Wilson v. John Crane, Inc., 385 Md. 185 (Court Of Appeals Of Maryland. 2005)

CATHELL, J.

This case raises questions relating to the discretion of a trial court when a defendant corporation in asbestos litigation seeks the withdrawal or amendment of admissions that were conclusively established due to that defendant’s failure to respond to plaintiffs’ request for admissions within the prescribed time frame.

The instant appeal involves a personal injury asbestos case that was tried before a jury in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City, beginning on June 26, 2002.1 Catherine Wilson, surviving spouse, and other immediate family members (collectively, the “petitioners”) brought suit against various defendant corporations involved in asbestos-containing product production and/or installation for injuries allegedly sustained as a result of Paul J. Wilson’s exposure for over forty years to asbestos while employed at certain job sites in Maryland. These

defendant corporations included Garlock, Inc. (“Garlock”), John Crane, Inc. (“Crane”) and AC & S, Inc. (“AC & S”).2

As stated, the case was tried before a jury beginning on June 26, 2002. On July 18, 2002, the jury returned verdicts against Garlock, Crane and AC & S and awarded damages in the amount of $2,775,706.75, jointly and severally. Judgment was entered on July 25, 2002, subject to the filing of post-trial motions. All post-trial motions were denied on September 19, 2002. The Final Judgment Order was ultimately entered on December 19, 2002.

Garlock thereafter appealed the decision of the trial court to the Court of Special Appeals and, on May 25, 2004, in an unreported opinion, the intermediate appellate court vacated the judgment of the trial court,3 finding that the trial court had committed an abuse of its discretion when it refused, by an Order dated June 24, 2002 (one day before the scheduled start of trial), to grant Garlock’s motion for leave to withdraw or amend certain admissions that Garlock was held to have made because of its failure to respond in a timely fashion to a request for admissions made by petitioners. As a result of this holding, the Court of Special Appeals further held that the judgment against Crane should be vacated as well, stating, in regard to the question of “whether the judgment in favor of [petitioners] ought to stand against Crane alone,” that “we believe it is fairer to Crane to send the entire Wilson case

back for retrial” (alteration added). Petitioners thereafter filed a Petition for Writ of Certiorari to this Court. On October 6, 2004, we granted the petition. Wilson v. John Crane, Inc., -Md.-,-A.2d-(2004). Petitioners present three questions for our review:

We hold that the trial court, in disallowing Garlock leave to withdraw or amend certain admissions deemed to have been conclusively established by default, did not commit an abuse of its discretion. The trial court specifically found that petitioners would suffer prejudice if Garlock was allowed to withdraw or amend its admissions, as Garlock did not bring its motion to withdraw or amend until after discovery was closed and the trial was scheduled to begin within days. We do not find that this determination by the trial court was so untenable as to constitute an abuse of that court’s discretion.

Because we hold that the trial court did not commit an abuse of discretion in denying Garlock’s motion to withdraw or for amendment of its admissions, thereby reversing the decision of the Court of Special Appeals on that particular issue, there is no need for this Court to address directly the issues raised by petitioners regarding whether the intermediate appellate court erred in vacating the judgment against Crane as a result of its finding that the trial court committed an abuse of its discretion in relation to Garlock’s motion to withdraw or

to amend its admissions. As those issues existed only where an abuse of discretion was held to have occurred and we now hold that no such abuse occurred, to address those additional issues would be extraneous and unnecessary.

Facts

Paul J. Wilson was an electrician employed at several job sites in Maryland for a period extending over forty years. His employment history included, but was not limited to, work at Bethlehem Steel’s Key Highway Shipyard, Maryland Shipbuilding and Drydock and Western Electric’s telephone parts manufacturing plant in Baltimore. In 1987 Wilson was diagnosed as suffering from asbestosis, a scarring of the lungs that leads to breathing problems and heart failure. As its name suggests, the chronic ailment is caused by the inhalation of asbestos fibers over a period of time. In July 1998, Wilson was diagnosed with malignant mesothelioma4 after visiting a

doctor because of concerns over his loss of appetite and fifty-pound weight loss in a six-month period. Following aggressive treatments to halt the progression of the cancer, treatments that included radiation therapy and the removal of his entire left lung, Wilson eventually succumbed to the disease on November 8, 1998.

