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PAS-L-000983-22 11/14/2022 9:26:54 AM Pg 1 of 14 Trans ID: LCV20223932527
Law Office of Yasmin Estrella, LLC
Yasmin Estrella Esq., Attorney ID: 293142019
8512 Kennedy Blvd. Suite One
North Bergen, New Jersey 07047
Tel. (201) 681-2735
Email: yestrellaesq@gmail.com
Tomas Espinosa, Esq.
Attorney ID: 025691985
8324 Kennedy Blvd. 2nd Floor
North Bergen, NJ 07047
Tel. (201) 223-1803
Email te@lawespinosa.com
Email: attespinosalawfirm@gmail.com
November 12, 2022.
The Honorable Bruno Mongiardo, J.S.C.
Superior Court of New Jersey
Passaic County- Law Division
Passaic County Courthouse
77 Hamilton Street
5th Floor
Paterson, NJ 07505
Re: Juan Estrella v. City of Union City, et al.
Docket No. PAS-L-00983-22
Response to Mr. Calviello’s letters of November 10 & 11 requesting time extension,
case management conference and dismissal of Plaintiff’s opposition
Dear Honorable Judge Mongiardo,
These offices represent the plaintiff, Juan Estrella in the above-captioned matter. Please
disregard the first letter (LCV20223930146) submitted as it was a draft filed accidentally. This is the
final letter which contends the same information of the draft just with the crossed out deleted.
First, we would like to offer an apology to your honor for having to endure the sour
grapes of issues brought by one counsel regarding its adversary. We understand that your honor
is very busy and this is not the correct forum to vent sour grapes. However, we write to you
regarding defendants’ request because it was put out as a memorandum although it does not
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appear to be so. We are writing to request that you deny the defendants’ request for an extension
of time, to deny defendants’ request to dismiss the Plaintiff’s opposition, reject defendants
request of a case management conference, to treat the letter of November 10, 2022 filed at
4:18:16 PM on the said date directed to you as defendant’s reply to Plaintiff’s opposition of
defendant’s motion to dismiss, and to deny defendants’ request to extend time. We will first
address the letter sent to your honor dated November 10, 2022.
Defendant’s so-called letter to the court, goes into the merits of Plaintiff’s opposition to
defendant’s motion to dismiss, this is a violation of the rules and for those reasons we are
requesting that Your Honor treats their letter as defendant’s reply to the motion to dismiss. If
beyond that Your Honor extends courtesy for any further submission beyond that letter from the
defendants on the matter of their R.4:6-2(e) motion, then the Plaintiff’s request for Your Honor
to extend courtesy to the Plaintiff and allow Plaintiff’s attorneys to submit a sur-reply. As Your
Honor is aware, defendants have two pending motions with a return date of November 18, 2022.
Defendants come to you with unclean hands, your honor, as their own papers are filled with
deficiencies. Yet once again, instead of filing the correct papers and bringing those so-called
deficiencies in the correct format under R. 4:46-1, the defendants attempt to get two bites of the
apple by requesting to submit yet another paper. We will detail those deficiencies further below
but let us address this letter violatory of the rules of court. In every motion there shall be the
motion papers, the opposition to the motion and the reply to the motion. “No other papers may
be filed without leave of court”. R. 1:6-3 and in motions under R. 4:6-2(e) where the applicable
requirements of time and papers are stated under R. 4:46-1, the language is similar “No other
papers may be filed without leave of Court”. The letter of the defendants is clearly a reply under
the guise of a request for a case management conference and/or time extension. It addresses the
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subject matter of the opposition, it goes into the merits that the Plaintiff is alleging, even cites
case law arguing their position and it further asks for a rejection of the opposition among the
other requests which apply to the opposition. This constitutes a de facto reply brief but is asking
for more time to answer the opposition by filing another reply with more time than the allotted
by the rules.
The Plaintiff will now address point by point the defendants’ attorneys' arguments, which
will outline why Your Honor should reject their request.
1. First, defendants point that the Plaintiff’s brief is 20 pages over the 65-page limit set
forth in R. 1:6-5. First, your honor, defendants themselves submitted over 500 pages
motion to dismiss in which the Plaintiff’s attorneys had to answer too. Second, the
Courts have relaxed this rule in so many cases, the Courts are concerned with the
merits of the case usually not on technicalities. For example, in the case of Guzman v.
E. Cost Toyota, 2020 N.J. Super. Unpub. LEXIS 1381, *2. In this case, the Plaintiff
did not submit a brief in support of their papers, while the Court acknowledged the
violation of R. 1:6-5, the Courts disregarded the defendant’s argument and focused on
the merits of the case. The defendants in their motion, filed a motion that was over
500 pages with exhibits, the Plaintiff had to review all the documents submitted and
then argue against some of the references made to those exhibits. Further the
defendants made at least 3 arguments for each count of Plaintiff’s complaint to which
the Plaintiff had an obligation to respond with law.
2. Defendants claims that our opposition should be done in a formal brief v. a letter brief
because it causes undue burden on the defendants (without explaining what exactly is
the due burden), as your honor is aware, this is simply not true- it’s standard practice
in NJ to do letter briefs, in my experience in over 30 years of practice Mr. Calviello is
the first attorney to raise such a distorted allegation.
3. The defendants further raise that the Plaintiff has failed to produce unpublished cases
and that the Plaintiff now wants the defendants and the Court to find the cases. First,
it is important to note that a citation was noted in these cases, in which all the
defendant has to do is copy and paste on their legal search engine just as they would
have done with other cases. Thus, with the facility of the legal search engine
nowadays this is no burden at all. Additionally, many of the cases cited were cases
cited by the defendants themselves to which there was already a publication by them
to the court. The remaining unpublished cases almost all came from cited published
decisions, for example Plaintiff cited to Rieder v. Department of Transp., 221 N.J.
Super. 547, 552, 535 A.2d 512 (App. Div. 1987), and Rieder cited to Sheridan v.
Mondelez Global LLC, 2015 N.J. Super. Unpub. LEXIS 2369, *2, Plaintiff did not
cite to any language in Sheridan rather he cited to Rieder. Most of the unpublished
cases (with the exception of probably 2 cases that were cited directly to an
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unpublished case), the rest of cases referenced by the Plaintiff is a result of a
published case citing an unpublished case. Further and most importantly, in a
dispositive motion this is not what the Courts are concerned about- technicalities and
this is explained further below. If this is such a burden, the Plaintiff can very well
send the defendants copies of all the cases used by the Plaintiff, even the published
ones. Plaintiff is not stuck or considered about technicalities like defendants seem to
be, we are rather focused on the substantive law governing a Motion under R. 4:6-
2(e) and the merits of the case.
