Earlier this month, the Texas Supreme Court, in In re Euless Pizza, L.P., No. 23-0830, 2024 WL 4996714 (Tex., Dec. 6, 2024) (per curiam), reiterated the standards for allowing a party to withdraw and amend answers to requests for admissions and held that a Dallas County judge abused its discretion in failing to grant the motion after discovery and investigation revealed the original answers were incorrect.
The case was a personal injury claim arising out of an auto accident. Trevor Rivera worked as a pizza delivery driver at i Fratelli Pizza in Grapevine, Texas. One evening, while out on a delivery route, Rivera and another delivery driver decided to race each other in a 40-mph zone. While traveling at 80 mph, Rivera crashed into a vehicle turning left, causing serious injuries to the couple inside. A lawsuit resulted, including the discovery at issue.
The requests for admission (RFAs) at issue asked the defendants to admit that, at the time of the accident, Rivera was acting within the scope of his employment “with i Fratelli Pizza” (RFA No. 6) and “with You” (RFA No. 10). The definition of “You” was confusing, defining “i Fratelli Pizza” as synonymous with “defendant,” “you,” “your,” and “Euless Pizza.” In their initial responses in March 2022, each defendant admitted to RFA No. 6, while only Euless Pizza admitted to RFA No. 10.
In November 2022, defendants amended their responses to reflect that each defendant denied both RFA No. 6 and RFA No. 10. Around the same time, defendants amended other discovery responses to clarify that Rivera was employed only by Euless Pizza, and that defendants contested that Rivera was acting within the scope of his employment when the crash occurred. Plaintiffs complained, the defendants filed a motion to withdraw and amend their initial responses, and the trial court denied it.
The Texas Supreme Court began with some “basic principles” regarding RFAs. First, it said, RFAs are intended to simplify trials by eliminating “uncontroverted matters or evidentiary ones like the authenticity or admissibility of documents.” Further, RFAs were “never intended to be used as a demand upon a plaintiff or defendant to admit that he had no cause of action or ground of defense.” RFAs “should be used as ‘a tool, not a trapdoor.’”
In keeping with these principles, the trial court should allow a party to withdraw or amend an admission upon a showing of (1) good cause, and (2) no undue prejudice. The Court said: “This is not a high bar.”
A party establishes good cause by showing the failure involved was an accident or mistake, or not intentional or the result of conscious indifference. As for undue prejudice, it has two components. One is whether permitting withdrawal of an admission would “delay trial or significantly hamper the opposing party’s ability to prepare for it.” The second is whether “presentation of the merits of the action will be subserved by permitting the party to amend or withdraw the admission.” These “two are different sides of the same coin, as presentation of the merits will suffer (1) if the requesting party cannot prepare for trial, and also (2) if the requestor can prepare but the case is decided on deemed (but perhaps untrue) facts anyway.”
Applying these principles, the Court held that the trial court abused its discretion by denying defendants’ motion to withdraw and amend their admissions to RFA Nos. 6 and 10. As to No. 6, the defendants explained that further discovery/investigation revealed their initial responses were incorrect, that “i Fratelli Pizza” was a brand name and not an entity, and that Euless Pizza only employed Rivera. Counsel stated it was “clearly a mistake” to have admitted anyone other than Euless Pizza employed Rivera.
As to No. 10, defendants asserted that extensive discovery (numerous depositions, witness interviews, and receipt of the voluminous police file from the Euless Police Department) revealed that Rivera’s “felonious racing” at the time of the accident was outside the scope of his employment because it was a serious criminal act that was unforeseeable to Euless Pizza, even though Rivera was on the clock at the time of the accident. Defendants’ counsel represented that the initial admissions were made “on accident and mistake” and that “the amended admissions are based on good faith belief through developed discovery.”
The Court acknowledged that defendants possibly “should have put more thought into their initial responses,” but that insufficient attention to detail when answering discovery, especially at the outset of litigation, does not foreclose the ability to amend it. Defendants repeatedly explained that their initial responses—made only four months into the case—were based on information that turned out to be inaccurate or incomplete. Because the Court found no evidence of conscious indifference, flagrant bad faith, or callous disregard for the rules, it held defendants established good cause to withdraw and amend their answers.
As for undue prejudice, the Court looked to the discovery deadlines, the trial settings, and the scheduling orders. The original trial setting had been cancelled, and when the trial court heard defendants’ motion, discovery was ongoing and the case had not be reset for trial. Thus, the Court said, granting withdrawal and amendment would not have delayed trial or significantly hampered plaintiffs’ ability to prepare for it.
The Court said the second element (“the other side of the coin”) also favored defendants. That is, denial of defendants’ motion compromised the presentation of the merits by eliminating defendants’ ability to controvert plaintiffs’ scope-of-employment allegations. Accordingly, defendants also had established a lack of undue prejudice to plaintiffs.
Because defendants satisfied both requirements for withdrawal and amendment, the Court ordered the trial court to vacate its order denying the motion and to issue a new order allowing amendment of the responses to RFAs No. 6 and No. 10.