On March 2, 2000, petitioners brought suit in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City for personal injuries and wrongful death, naming as defendants numerous corporations that petitioners claimed had been involved in the manufacturing, distribution and/or installation of asbestos-containing products to which Wilson was alleged to have been regularly exposed due to his employment. Respondents Garlock and John Crane were two of these named defendant corporations. The suit alleged that it was Wilson’s continuous exposure to asbestos fibers that caused his illness and eventual death from mesothelioma.

When the trial commenced in the circuit court on June 26, 2002, for varying reasons not pertinent to the case at bar, only three of the defendant corporations remained in the case— Garlock, Crane and AC & S. Petitioners’ case against these remaining corporations relied primarily upon the testimony of two of Wilson’s co-workers at Western Electric, along with expert testimony relating to the presence of asbestos in the corporations’ products, the history of asbestos-related diseases

generally and the particular disease history of Wilson. There is little doubt, however, that petitioners’ case against Garlock was aided when the trial court allowed certain admissions to be read to the jury that stated that Garlock manufactured asbestos-containing gaskets that were used at both Maryland Shipbuilding and Drydock and Western Electric and that Wilson inhaled the released fibers from these gaskets while he was employed at these places. These admissions were admittedly the result of Garlock not timely answering petitioners’ electronically-filed “First Request for Admission of Facts and Genuineness of Documents,”5 which was filed on April 5, 2002,

and sent to “each direct defendant and its attorney of record.” Garlock claims that its failure to respond to petitioners’ requests was an “excusable and inadvertent error.” Garlock, however, does not deny or dispute that the requests were filed.6 As we shall discuss, infra, the propriety of the trial court in not allowing Garlock leave to file responses to the requests or to withdraw or amend these specific admissions is the issue at the heart of this appeal.

On July 18, 2002, the jury announced its verdict, finding, by a preponderance of the evidence, that Garlock, Crane and AC & S were liable for their negligence in the “manufacture, sale, supply and/or distribution of [their] asbestos-containing products! ]” and that “Paul J. Wilson’s exposure to the asbestos-containing products manufactured, sold, supplied and/or distributed by the defendants ... was a substantial contributing factor in the development of his mesothelioma” (alteration added). The jury verdict totaled $2,775,706.75 against Gar-lock, Crane and AC & S, jointly and severally. Because AC & S, on September 16, 2002, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, only Garlock and John Crane remain liable, jointly and severally, for the amount of the jury verdict.7

Discussion

Petitioners contend that the Court of Special Appeals erred when it found that the trial court committed an abuse of its discretion when it denied Garlock leave to file responses or to withdraw or amend certain admissions Garlock was held to have made regarding its culpability in manufacturing and distributing asbestos-containing products, which were alleged to have caused the onset of Wilson’s mesothelioma. Petitioners point to specific reasons that they say evidence the fact

that the trial court carefully considered whether to allow Garlock to withdraw or amend these admissions prior to trial. For example, as we shall discuss more thoroughly, infra, the trial court had, ten days earlier, on June 11, 2002, heard arguments from two other defendant corporations concerning substantially the same matter, i.e., motions to withdraw or amend virtually identical admissions and had granted, at that point in time, the motions, which allowed those parties to withdraw or amend their admissions. Also, the trial court made it unquestionably clear that it was especially concerned with the prospect of granting Garlock’s motion on what was essentially the eve of trial, finding that such an allowance at that time would be, in its opinion, “inappropriate.” Such considerations, petitioners claim, demonstrate that the trial court’s eventual decision not to allow such withdrawal or amendment should not be considered to be an abuse of the trial court’s discretion. Maryland Rule 2-424 states, in pertinent part:

would assist the presentation of the merits of the action and the party who obtained the admission fails to satisfy the court that withdrawal or amendment will prejudice that party in maintaining the action or defense on the merits. Any admission made by a party under this Rule is for the purpose of the pending action only and is not an admission for any other purpose, nor may it be used against that party in any other proceeding.” [Emphasis added.]