4. The fact that defendants claim that Plaintiff did not cite the language of the Complaint
but answered the argument made by defendants against the complaint is because we
were focusing on of invalidity of those arguments, the complaint itself is detailed and
the counts clear , they are not numerous and when the defendants addressed the
language the language was addressed in the opposition, clear example was in the
issue of the promise by Brian Stack, if it was intended to be future, or present and in
respect to damages. The defendant's statement that the plaintiff's opposition does not
cite the redacted amended complaint’s language as a defect that would nullify the
opposition is a Subjective view about what had to be contained in the opposition
papers. Plaintiff obviously disagrees with this. Nonetheless, the Plaintiff has no
obligation to make the arguments that are responsive to those of the defendants to be
bound by their thought processes as to what’s the correct way of writing a legal paper,
and we submit that the plaintiff in his response kept all of his arguments within the
boundaries of the statements of the complaint except when an affirmation of the
defendants was about facts not in the complaint and in which the defendant’s
attorney, in violation to both R. 1:6-6 and the requirements under case law of R. 4:6-
2(e), lied ( statement by them in their papers that the plaintiff had not filed a Notice of
Tort Claim) and this required that it be illustrated as a lie without the offer of the
statement illustrating the lie as evidence and where the statements in response to the
argument of the defendants were implied in the statement of the complaint as
something that could be inferred from the said statement in the complaint as was
brought when the defendants stated that there was no description of the damages
pleaded. Clearly, there is no reason for this Court to even entertain defendants' tactics.
5. Defendants’ attorney constantly misconstrued the issues in every occasion where
they have sought to confer on matters already submitted to the court decision and
what transpires in those conversations they distort to their advantage that requires
more effort to correct or to deny their representation of what occurred, this is why the
Plaintiff no longer will confer with defendants unless to resolve the matter that are not
presently before the court for formal resolution and even then Plaintiff will exercise
extreme caution as to exactly what will be the agreement. This is why we will only
confer only if mandated by the Court. Defendants’ assert that because Plaintiff used
the word typo in the complaint should be remanded, Plaintiff is not changing the
meritorious allegations by this or what the wrongs are in the allegations for the causes
of action, rather a mistake or mixing of a word does not change the allegations in the
complaint. Additionally, the statements we claim to be typo speak for itself, any jury,
judge, or lay person clearly understands what’s stated in the complaint. Further, upon
Your Honor’s pending decision of the pending motions the Plaintiff will decide what
is the appropriate measure but at this stage it's too preliminary to do so.
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6. Defendants have the pattern of misconstruing words in their favor and then avoiding
to disclose facts that are not in their favor, thus, being dishonest to this tribunal and to
their adversaries. Defendants claim that in Plaintiff’s opposition a new claim is
brought up based on retaliation, the point that the Plaintiff has raised in his retaliation
point is this simple he was retaliated against for the filing of the complaint. It cannot
get simpler for the defendants than that. If they disagree with us, then his proper
recourse is to bring it up in his reply papers and let the Court decide. That is the
purpose of the rules on motions, to include filing motions, oppositions, and replies.
7. Defendants' attorney argument fails as to summary judgment for various reasons,
first, we are simply illustrating to the Court that defendants have lied. Defendants lied
to the court when in violation of the R.1:6-6 they affirmed facts beyond the statement
of the complaint and that they knew or should had known were untrue such as that the
plaintiff had not filed a Notice of Tort Claim that is required under the New Jersey’s
Tort Claims Act showing not only a lack of candor to the court and an act of fraud on
the court tantamount to committing perjury and come to Your Honor without any
compunction for their lies. Second, the making of inferences from the facts alleged in
the complaint during arguments is not injecting material beyond the complaint as
when the damages of the bypass and failure to promote plaintiff is deducted from the
statements in complaint. Defendants attempted in their motion that this Court base
their decision to dismiss the Plaintiff’s complaint based on lies. Rather, it was the
defendants that have failed because they have sought to introduce as facts through
their statements matters outside of the four corners of the redacted amended
complaint forcing the plaintiff to illustrate to the Court the lies presented by the
defendants. Further, inferences that follow from the nature of the complaint are not
facts outside of the complaint.
Your Honor, defendants filed two motions, one to dismiss and a second one, motion for
change of venue that required substantial legal research and the Plaintiff did not ask for an
extension of the time to answer, the attorneys of the defendants had months of default, were
given extension to answer of 23 days after vacating their default and they had also the time that
transpired from the filing of their motions to the time in which responses to their motions were
filed. Plaintiff’s attorneys had an obligation to prepare two oppositions (to the motion to dismiss
& motion for change of venue) and a cross-motion all within the same time cycle without
requesting time extensions.
The size of the defendants submissions and the content of their motions in which
systematically there were included facts beyond the pleadings (many of them false), without
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certifications on personal knowledge, and the citing of a myriad of irrelevant federal case law
citations inapplicable to the case and to a motion under R. 4:6-2(e) forced the plaintiff’s
attorneys to have an extended brief, especially, when, their legal brief contained at least three
different approaches for each arguments that they had raised, in the event that the court did not
decide on one issue, they still will have two bites to the apple under the same set of
circumstances for each of the legal issues raised in the motion and brought as advanced
arguments on their brief. Therefore, this required the extensive response to the defendants’ brief
in order to avoid leaving an argument unanswered by the plaintiff’s attorneys.
