Wisconsin Business Law and Litigation
A blog dedicated to Wisconsin business law and business litigation matters, authored by Chris Moander of the Moander Law Firm.

Yes, requests for admissions are what they sound like - questions designed to get a party to absolutely admit or repudiate a fact (which can be an event, a statement, a time, a location, etc). It is always beneficial to a party of a lawsuit to “pin” the opposing party to a fixed position on a fact. After all, if you get your opponent to commit to a position in written discovery, it makes it very hard for them to change their story down the road and you also get the benefit of knowing where the opposing party stands with some certainty. Such a tactic comes in handy when your attorney wants to lay what is called a foundation for documents or other evidence. A foundation is testimony or other evidence that allows the court to admit other evidence, much like a concrete foundation supports a house. A foundation laid through well-drafted admissions gets other evidence in faster and with less effort.

To narrow our definition down further, requests for admissions address two very specific needs: one is to eliminate an element of a cause of action from trial; the other (and opposite) is to show the court that a given issue is very much in dispute and thus fit for trial.

I can break down these two concepts into more manageable bites. A cause of action is the legal theory behind a lawsuit (ex: breach of contract). Each cause of action is constructed of elements, as a cake is made of ingredients - however, in most cases, each element must be proven by facts. To eliminate one element is to “kill” the cause of action and that part of the lawsuit is kicked out of court. You can see why admissions can have a profound impact on your case. On the flipside, admission of certain facts confirms that a dispute exists between the parties and the lawsuit remains alive. This scenario avoids what is called summary judgment, meaning that no dispute as to the facts of the case exists and the judge can apply the law to facts as they stand, resulting in no need for a trial.

The most important concept for you, as a litigant, to understand is that once you admit to something via a request for admissions, that factual matter is definitively settled. The only exception is when the court allows you to withdraw and admission, which is rare.

As with interrogatories, you have a limited time to answer and return requests for admission. By now, you probably realize you will need to handle requests for admission with your attorney. Each response, with your assistance, will be meticulously drafted to stay in line with the litigation strategy and to spot any objectionable requests. Your attorney will also inform you that the tactic of “I don’t recall” that worked with depositions and interrogatories will not be allowed with requests for admission - you either admit or deny, there is no middle ground and there are no qualified answers.

Admissions can kill your case, or get the case resolved in your favor, as fast as any single discovery device. Close work with your attorney will pay handsomely.

Next up is our final topic: inspections of documents, places, and things.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 11th, 2008 at 1:06 pm and is filed under Business Litigation, Business Strategy, Lawyer edification. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.