Monday, January 26, 2026
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Discovery Sanctions on Wife Are Not Unjust Due to Husband’s Domestic Abuse Record—C.A.
Opinion Declines to Find That Existence of Restraining Order Against Husband Rendered Imposition of Penalty for Argumentative Posture During Deposition Unfair
By a MetNews Staff Writer
Div. Six of this district’s Court of Appeal has affirmed an order imposing $6,000 in sanctions against a wife and her attorney for “argumentative and obstreperous” conduct during a deposition in which she answered every question by saying, “I don’t recall,” among other discovery violations, rejecting her assertion that the existence of a domestic violence restraining order against the husband rendered the decree “unjust.”
At issue is Code of Civil Procedure §2023.030(a), which provides:
“The court may impose a monetary sanction ordering that one engaging in the misuse of the discovery process, or any attorney advising that conduct, or both pay the reasonable expenses, including attorney’s fees, incurred by anyone as a result of that conduct…..If a monetary sanction is authorized…, the court shall impose that sanction unless it finds that the one subject to the sanction acted with substantial justification or that other circumstances make the imposition of the sanction unjust.”
Justice Tari L. Cody, in an unpublished opinion filed Thursday, acknowledged that the section requires a court to take into account principles of fairness but declared that the history of domestic violence by the husband was irrelevant to his request for sanctions relating to alleged discovery violations.
Dissolution Proceedings
Appealing the sanctions order was Linda Pylypchenko, who married Andriy Pylypchenko in June 2022. Five months later, on Dec. 30, Andriy Pylypchenko petitioned for dissolution of marriage. The couple shares one child.
In January 2023, Linda Pylypchenko filed a request for a domestic violence restraining order (“DVRO”) against her husband, declaring that he “imprisoned [her] in [their] home and told his relatives to ‘watch [her]’ so [she] could not leave” and that he threatened to hurt her if she tried to vacate the family home without his permission.
Andriy Pylypchenko denied the allegations, but Ventura Superior Court Judge JoAnn Johnson issued the DVRO on Jan. 10, ordering the husband to not “[h]arass, attack, strike, threaten” or disturb the peace of his wife and to stay at least 100 yards away from her.
After an attempt to depose Linda Pylypchenko fell apart in 2023, the parties agreed to try again on a later date. On April 30, 2024, the husband served her with a new notice to take her deposition.
Linda Pylypchenko’s attorney, Roger L. Wilkerson of the Century City-based firm Sharif & Wilkerson PC, filed an objection, and she did not appear for questioning.
Motion to Compel
On May 22, 2024, Andriy Pylypchenko filed a motion to compel, which Ventura Superior Court Judge Dana K. Caudill granted. The judge found the wife’s objections to be without merit and ordered her to appear for the next scheduled deposition.
At the second deposition, Linda Pylypchenko failed to bring requested documents and, according to Andriy Pylypchenko, she and Wilkerson were “rude, disrespectful, and unnecessarily combative.” The questioning stopped after she failed to offer substantive responses, and the husband announced, through counsel, that he would be filing a motion to compel compliance and a request for sanctions.
Following a hearing, Caudill declared that the behavior of Linda Pylypchenko and Wilkerson during the second deposition was “inappropriate” and, in October 2024, ordered the wife to attend a third deposition, appointed a discovery referee, and imposed sanctions “against both,” citing Code of Civil Procedure §2023.010(d), which declares that “[f]ailing to…submit to an authorized method of discovery” is a “[m]issue of the discovery process.”
Thursday’s decision, joined in by Acting Presiding Justice Kenneth Yegan and Justice Hernaldo J. Baltodano, affirms the order.
Broad Discretion
Noting that §2023.030 gives a judge “broad discretion” to impose sanctions for discovery abuses, Cody remarked that “[w]e disagree” with the wife’s claim that she was under no obligation to attend the second deposition because her counsel objected on the basis that discovery had been completed. She pointed out that both sides had agreed to reschedule after the first attempt to obtain testimony in 2023 ended prematurely.
Turning to the 2024 deposition, she wrote:
“Husband presented evidence showing wife…did not answer questions and provided deliberately evasive responses. The trial court found the conduct of wife and her counsel at the deposition was, ‘argumentative and obstreperous.’ It ordered wife to appear at another deposition and could reasonably find there was no justification for the conduct of wife and her counsel….Sanctions may be awarded for not bringing requested documents to a deposition…, and for making [frivolous] objections to discovery.”
As to the assertion that the trial court should have considered the fact that Andriy Pylypchenko had been subjected to a DVRO in weighing the fairness of ordering the imposition of sanctions, the jurist said:
“The DVRO is a separate proceeding….The DVRO’s impact may be relevant in other stages of the dissolution action. But the current matter involves a discovery motion in a dissolution of marriage action where a trial court may impose monetary sanctions under sections 2023.010 and 2023.030 for discovery misconduct.”
Harsh Conduct
She added:
“Wife mentions husband’s harsh conduct directed against her. But the court reasonably found the relevant issue before it on husband’s motions was the discovery conduct of wife and her counsel. The court complied with section 2023.030, subdivision (a), which requires it to consider whether imposing sanctions is ‘unjust.’ The court reasonably found sanctions were appropriate, and it would be unjust for husband to bear attorney fees for two unsuccessful attempts to depose wife caused by her and her attorney’s conduct.”
The court was similarly unpersuaded by the wife’s claim that the order was issued in error due to her inability to pay, citing a successful motion to waive appellate fees based on indigency in the Court of Appeal. Cody commented:
“[S]he did not cite to the record of any evidence of her inability to pay at the time of the trial court hearing, she may not rely on her current financial declaration on appeal to claim trial court error retroactively….The trial court’s decisions are judged based on the record before the court at the hearing, not on new matters that were not presented to it and are raised for the first time on appeal.”
Declining to issue sanctions for filing a frivolous appeal, the jurist remarked:
“Wife’s issues are not so lacking in merit that sanctions should be awarded and there is no showing that this appeal was filed for the purpose of delay. There is also no showing the appeal was prosecuted for an improper motive or in bad faith.”
The case is In re Marriage of Pylypchenko, B342482.
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