This Court has stated that “[t]he primary function of a request for admissions is to avoid the necessity of preparation, and proof at the trial, of matters which either cannot be or are not disputed.” Mullan Contracting Co. v. IBM Corp., 220 Md. 248, 260, 151 A.2d 906, 913 (1959). The particular admissions at issue in the case sub judice, which were later read to the jury at trial, stated the following:

i. sheet gasketing

Garlock contends that the trial court’s inclusion of these admissions in the face of its vehement protests in its “Motion for Leave to File Responses to Plaintiffs’ Request for Admissions Out of Time or, in the Alterative, for Withdrawal and Amendment of any Admission Deemed Admitted,” greatly benefitted petitioners’ case against Garlock and conclusively established facts which Garlock had every intention of disputing. What must be resolved, however, is whether such an action by the trial court, in the circumstances of this particular case, amounted to an abuse of discretion. As we stated in In re Adoption/Guardianship No. 3598, 347 Md. 295, 701 A.2d 110 (1997):

sum, to be reversed ‘[t]he decision under consideration has to be well removed from any center mark imagined by the reviewing court and beyond the fringe of what that court deems minimally acceptable.’ ”

Id. at 312-13, 701 A.2d at 118-19 (citations omitted); see also Baltimore Transit Co. v. Mezzanotti, 227 Md. 8, 13-14, 174 A.2d 768, 771 (1961) (stating that “trial judges, who are primarily called upon to administer [discovery] rules, are vested with a reasonable, sound discretion in applying them, which discretion will not be disturbed in the absence of a showing of its abuse”) (alteration added). Thus, an abuse of discretion should only be found in the extraordinary, exceptional, or most egregious case.

The decision of whether to allow a withdrawal or amendment of an admission is “quintessentially an equitable one, balancing the right to a full trial on the merits, including the presentation of all relevant evidence, with the necessity of justified reliance by parties on pre-trial procedures and finality as to issues deemed no longer in dispute.” Branch Banking & Trust Co. v. Deutz-Allis Corp., 120 F.R.D. 655, 658 (E.D.N.C.1988) (some emphasis added) (discussing analogous federal rule). In the instant case, the trial court was put into the unenviable position of having to decide, only four days before the scheduled start of trial,8 whether to grant Garlock the opportunity to withdraw or amend its deemed admissions under Rule 2-424(d) irrespective of the fact that Garlock had not responded to petitioners’ request for admissions before the thirty-day allotted deadline required by Rule 2-424(b). A suggestion as to the answer of this question is to be found in the plain language of Rule 2-424(d) itself, which states that

“[t]he court may permit withdrawal or amendment if the court finds that it would assist the presentation of the merits of the action and the party who obtained the admission fails to satisfy the court that withdrawal or amendment will prejudice that party in maintaining the action or defense on the merits” (emphasis added). That the Rule specifically states that the trial court “may permit” instead of “shall permit” is telling in and of itself, i.e., the power of the trial court in deciding matters relating to whether to allow withdrawal or amendment of admissions is broad. See Livesay v. Baltimore County, 384 Md. 1, 16, 862 A.2d 33, 42 (2004) (stating that “ ‘[m]ay’ is generally interpreted as permissive, in contrast with ‘shall,’ which is interpreted as mandatory”). The Rule, therefore, does not require the trial court to allow for withdrawal or amendment if certain circumstances exist. Rather, it permits the court to do so if those circumstances exist. In Donovan v. Carls Drug Co., 70S F.2d 650 (2d Cir.1983), the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, in examining Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 36(b), from which Rule 2-424 is derived, explained a trial court’s broad discretion in this regard:

Donovan, 70S F.2d at 651-52 (citation omitted) (some emphasis added).

As with the federal rule, Maryland Rule 2-424(d) provides that a court should determine whether to allow for withdrawal or amendment of party admissions according to a two-pronged test, of which both parts must be fulfilled before a court “may permit,” in its discretion, the sought withdrawal or amendment. First, the trial court is to determine whether the withdrawal or amendment of an admission would “assist the presentation of the merits of the action.” Rule 2 — 424(d). Secondly, the trial court determines whether the withdrawal or amendment would “prejudice that party in maintaining the action or defense on the merits.” Rule 2-424(d). The test under Rule 2-424(d) is clearly analogous to that of the federal rule. Therefore, while Rule 2^424(d) establishes two prerequisites to permitting withdrawal or amendment of admissions, it says nothing about denying motions to withdraw or to amend admissions. Nevertheless, as we shall explain, even if we analyze whether the trial court’s decision was within the boundaries of its broad discretion under the two-pronged test, that court’s decision to deny Garlock the opportunity to withdraw or amend its deemed admissions did not amount to an abuse of discretion.