The defendants for Six (6) months have engaged in a pattern of strategy that have caused
delays, first by removing the case from Passaic Superior Court to the Federal Court, then,
engaging at the Federal Court in motion practice, while at the same time trying to achieve the
aims of their motion by sounding the plaintiff’s attorneys and engaging them in discussing the
facts and the law, to later on using part of those discussions, some language, which of course,
had been distorted by them to draft stipulations that ended up with language that Plaintiff’s
attorneys had proposed to be rejected. Every time that Defendants’ attorney had approached
plaintiff's attorneys just to obtain the plaintiff’s attorneys thought process and product,later on,
they brought it up to the court or plaintiff’s attorneys under a threat of filing motions. Contrary to
plaintiff’s attorneys, the Defendants’ attorneys have plenty of funds to backfire the plaintiff, and
they use every single opportunity to bill their clients, since their client clearly has larger
resources, even to tax the court time with childish excuses such as that the communication
between the plaintiff’s attorneys and defendants’ attorney had been broken. This is the pattern of
behavior that the defendants’ attorneys have displayed that made the plaintiff’s attorneys not to
trust them. They will use whatever tactic they can to win this case without going to the merits of
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it. This is not the method of operation used by the plaintiff’s attorneys, we seek to bring justice
and fair outcome to plaintiff’s damages, especially when plaintiff does not have the same
financial resources as the defendants. See the enormity of the defendants’ motion under R. 4:6-
2(e) that under the rules is to be decided within the four corners of the complaint and it has been
subjected to more than 500 pages of application. This is the type of actions that are abusive by
the defendants’ attorneys, that makes the plaintiff’s prayer to the court to exercise its discretion
under R. 1:1-2(a) that states in pertinent part: “Unless otherwise stated, any rule may be
relaxed or dispensed with by the court in which the action is pending if adherence to it
result in an injustice”, applicable to the 20 pages beyond the limit of the opposition brief that
pales with the more than 500 pages of defendants submission for a motion that must be made
only on the basis of the statement in the complaint and decided by the court only by analysis of
content within the four corners of the complaint. The Redacted Amended Complaint has only 39
Pages and 8 counts. As noted by Justice Clifford in his dissent in Stone v. Old Bridge Tp., 111
N.J. 110, 125 (1988) as cited in the comment to R. 1:1-2 directed to the construction and
application of it ( 2022 Edition, Rules Governing The Courts Of the State of New Jersey,
Pressler & Verniero, Gann Books)” our rules of procedure are not simply a minuet scored for
lawyers to prance through on pain of losing the dance contest should they trip. Those rules have
a purpose, one of which is to assist in the processing of the increasing number and complexity of
the cases…. that we have experienced over the last couple of decades.” The courts have been
explicit that “They have to be subordinated to their true role, i.e., simply a means to the end of
obtaining just and expeditious determination between the parties on the ultimate merits”.
Ragusa v. Lau, 119 N.J. 276, 283-284 (1990) When addressing the submission of briefs beyond
the allowed pages the court looks at if the violation has prejudiced the other party and when the
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alleged prejudice outweighs the damage created by disallowing the submissions of the parties,
the courts even in cases in which the court has stated their concern and stated strictures against
violations of the limitations of pages, they have ruled against disallowing of the briefs where
there has been no prejudice to the defendants. Ramroop v. Landsman, 2016 N.J. Super. Unpub.
Lexis 2712 at *9-*10 In the present case, defendants’ attorneys had the time allotted by the rules
for a reply and cannot state to the court that after the length of their submission that they cannot
fairly respond during the period of time allotted by the rules. “It makes little sense under these
particular circumstances to now require defendants to file a separate motion for reconsideration
under R. 4:49-2 containing the exact information from the sur-reply, which will not change the
substantive disposition of the case, and simply cost the litigants additional unnecessary time,
money and energies to take a needless extra step in order to conclude this matter. Due to the
seriousness of the issues involved, and the fact that the relief requested was time sensitive for
both parties, the court in this instance permits the defendant's sur-reply to be added to the
record”. Ramroop v. Landsman, 2016 N.J. Super. Unpub. LEXIS 2712, *9-*10”.
Plaintiff submits that this is even more valid in the present case where there has been
seven months of this maneuvering of the defendants and gigantic submission of more than 500
pages. The defendants’ attorney lack of candor shown in their submitted papers with affirmations
that are simply lies, in both pending motions, is also shown in the letter to Your Honor and in the
letter to us where Defendant’s attorneys threatened to come to Your Honor for the draconian
measures that he menaced (Mr. Calviello), if he had simply asked from plaintiff’s attorneys that
he wanted to file an extended brief within the time allotted to the reply, we would have probably
not objected but only if he had filed it within the period allotted for the reply. In fact, if the court
allows the defendants’ attorney more time as it has been sought, then, the court would have
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permitted the defendants’ reply of November 10, 2022 and an additional sur-reply to be filed.
Thereafter, in order to be in an even field, the court in exercising may permit that we answer, and
where will this end? Despite the burden of an immense task the Plaintiff’s attorneys had met the
time period to file two oppositions within the time allotted to the Court. The defendants’
attorneys have a lesser task since they are supposed to have researched aloof the applicable law
before they filed their motions and had an additional period of time until the filing of our
oppositions to prepare for any such reply.
Further, defendants’ attorneys seek assistance from the Court because the Plaintiff’s
attorneys no longer want to meet with them. First, once again the Plaintiff’s attorneys apologizes
that these sour grapes are being brought up to Your Honor's attention as this clearly isn’t
something that the Court has an obligation to entertain. However, due to the fact that it is the
defendants’ attorneys’ pattern to misconstrue what it has been said to them and to distort it at
their convenience, while providing half-truth to the Court- thus, lying to the Court and for that
reason Plaintiff’s attorneys have made clear to them, that no conference will be held unless
mandated by the Court or to confer on issues unrelated to the merits of this case, i.e adjournment
request or settlements. That is very different from what has been brought up to Your Honor that
Plaintiff’s attorney will no longer meet with them now or in the future. We made it clear that
unless it was mandated by the Court or for settlements, we will no longer meet with them. Thus,
this was not what was represented to the Court and this is the type of behavior by the defendants’
attorneys that Plaintiff’s attorneys no longer want to deal with unless it is absolutely necessary.
Now to address defendants’ allegation regarding the letter submitted to Your Honor on
November 11, 2022, at 5:10 pm LCV20223926186. First, defendants requested a case
management conference “because communication between counsels have broken down.” Your
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Honor, the matter before you has two pending motions, we ask the Court not to entertain the sour
grapes being poured from an attorney. This is not a matter of broken communications but the
defendants’ attorney portrayed lies in their submissions to the court, distortion of matters
discussed when there was communication, the usage of conferences to sound the case strategy of
the plaintiff, plaintiff’s attorney thought process and the trying to force the plaintiff’s attorneys to
go in their direction through this type of letter in the middle of motions. Our client does not have
the resources of the City of Union City and for 7 months he has been subjected to delays because
of all these maneuverings of the defense. As of now, there are two pending motions filed by the
defendants and a cross-motion filed by the plaintiff and that is all that the Plaintiff’s attorneys are
focused on. The merits and the substantial matters is what the focus should be on. We ask the
Court not to deviate from the motion practice standard, holding a case management conference
in the middle of three pending motions would not make a difference, since, the only aim of the
defendants’ seeking for such a conference is to gain more time to file their replies, the reticence
of the plaintiff's attorneys to accommodate further the defendants’ attorneys are the sole
consequences of their own deceitful acts.
