FRCP 33(d) and Who Bears Burden of Identifying Documents

FRCP 33(d) allows a party answering interrogatories to refer the discovering party to documents produced with the Answers. Disputes arise as to how much detail is required to identify the documents.

Here is a response by a well-known Plaintiffs' firm to a request by defendants to further specify which documents are responsive to which Interrogatories:

"Specifically, Rule 33(d) requires a determination that the effort necessary for the interrogating party to obtain the information from those records would not be substantially greater then the burden on the responding party to do the same thing. The effort need not be precisely equal and the inquiring party cannot deprive its opponent of the Rule 33(d) option by the simple expedient of pointing out that any party is likely to be more at ease with its own records. See. Sabel v. Mead Johnson & Co. 110 F.R.D. 553, 556 (D.C. Mass 1986) (while an interrogated party will always be more familiar with its own records then the interrogating party, familiarity with the records cannot be the sole test. The inquire is whether ithe relative burdens are substantially the same, not whether they are precisely equal.) See also Compaignie Francaise D'Assurance v. Phillips Petroleum Co. 105 F. R.D. 16, 44 (D.C.NY 1984) (one party's familiarity with the documents does not create a disparity in the ease of discovery that would preclude resort to Rule 33(d) "

Please note, I did not check the cases cited to determine if the summaries were accurate