In the case at bar, there is little doubt that the admissions Garlock was held by Rule 2-424 to have made were of importance to the merits of the defense against the claim brought by petitioners, as well as the merits of the claim itself. The admissions, which “conclusively established” that Garlock manufactured certain types of gaskets that contained asbestos and that these asbestos-containing gaskets released asbestos fibers into the air that Wilson breathed at his employment, help create the link by which a jury could find that Wilson’s illness, and eventual death, were caused in part by Garlock’s products. While petitioners at trial still had the burden of establishing that Garlock’s asbestos-containing gaskets were a “substantial contributing factor” to Wilson being stricken with mesothelioma, the admissions certainly cannot be said to have concerned matters “which either cannot be or are not disputed.” Mullan, 220 Md. at 260, 151 A.2d at 913.

Under Rule 2-424(d), however, the inquiry is not done. As stated, the court must now, having already decided that the withdrawal or amendment of admissions would “assist the presentation of the merits of the action,” turn its focus to whether allowing a withdrawal or amendment would prejudice the party seeking the admission. As expected, Garlock claims that no prejudice would have befallen petitioners if such withdrawal or amendment had been allowed, while petitioners claim that prejudice would have occurred if Garlock had been permitted to, in effect, recant its earlier admissions.

We find that the circumstances are such that petitioners would likely have been prejudiced if the trial court had allowed Garlock to withdraw or amend its relevant admissions at the late point in which withdrawal was sought. Petitioners cite specific trial strategies which were scaled back or altogether abandoned due to their lack of necessity after Garlock was held to certain admissions due to its inaction in responding to petitioners’ requests for admissions. For example, petitioners state that, because of the admissions, they did not pursue the use of non-plaintiff-specific witnesses of workplace exposure and hazard, witnesses who did not know Wilson personally but would have been able to identify Garlock’s asbestos-containing gaskets at Wilson’s workplaces.9 Furthermore, certain testimonial evidence adduced at trial was founded upon Garlock’s admissions, e.g., a doctor’s expert-witness testimony, acquired via video deposition, that Wilson’s exposure to Garlock’s asbestos-containing gaskets was a “sub

stantial contributing factor” in his being stricken with mesothelioma, depended greatly upon Garlock’s admissions being “conclusively established” under Rule 2-424. Without the establishment of those admissions, the trial court may very well have refused to allow what would then possibly be an expert opinion lacking an evidentiary foundation.10

The trial court’s rationale for denying Garlock’s motion was clearly based on the court’s perceived prejudicial effect that allowing withdrawal or amendment would create for petitioners. At the pre-trial hearing on June 21, 2002, the trial court, subsequent to hearing arguments from both parties as to whether Garlock should be allowed to withdraw or amend its admissions, explained its decision to deny withdrawal or amendment:

But I think that the time makes a difference, not the defendant, it doesn’t make any difference to me who the defendants are, but the timing is.

We do not find that the trial court’s denial of Gar-lock’s motion for withdrawal or amendment of its deemed admissions constituted an abuse of the trial court’s discretion. The trial court clearly found a basis for its decision, i.e., that petitioners would be prejudiced by the withdrawal or amendment of Garlock’s admissions on the eve of trial. The proximity of the trial date is of considerable concern when undertaking a prejudice analysis in relation to Rule 2-424(d), just as it is under the corresponding federal rule. Compare Coca-Cola Bottling Co. of Shreveport, Inc. v. Cocar-Cola Co., 123 F.R.D. 97, 107 (D.Del.1988) (finding that prejudice would occur if the court “were to allow the withdrawal of the admissions less than a month prior to the beginning of the ... trial. At this late date, plaintiffs do not have the time to begin fresh discovery to establish facts previously admitted”) with Herrin v. Blackman, 89 F.R.D. 622, 624 (W.D.Tenn.1981) (because “no trial date has been set ... no real prejudice can have accrued to the plaintiff” and late filing of responses to request for admissions should be allowed); see also United States v. Golden Acres, Inc., 684 F.Supp. 96, 98 (D.Del.1988) (disallowing withdrawal of an admission where “[gjranting the motion here could well delay trial”); E.E.O.C. v. Jordan Graphics, Inc., 135 F.R.D. 126, 129 (W.D.N.C.1991) (stating that “[t]o permit the admissions to be withdrawn at this late date may require additional discovery and would most likely delay the disposition of this matter. For these reasons, the Court believes that withdrawal of the admissions would prejudice

Defendant, and that therefore, withdrawal of the admission ... is not appropriate”).