However, the discussion that plaintiff’s attorney had regarding the stipulation to remand
to the State Court with Mr. Caviello was used by Mr. Calviello to obtain plaintiff’s attorney legal
grounds for our refusal. This is not communication but trickery. As is trickery the attempt by
injecting matters outside the redacted amended complaint into their argument without
certification or affidavit on personal knowledge, including lies to provoke a response and then
claim as he has done that the response was a violation that should convert the matter into a
Summary Judgment motion. The defendants’ attorney does not shoot straight. The defendants
have not provided any valid reasons other than the difficulties with their adversaries. We ask the
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Court not to deviate from due course of the merits of the case to entertain differences between
attorneys. Let it be clear the Opposition to the motion to dismiss under R.4:6-2(e) of the
defendants was filed 10 days before the return date as the rule requires, it was filed timely.
As to the second letter filed on November 10, 2022, at 5:20 pm, defendants’ attorney
request for additional time to respond to the opposition to their motion for change of venue and
to respond to the cross motion should be denied for the following reasons:
First, plaintiff’s first submission LCV20223921974 should be disregarded, unfortunately,
Plaintiff’s counsel had a computer malfunction and the plaintiff’s attorney’s certification and
certification of service was not attached when uploaded. Upon Plaintiff’s attorney realizing that
the certification and certificate of service had not been uploaded, Plaintiff’s attorney filed the
same opposition with the same exhibits but with Plaintiff’s attorney certification and the
certificate of service. Thus, defendants’ attorneys only have to respond to the submission under
LCV20223921984 for the opposition of change of venue. However, both filings, the defective
one and the correct one was filed on the same date 8 days before the return date on the motion.
The plaintiff’s opposition and cross-motion were filed timely. If defendants’ attorneys sought a
time extension based on confusion, they should have noticed the difference of submission was
only a difference of a certification and a certificate of service; this does not provide a reason to
seek an extension from the court.
Further, as to plaintiff’s cross motion contains the same exact exhibits as his opposition,
in fact the certification done by plaintiff’s attorneys is a certification in support of the opposition
and of the cross-motion, the same applies to the exhibits, all exhibits used are in support of the
opposition to change venue and the cross motion (this is standard as per the rules). Further there
is only one brief which supports both the opposition and the cross-motion, thus, this extensive
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amount of documents that the defendants claim to be the reason why they need additional time
simply does not exist. Further, a lot of the exhibits are the unpublished cases, we noticed this is
extremely important to the defendants and thus, we didn’t want to burden them further so we
supplied the unpublished cases. But now they have an issue with the size of the submission when
they themselves were requesting copies of the unpublished cases. Since, the court was going to
take some time to deliver a stamped copy via electronic service (E-Courts or JEDS), we decided
to send an email with a courtesy copy, which of course, was not stamped by the court yet, but it
was the same rendition submitted to the court, upon defendants’ attorney to avoid a claim of not
receiving the filings from the court and not receiving service of plaintiff’s filing.
As the court is aware any motions and/or cross motions filed need to be processed by the
case management prior to delivery of an electronic copy to all parties involved in the case.
Furthermore, the court can see how the defendants’ attorney misconstrued the facts when we
served our courtesy copy upon them. This is a clear example of the distortions made by the
defendants’ attorney to the court.
Everything that was done in the opposition and cross-motion is common practice and is
correct practice under the rules.
Lastly, the defendants’ attorney lame excuse that the Plaintiff’s attorneys made the filing
a few minutes before the end of the day on the due date is pointless, plaintiff’s submission was
due on November 10, 2022 per the rule, the time of the submission is irrelevant as long as it was
filed on November 10, 2022, since our courts have become electronic filing system, there is not a
time limit when an opposition has to be filed, the rules do not have a time frame set for any
opposition that are filed electronically, as in the present case, the plaintiff’s attorney filed the
opposition and cross-motion within the time prescribed by the New Jersey Court Rules.
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Should the Court consider such an excuse, then, every case would require additional time
as the rules only provide that an opposition for this type of motion should be filed 8 days prior to
the return day. The fact that the defendants’ attorney are attempting to say that plaintiff’s
attorneys waited to the last minute, prior to a holiday for them to seek more time to reply, are
baseless objections to object about the filing of plaintiff’s opposition and cross-motion, this is
“peccata minuta” for the defendants’ arguments to be brought before this court, contrary to the
plaintiff’s submission where it showed serious allegations about defendants’ attorneys
misconduct, lack of candor to the court in violation of Rules of Professional Conduct having
more weight than the time (hour, minutes, seconds) of the timing where plaintiff’s opposition
and cross motion were filed with the court, although on the due date as per the rules, the court
should reject defendants’ attorney alleged objection, as immaterial.
All of this drama from the defendants’ attorney to the court, is simply to obtain from the
court, extra time and approval for filing a sur-reply, nothing else.
Defendants’ attorneys have sufficient time per the rules to respond and should not be
treated differently than other defendants that have matters before this Court; this does not merit a
relaxation of the rules, since there have not been extraordinary circumstances advanced by the
defendants’ attorney to grant such extension. Your Honor, defendants filed two motions
returnable on the same motion cycle, one of which was a dispositive motion with over 500 pages.
Plaintiff’s attorneys are both solo-practitioners and did not request an extension of time to
oppose defendants’ motions even though their motions were extensive in arguments and
documents submitted, nor objected to the limitation of their submission to the court. Defendants’
attorneys belong to a large law firm with multiple attorneys; therefore, they have the manpower
to reply within the time allotted by the court rules.
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A time extension will be highly prejudicial to the Plaintiff in this case as this matter has
been pending for months now with its first response by the defendants filed a few weeks ago.
The case should move forward despite all of the shenanigans of the defendants’ attorneys. For
the reasons stated above we respectfully request, that Your Honor denies defendants’ request to
extend time to answer, dismissal of Plaintiff’s opposition and case management conference
request.
Very Respectfully,
/s/ Yasmin Estrella
Yasmin Estrella, Esq.
/s/ Tomas Espinosa
Tomas Espinosa, Esq.
Co-counsel
YE/ye.
