie J. Vargas, Kristina Bogardus, and Briana H. Zamora concurred in the opinion. The court found that the plaintiffs did not demonstrate error in the district court's decisions. The plaintiffs misstated events by claiming the district court excluded an expert witness, whereas the court had actually granted summary judgment due to the plaintiffs' failure to name an expert witness after the deadline set in the scheduling order. The plaintiffs also failed to show good cause for modifying the scheduling order to extend the time for discovery to identify an expert witness. The court emphasized the importance of adhering to scheduling orders to maintain the integrity of judicial proceedings and found no abuse of discretion by the district court in its rulings (paras 2-9).