The proximity of the scheduled trial date and adherence to it is especially important in asbestos litigation, which we have considered a “national crisis.” ACandS, Inc. v. Godwin, 340 Md. 334, 421, 667 A.2d 116, 158 (1995). The United States Supreme Court has itself raised concerns over the “the elephantine mass of asbestos cases” being brought before the courts, both federal and state. Ortiz v. Fibreboard Corp., 527 U.S. 815, 821, 119 S.Ct. 2295, 2302, 144 L.Ed.2d 715 (1999). Justice Breyer, in his dissent to the majority holding in Ortiz, expressed his concern over the nature of asbestos cases, which “on average take almost twice as long as other lawsuits to resolve.” Id. at 866, 119 S.Ct. at 2324 (Breyer, J., dissenting). In order to lessen the burden visited upon the federal district courts by the multitude of asbestos cases before them, Justice Breyer stated that “I believe our Court should allow a district court full authority to exercise every bit of discretionary power that the law provides ” in order to expedite resolution of asbestos cases. Id. at 868,119 S.Ct. at 2325 (emphasis added) (Breyer, J., dissenting). Justice Breyer partly based this conclusion on his perception of “ ‘a disparity of appreciation for the magnitude of the problem,’ growing out of the difference between trial courts’ ‘daily involvement with asbestos litigation’ and the appellate courts’ ‘limited’ exposure to such litigation in infrequent appeals.” Id. at 867, 119 S.Ct. at 2325 (Breyer, J., dissenting) (quoting Cimino v. Raymark Industries, Inc., 751 F.Supp. 649, 651 (E.D.Tex.1990)).

In the 2003 “State of the City Docket” for the Circuit Court for Baltimore City the large number of asbestos case filings is made readily clear. The report states that “[sjince October 1999 when the Court convened a ‘working group’ of attorneys from the asbestos bar to tackle the backlog of cases on the ‘active’ docket, the Court has continued to schedule 150 cases for trial every three weeks.... Efforts to eliminate the remaining backlog continue.” The annual report further states that “[i]n 2003, an average of one hundred twenty (120) new cases were electronically filed per month.”

The Circuit Court for Baltimore City, in an attempt to create a more efficient procedure for asbestos claims, introduced an “inactive docket for asbestos personal injury cases” in 1992. In re Asbestos Personal Injury and Wrongful Death Asbestos Cases, File No. 92344501 (Balto. City Cir. Ct. Dec. 9, 1992). The existence of an inactive docket allows for the claims of impaired claimants to be heard more promptly by deferring the claims of unimpaired claimants to an inactive docket until the individual develops an actual impairment. No plaintiff loses a cause of action; once someone becomes sick, his or her claim can proceed. Notwithstanding the use of an inactive docket system, as noted in the 2003 annual report, there still exists a backlog of asbestos cases on the “active docket” in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City.

The overwhelming impact of asbestos litigation was also recently addressed in a law review article, see Mark A. Behrens, Victor E. Schwartz & Rochelle M. Tedesco, Addressing the “Elephantine Mass” of Asbestos Cases: Consolidation Versus Inactive Dockets (Pleural Registries) and Case Management Plans that Defer Claims Filed by the Non-Sick, 31 Pepp.L.Rev. 271 (2003), which stated:

“Former Michigan Supreme Court Chief Justice Conrad L. Mallett, Jr. described the situation facing many judges with heavy asbestos caseloads in testimony before Congress. He observed that trial court judges inundated with asbestos claims might feel compelled to shortcut procedural rules:

does not allow individual claimants to be treated individually; everyone is thrown into the ‘courtroom Cuisinart.’ ...

Id. at 273-98 (alterations added) (footnotes omitted). The article had earlier noted the Maryland experience:

Id. at 290 (footnotes omitted).