TE/ve.
cc: David Calviello, Esq. Via E-Courts
Gianna Bove, Esq. Via E-Courts
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PAS-L-000983-22 11/14/2022 9:26:54 AM Pg 1 of 14 Trans ID: LCV20223932527 Law Office of Yasmin Estrella, LLC Yasmin Estrella Esq., Attorney ID: 293142019 8512 Kennedy Blvd. Suite One North Bergen, New Jersey 07047 Tel. (201) 681-2735 Email: yestrellaesq@gmail.com Tomas Espinosa, Esq. Attorney ID: 025691985 8324 Kennedy Blvd. 2nd Floor North Bergen, NJ 07047 Tel. (201) 223-1803 Email te@lawespinosa.com Email: attespinosalawfirm@gmail.com November 12, 2022. The Honorable Bruno Mongiardo, J.S.C. Superior Court of New Jersey Passaic County- Law Division Passaic County Courthouse 77 Hamilton Street 5th Floor Paterson, NJ 07505 Re: Juan Estrella v. City of Union City, et al. Docket No. PAS-L-00983-22 Response to Mr. Calviello’s letters of November 10 & 11 requesting time extension, case management conference and dismissal of Plaintiff’s opposition Dear Honorable Judge Mongiardo, These offices represent the plaintiff, Juan Estrella in the above-captioned matter. Please disregard the first letter (LCV20223930146) submitted as it was a draft filed accidentally. This is the final letter which contends the same information of the draft just with the crossed out deleted. First, we would like to offer an apology to your honor for having to endure the sour grapes of issues brought by one counsel regarding its adversary. We understand that your honor is very busy and this is not the correct forum to vent sour grapes. However, we write to you regarding defendants’ request because it was put out as a memorandum although it does not 1 PAS-L-000983-22 11/14/2022 9:26:54 AM Pg 2 of 14 Trans ID: LCV20223932527 appear to be so. We are writing to request that you deny the defendants’ request for an extension of time, to deny defendants’ request to dismiss the Plaintiff’s opposition, reject defendants request of a case management conference, to treat the letter of November 10, 2022 filed at 4:18:16 PM on the said date directed to you as defendant’s reply to Plaintiff’s opposition of defendant’s motion to dismiss, and to deny defendants’ request to extend time. We will first address the letter sent to your honor dated November 10, 2022. Defendant’s so-called letter to the court, goes into the merits of Plaintiff’s opposition to defendant’s motion to dismiss, this is a violation of the rules and for those reasons we are requesting that Your Honor treats their letter as defendant’s reply to the motion to dismiss. If beyond that Your Honor extends courtesy for any further submission beyond that letter from the defendants on the matter of their R.4:6-2(e) motion, then the Plaintiff’s request for Your Honor to extend courtesy to the Plaintiff and allow Plaintiff’s attorneys to submit a sur-reply. As Your Honor is aware, defendants have two pending motions with a return date of November 18, 2022. Defendants come to you with unclean hands, your honor, as their own papers are filled with deficiencies. Yet once again, instead of filing the correct papers and bringing those so-called deficiencies in the correct format under R. 4:46-1, the defendants attempt to get two bites of the apple by requesting to submit yet another paper. We will detail those deficiencies further below but let us address this letter violatory of the rules of court. In every motion there shall be the motion papers, the opposition to the motion and the reply to the motion. “No other papers may be filed without leave of court”. R. 1:6-3 and in motions under R. 4:6-2(e) where the applicable requirements of time and papers are stated under R. 4:46-1, the language is similar “No other papers may be filed without leave of Court”. The letter of the defendants is clearly a reply under the guise of a request for a case management conference and/or time extension. It addresses the 2 PAS-L-000983-22 11/14/2022 9:26:54 AM Pg 3 of 14 Trans ID: LCV20223932527 subject matter of the opposition, it goes into the merits that the Plaintiff is alleging, even cites case law arguing their position and it further asks for a rejection of the opposition among the other requests which apply to the opposition. This constitutes a de facto reply brief but is asking for more time to answer the opposition by filing another reply with more time than the allotted by the rules. The Plaintiff will now address point by point the defendants’ attorneys' arguments, which will outline why Your Honor should reject their request. 1. First, defendants point that the Plaintiff’s brief is 20 pages over the 65-page limit set forth in R. 1:6-5. First, your honor, defendants themselves submitted over 500 pages motion to dismiss in which the Plaintiff’s attorneys had to answer too. Second, the Courts have relaxed this rule in so many cases, the Courts are concerned with the merits of the case usually not on technicalities. For example, in the case of Guzman v. E. Cost Toyota, 2020 N.J. Super. Unpub. LEXIS 1381, *2. In this case, the Plaintiff did not submit a brief in support of their papers, while the Court acknowledged the violation of R. 1:6-5, the Courts disregarded the defendant’s argument and focused on the merits of the case. The defendants in their motion, filed a motion that was over 500 pages with exhibits, the Plaintiff had to review all the documents submitted and then argue against some of the references made to those exhibits. Further the defendants made at least 3 arguments for each count of Plaintiff’s complaint to which the Plaintiff had an obligation to respond with law. 2. Defendants claims that our opposition should be done in a formal brief v. a letter brief because it causes undue burden on the defendants (without explaining what exactly is the due burden), as your honor is aware, this is simply not true- it’s standard practice in NJ to do letter briefs, in my experience in over 30 years of practice Mr. Calviello is the first attorney to raise such a distorted allegation. 3. The defendants further raise that the Plaintiff has failed to produce unpublished cases and that the Plaintiff now wants the defendants and the Court to find the cases. First, it is important to note that a citation was noted in these cases, in which all the defendant has to do is copy and paste on their legal search engine just as they would have done with other cases. Thus, with the facility of the legal search engine nowadays this is no burden at all. Additionally, many of the cases cited were cases cited by the defendants themselves to which there was already a publication by them to the court. The remaining unpublished cases almost all came from cited published decisions, for example Plaintiff cited to Rieder v. Department of Transp., 221 N.J. Super. 547, 552, 535 A.2d 512 (App. Div. 1987), and Rieder cited to Sheridan v. Mondelez Global LLC, 2015 N.J. Super. Unpub. LEXIS 2369, *2, Plaintiff did not cite to any language in Sheridan rather he cited to Rieder. Most of the unpublished cases (with the exception of probably 2 cases that were cited directly to an 3 PAS-L-000983-22 11/14/2022 9:26:54 AM Pg 4 of 14 Trans ID: LCV20223932527 unpublished case), the rest of cases referenced by the Plaintiff is a result of a published case citing an unpublished case. Further and most importantly, in a dispositive motion this is not what the Courts are concerned about- technicalities and this is explained further below. If this is such a burden, the Plaintiff can very well send the defendants copies of all the cases used by the Plaintiff, even the published ones. Plaintiff is not stuck or considered about technicalities like defendants seem to be, we are rather focused on the substantive law governing a Motion under R. 4:6- 2(e) and the merits of the case. 4. The fact that defendants claim that Plaintiff did not cite the language of the Complaint but answered the argument made by defendants against the complaint is because we were focusing on of invalidity of those arguments, the complaint itself is detailed and the counts clear , they are not numerous and when the defendants addressed the language the language was addressed in the opposition, clear example was in the issue of the promise by Brian Stack, if it was intended to be future, or present and in respect to damages. The defendant's statement that the plaintiff's opposition does not cite the redacted amended complaint’s language as a defect that would nullify the opposition is a Subjective view about what had to be contained in the opposition papers. Plaintiff obviously disagrees with this. Nonetheless, the Plaintiff has no obligation to make the arguments that are responsive to those of the defendants to be bound by their thought processes as to what’s the correct way of writing a legal paper, and we submit that the plaintiff in his response kept all of his arguments within the boundaries of the statements of the complaint except when an affirmation of the defendants was about facts not in the complaint and in which the defendant’s attorney, in violation to both R. 1:6-6 and the requirements under case law of R. 4:6- 2(e), lied ( statement by them in their papers that the plaintiff had not filed a Notice of Tort Claim) and this required that it be illustrated as a lie without the offer of the statement illustrating the lie as evidence and where the statements in response to the argument of the defendants were implied in the statement of the complaint as something that could be inferred from the said statement in the complaint as was brought when the defendants stated that there was no description of the damages pleaded. Clearly, there is no reason for this Court to even entertain defendants' tactics. 5. Defendants’ attorney constantly misconstrued the issues in every occasion where they have sought to confer on matters already submitted to the court decision and what transpires in those conversations they distort to their advantage that requires more effort to correct or to deny their representation of what occurred, this is why the Plaintiff no longer will confer with defendants unless to resolve the matter that are not presently before the court for formal resolution and even then Plaintiff will exercise extreme caution as to exactly what will be the agreement. This is why we will only confer only if mandated by the Court. Defendants’ assert that because Plaintiff used the word typo in the complaint should be remanded, Plaintiff is not changing the meritorious allegations by this or what the wrongs are in the allegations for the causes of action, rather a mistake or mixing of a word does not change the allegations in the complaint. Additionally, the statements we claim to be typo speak for itself, any jury, judge, or lay person clearly understands what’s stated in the complaint. Further, upon Your Honor’s pending decision of the pending motions the Plaintiff will decide what is the appropriate measure but at this stage it's too preliminary to do so. 4 PAS-L-000983-22 11/14/2022 9:26:54 AM Pg 5 of 14 Trans ID: LCV20223932527 6. Defendants have the pattern of misconstruing words in their favor and then avoiding to disclose facts that are not in their favor, thus, being dishonest to this tribunal and to their adversaries. Defendants claim that in Plaintiff’s opposition a new claim is brought up based on retaliation, the point that the Plaintiff has raised in his retaliation point is this simple he was retaliated against for the filing of the complaint. It cannot get simpler for the defendants than that. If they disagree with us, then his proper recourse is to bring it up in his reply papers and let the Court decide. That is the purpose of the rules on motions, to include filing motions, oppositions, and replies. 7. Defendants' attorney argument fails as to summary judgment for various reasons, first, we are simply illustrating to the Court that defendants have lied. Defendants lied to the court when in violation of the R.1:6-6 they affirmed facts beyond the statement of the complaint and that they knew or should had known were untrue such as that the plaintiff had not filed a Notice of Tort Claim that is required under the New Jersey’s Tort Claims Act showing not only a lack of candor to the court and an act of fraud on the court tantamount to committing perjury and come to Your Honor without any compunction for their lies. Second, the making of inferences from the facts alleged in the complaint during arguments is not injecting material beyond the complaint as when the damages of the bypass and failure to promote plaintiff is deducted from the statements in complaint. Defendants attempted in their motion that this Court base their decision to dismiss the Plaintiff’s complaint based on lies. Rather, it was the defendants that have failed because they have sought to introduce as facts through their statements matters outside of the four corners of the redacted amended complaint forcing the plaintiff to illustrate to the Court the lies presented by the defendants. Further, inferences that follow from the nature of the complaint are not facts outside of the complaint. Your Honor, defendants filed two motions, one to dismiss and a second one, motion for change of venue that required substantial legal research and the Plaintiff did not ask for an extension of the time to answer, the attorneys of the defendants had months of default, were given extension to answer of 23 days after vacating their default and they had also the time that transpired from the filing of their motions to the time in which responses to their motions were filed. Plaintiff’s attorneys had an obligation to prepare two oppositions (to the motion to dismiss & motion for change of venue) and a cross-motion all within the same time cycle without requesting time extensions. The size of the defendants submissions and the content of their motions in which systematically there were included facts beyond the pleadings (many of them false), without 5 PAS-L-000983-22 11/14/2022 9:26:54 AM Pg 6 of 14 Trans ID: LCV20223932527 certifications on personal knowledge, and the citing of a myriad of irrelevant federal case law citations inapplicable to the case and to a motion under R. 4:6-2(e) forced the plaintiff’s attorneys to have an extended brief, especially, when, their legal brief contained at least three different approaches for each arguments that they had raised, in the event that the court did not decide on one issue, they still will have two bites to the apple under the same set of circumstances for each of the legal issues raised in the motion and brought as advanced arguments on their brief. Therefore, this required the extensive response to the defendants’ brief in order to avoid leaving an argument unanswered by the plaintiff’s attorneys. The defendants for Six (6) months have engaged in a pattern of strategy that have caused delays, first by removing the case from Passaic Superior Court to the Federal Court, then, engaging at the Federal Court in motion practice, while at the same time trying to achieve the aims of their motion by sounding the plaintiff’s attorneys and engaging them in discussing the facts and the law, to later on using part of those discussions, some language, which of course, had been distorted by them to draft stipulations that ended up with language that Plaintiff’s attorneys had proposed to be rejected. Every time that Defendants’ attorney had approached plaintiff's attorneys just to obtain the plaintiff’s attorneys thought process and product,later on, they brought it up to the court or plaintiff’s attorneys under a threat of filing motions. Contrary to plaintiff’s attorneys, the Defendants’ attorneys have plenty of funds to backfire the plaintiff, and they use every single opportunity to bill their clients, since their client clearly has larger resources, even to tax the court time with childish excuses such as that the communication between the plaintiff’s attorneys and defendants’ attorney had been broken. This is the pattern of behavior that the defendants’ attorneys have displayed that made the plaintiff’s attorneys not to trust them. They will use whatever tactic they can to win this case without going to the merits of 6 PAS-L-000983-22 11/14/2022 9:26:54 AM Pg 7 of 14 Trans ID: LCV20223932527 it. This is not the method of operation used by the plaintiff’s attorneys, we seek to bring justice and fair outcome to plaintiff’s damages, especially when plaintiff does not have the same financial resources as the defendants. See the enormity of the defendants’ motion under R. 4:6- 2(e) that under the rules is to be decided within the four corners of the complaint and it has been subjected to more than 500 pages of application. This is the type of actions that are abusive by the defendants’ attorneys, that makes the plaintiff’s prayer to the court to exercise its discretion under R. 1:1-2(a) that states in pertinent part: “Unless otherwise stated, any rule may be relaxed or dispensed with by the court in which the action is pending if adherence to it result in an injustice”, applicable to the 20 pages beyond the limit of the opposition brief that pales with the more than 500 pages of defendants submission for a motion that must be made only on the basis of the statement in the complaint and decided by the court only by analysis of content within the four corners of the complaint. The Redacted Amended Complaint has only 39 Pages and 8 counts. As noted by Justice Clifford in his dissent in Stone v. Old Bridge Tp., 111 N.J. 110, 125 (1988) as cited in the comment to R. 1:1-2 directed to the construction and application of it ( 2022 Edition, Rules Governing The Courts Of the State of New Jersey, Pressler & Verniero, Gann Books)” our rules of procedure are not simply a minuet scored for lawyers to prance through on pain of losing the dance contest should they trip. Those rules have a purpose, one of which is to assist in the processing of the increasing number and complexity of the cases…. that we have experienced over the last couple of decades.” The courts have been explicit that “They have to be subordinated to their true role, i.e., simply a means to the end of obtaining just and expeditious determination between the parties on the ultimate merits”. Ragusa v. Lau, 119 N.J. 276, 283-284 (1990) When addressing the submission of briefs beyond the allowed pages the court looks at if the violation has prejudiced the other party and when the 7 PAS-L-000983-22 11/14/2022 9:26:54 AM Pg 8 of 14 Trans ID: LCV20223932527 alleged prejudice outweighs the damage created by disallowing the submissions of the parties, the courts even in cases in which the court has stated their concern and stated strictures against violations of the limitations of pages, they have ruled against disallowing of the briefs where there has been no prejudice to the defendants. Ramroop v. Landsman, 2016 N.J. Super. Unpub. Lexis 2712 at *9-*10 In the present case, defendants’ attorneys had the time allotted by the rules for a reply and cannot state to the court that after the length of their submission that they cannot fairly respond during the period of time allotted by the rules. “It makes little sense under these particular circumstances to now require defendants to file a separate motion for reconsideration under R. 4:49-2 containing the exact information from the sur-reply, which will not change the substantive disposition of the case, and simply cost the litigants additional unnecessary time, money and energies to take a needless extra step in order to conclude this matter. Due to the seriousness of the issues involved, and the fact that the relief requested was time sensitive for both parties, the court in this instance permits the defendant's sur-reply to be added to the record”. Ramroop v. Landsman, 2016 N.J. Super. Unpub. LEXIS 2712, *9-*10”. Plaintiff submits that this is even more valid in the present case where there has been seven months of this maneuvering of the defendants and gigantic submission of more than 500 pages. The defendants’ attorney lack of candor shown in their submitted papers with affirmations that are simply lies, in both pending motions, is also shown in the letter to Your Honor and in the letter to us where Defendant’s attorneys threatened to come to Your Honor for the draconian measures that he menaced (Mr. Calviello), if he had simply asked from plaintiff’s attorneys that he wanted to file an extended brief within the time allotted to the reply, we would have probably not objected but only if he had filed it within the period allotted for the reply. In fact, if the court allows the defendants’ attorney more time as it has been sought, then, the court would have 8 PAS-L-000983-22 11/14/2022 9:26:54 AM Pg 9 of 14 Trans ID: LCV20223932527 permitted the defendants’ reply of November 10, 2022 and an additional sur-reply to be filed. Thereafter, in order to be in an even field, the court in exercising may permit that we answer, and where will this end? Despite the burden of an immense task the Plaintiff’s attorneys had met the time period to file two oppositions within the time allotted to the Court. The defendants’ attorneys have a lesser task since they are supposed to have researched aloof the applicable law before they filed their motions and had an additional period of time until the filing of our oppositions to prepare for any such reply. Further, defendants’ attorneys seek assistance from the Court because the Plaintiff’s attorneys no longer want to meet with them. First, once again the Plaintiff’s attorneys apologizes that these sour grapes are being brought up to Your Honor's attention as this clearly isn’t something that the Court has an obligation to entertain. However, due to the fact that it is the defendants’ attorneys’ pattern to misconstrue what it has been said to them and to distort it at their convenience, while providing half-truth to the Court- thus, lying to the Court and for that reason Plaintiff’s attorneys have made clear to them, that no conference will be held unless mandated by the Court or to confer on issues unrelated to the merits of this case, i.e adjournment request or settlements. That is very different from what has been brought up to Your Honor that Plaintiff’s attorney will no longer meet with them now or in the future. We made it clear that unless it was mandated by the Court or for settlements, we will no longer meet with them. Thus, this was not what was represented to the Court and this is the type of behavior by the defendants’ attorneys that Plaintiff’s attorneys no longer want to deal with unless it is absolutely necessary. Now to address defendants’ allegation regarding the letter submitted to Your Honor on November 11, 2022, at 5:10 pm LCV20223926186. First, defendants requested a case management conference “because communication between counsels have broken down.” Your 9 PAS-L-000983-22 11/14/2022 9:26:54 AM Pg 10 of 14 Trans ID: LCV20223932527 Honor, the matter before you has two pending motions, we ask the Court not to entertain the sour grapes being poured from an attorney. This is not a matter of broken communications but the defendants’ attorney portrayed lies in their submissions to the court, distortion of matters discussed when there was communication, the usage of conferences to sound the case strategy of the plaintiff, plaintiff’s attorney thought process and the trying to force the plaintiff’s attorneys to go in their direction through this type of letter in the middle of motions. Our client does not have the resources of the City of Union City and for 7 months he has been subjected to delays because of all these maneuverings of the defense. As of now, there are two pending motions filed by the defendants and a cross-motion filed by the plaintiff and that is all that the Plaintiff’s attorneys are focused on. The merits and the substantial matters is what the focus should be on. We ask the Court not to deviate from the motion practice standard, holding a case management conference in the middle of three pending motions would not make a difference, since, the only aim of the defendants’ seeking for such a conference is to gain more time to file their replies, the reticence of the plaintiff's attorneys to accommodate further the defendants’ attorneys are the sole consequences of their own deceitful acts. However, the discussion that plaintiff’s attorney had regarding the stipulation to remand to the State Court with Mr. Caviello was used by Mr. Calviello to obtain plaintiff’s attorney legal grounds for our refusal. This is not communication but trickery. As is trickery the attempt by injecting matters outside the redacted amended complaint into their argument without certification or affidavit on personal knowledge, including lies to provoke a response and then claim as he has done that the response was a violation that should convert the matter into a Summary Judgment motion. The defendants’ attorney does not shoot straight. The defendants have not provided any valid reasons other than the difficulties with their adversaries. We ask the 10 PAS-L-000983-22 11/14/2022 9:26:54 AM Pg 11 of 14 Trans ID: LCV20223932527 Court not to deviate from due course of the merits of the case to entertain differences between attorneys. Let it be clear the Opposition to the motion to dismiss under R.4:6-2(e) of the defendants was filed 10 days before the return date as the rule requires, it was filed timely. As to the second letter filed on November 10, 2022, at 5:20 pm, defendants’ attorney request for additional time to respond to the opposition to their motion for change of venue and to respond to the cross motion should be denied for the following reasons: First, plaintiff’s first submission LCV20223921974 should be disregarded, unfortunately, Plaintiff’s counsel had a computer malfunction and the plaintiff’s attorney’s certification and certification of service was not attached when uploaded. Upon Plaintiff’s attorney realizing that the certification and certificate of service had not been uploaded, Plaintiff’s attorney filed the same opposition with the same exhibits but with Plaintiff’s attorney certification and the certificate of service. Thus, defendants’ attorneys only have to respond to the submission under LCV20223921984 for the opposition of change of venue. However, both filings, the defective one and the correct one was filed on the same date 8 days before the return date on the motion. The plaintiff’s opposition and cross-motion were filed timely. If defendants’ attorneys sought a time extension based on confusion, they should have noticed the difference of submission was only a difference of a certification and a certificate of service; this does not provide a reason to seek an extension from the court. Further, as to plaintiff’s cross motion contains the same exact exhibits as his opposition, in fact the certification done by plaintiff’s attorneys is a certification in support of the opposition and of the cross-motion, the same applies to the exhibits, all exhibits used are in support of the opposition to change venue and the cross motion (this is standard as per the rules). Further there is only one brief which supports both the opposition and the cross-motion, thus, this extensive 11 PAS-L-000983-22 11/14/2022 9:26:54 AM Pg 12 of 14 Trans ID: LCV20223932527 amount of documents that the defendants claim to be the reason why they need additional time simply does not exist. Further, a lot of the exhibits are the unpublished cases, we noticed this is extremely important to the defendants and thus, we didn’t want to burden them further so we supplied the unpublished cases. But now they have an issue with the size of the submission when they themselves were requesting copies of the unpublished cases. Since, the court was going to take some time to deliver a stamped copy via electronic service (E-Courts or JEDS), we decided to send an email with a courtesy copy, which of course, was not stamped by the court yet, but it was the same rendition submitted to the court, upon defendants’ attorney to avoid a claim of not receiving the filings from the court and not receiving service of plaintiff’s filing. As the court is aware any motions and/or cross motions filed need to be processed by the case management prior to delivery of an electronic copy to all parties involved in the case. Furthermore, the court can see how the defendants’ attorney misconstrued the facts when we served our courtesy copy upon them. This is a clear example of the distortions made by the defendants’ attorney to the court. Everything that was done in the opposition and cross-motion is common practice and is correct practice under the rules. Lastly, the defendants’ attorney lame excuse that the Plaintiff’s attorneys made the filing a few minutes before the end of the day on the due date is pointless, plaintiff’s submission was due on November 10, 2022 per the rule, the time of the submission is irrelevant as long as it was filed on November 10, 2022, since our courts have become electronic filing system, there is not a time limit when an opposition has to be filed, the rules do not have a time frame set for any opposition that are filed electronically, as in the present case, the plaintiff’s attorney filed the opposition and cross-motion within the time prescribed by the New Jersey Court Rules. 12 PAS-L-000983-22 11/14/2022 9:26:54 AM Pg 13 of 14 Trans ID: LCV20223932527 Should the Court consider such an excuse, then, every case would require additional time as the rules only provide that an opposition for this type of motion should be filed 8 days prior to the return day. The fact that the defendants’ attorney are attempting to say that plaintiff’s attorneys waited to the last minute, prior to a holiday for them to seek more time to reply, are baseless objections to object about the filing of plaintiff’s opposition and cross-motion, this is “peccata minuta” for the defendants’ arguments to be brought before this court, contrary to the plaintiff’s submission where it showed serious allegations about defendants’ attorneys misconduct, lack of candor to the court in violation of Rules of Professional Conduct having more weight than the time (hour, minutes, seconds) of the timing where plaintiff’s opposition and cross motion were filed with the court, although on the due date as per the rules, the court should reject defendants’ attorney alleged objection, as immaterial. All of this drama from the defendants’ attorney to the court, is simply to obtain from the court, extra time and approval for filing a sur-reply, nothing else. Defendants’ attorneys have sufficient time per the rules to respond and should not be treated differently than other defendants that have matters before this Court; this does not merit a relaxation of the rules, since there have not been extraordinary circumstances advanced by the defendants’ attorney to grant such extension. Your Honor, defendants filed two motions returnable on the same motion cycle, one of which was a dispositive motion with over 500 pages. Plaintiff’s attorneys are both solo-practitioners and did not request an extension of time to oppose defendants’ motions even though their motions were extensive in arguments and documents submitted, nor objected to the limitation of their submission to the court. Defendants’ attorneys belong to a large law firm with multiple attorneys; therefore, they have the manpower to reply within the time allotted by the court rules. 13 PAS-L-000983-22 11/14/2022 9:26:54 AM Pg 14 of 14 Trans ID: LCV20223932527 A time extension will be highly prejudicial to the Plaintiff in this case as this matter has been pending for months now with its first response by the defendants filed a few weeks ago. The case should move forward despite all of the shenanigans of the defendants’ attorneys. For the reasons stated above we respectfully request, that Your Honor denies defendants’ request to extend time to answer, dismissal of Plaintiff’s opposition and case management conference request. Very Respectfully, /s/ Yasmin Estrella Yasmin Estrella, Esq. /s/ Tomas Espinosa Tomas Espinosa, Esq. Co-counsel YE/ye. TE/ve. cc: David Calviello, Esq. Via E-Courts Gianna Bove, Esq. Via E-Courts 14