The adverse consequences of continuances on the parties and on the courts has perhaps been best' explained by the United States District Court for the District of Maine in

Stacey v. Bangor Punta Corp., 107 F.R.D. 779 (D.Me.1985), a case against gun manufacturers. The defendants in that case had served notice of two of their expert witnesses on the plaintiffs a year before. At the last minute plaintiffs apparently were contending that their subsequent discovery of a theory propounded by the defendants’ experts created a need for them to obtain the court’s permission to add other expert witnesses for the plaintiffs. Before rendering its decision the court opined: “The Court views the Plaintiffs motion as arising from a significant breach of the Plaintiffs obligation to diligently prepare for trial and to observe the discovery requirements specified in the discovery rules and those imposed by the Court in the particular proceeding.” Id. at 782. It then noted the case of Johnson v. H.K. Webster, Inc., 775 F.2d 1 (1st Cir.1985), which in turn referred to Meyers v. Pennypack Woods Home Ownership Ass’n., 559 F.2d 894 (3d Cir. 1977), and quoting from those two cases the Stacey court stated: “The First Circuit Court of Appeals has just recently stated, concerning the criteria set out in Meyers, ‘[w]e agree with the Third Circuit that the two most important factors to be considered are the prejudice and surprise suffered by the opposing party, and that party’s ability to cure the prejudice.’ ” Id. at 782-83 (citation omitted). The Stacey court went on to hold:

made available in November for this case, to thrust upon counsel in other cases the burden to speedily prepare their cases for trial after having been assured by the Court that they are not at risk of trial until January 2, 1986.... Finally, if continued, this lengthy case would have to be inserted into the existing January 1986 trial schedule, thereby disrupting it and utilizing time now allocated to trial of other cases for which counsel therein are now preparing.

Id. at 784-85.

At the time Judge Rombro denied Garlock’s motion for withdrawal or amendment, the case sub judice had been pending for over two years. It is clear that there are numerous asbestos cases pending on the particular docket at issue in this case. Much of what the Stacey court noted may be equally applicable in the Maryland asbestos cases and the asbestos docket.

Were the Court to find that the trial judge in this case had abused his discretion in not permitting the “last minute” withdrawal or amendment of admissions, we would be sending a message to all potential defendants in mass tort actions that a lack of diligence, instead of penalizing the party lacking diligence, can become a weapon to create delay and thus penalize the party seeking prompt redress in the courts. The prejudice to an opposing party from such a lack of diligence is

amplified in mass tort cases where there are already built-in periods of extensive delay caused by the very mass of cases in the first instance. If a last minute granting of such withdrawals creates the need for a continuance for the opposing party in order for it to adjust its trial strategies to the new defenses arising from a withdrawal of admissions, that party is faced with a Hobson’s Choice11 — either continue with the regularly scheduled trial date and try to overcome the last minute hurdle placed in his way by the withdrawal of admissions including the adjustment of witnesses (either addition or deletion of expert witnesses, etc.) and the like, or request a continuance and lose the party’s place in the litigation lineup which may result in further extensive delay in having that particular trial rescheduled. Additionally, even if the trial court were later willing to insert that case into the lineup of cases awaiting trial, absent built in openings in the docket, it would have to wait either for a pending case to settle out (and most cases settle out at the last minute, making it difficult to replace them), or arbitrarily to insert the case into the lineup, pushing back all the cases from the point of the insertion, thereby changing the trial calendars of numerous parties and attorneys.

A key consideration for the trial judges in the mass tort area is their ability to recognize the timing factor when the granting of such a motion to withdraw is likely to prejudice the opposing party by causing that party to be faced with the Hobson’s Choice we have described above. If there is sufficient time for the opposing party to adjust its case with a full opportunity for a fair presentation, then it may not be an abuse of discretion to grant such a motion, but, if the contrary exists, i.e., if the motion to withdraw admissions were to be granted and the opposing party in a mass tort be required to seek a continuance in order to be afforded a full opportunity to fairly present the plaintiffs case, then it generally will not be

an abuse of discretion for the trial court to deny the motion, leaving the moving party with the prejudice, if any, its own lack of diligence created in the first instance.

Judge Rombro clearly understood the importance of the timing of Garlock’s motion to withdrawal or amend in the case sub judice. The record reflects that he had both granted such motions and denied them. And he did so based upon the time remaining for the opposing parties to adjust.. To him, it was the timing — and he got it right.

With the quantity of cases involving asbestos litigants, the scheduling and maintaining of trial dates is more important, both for the parties to the action and the courts. See, e.g., Norfolk Southern Railway Co. v. MCGraw, 71 Fed.Appx. 967, 971 (4th Cir.2003) (per curiam) (United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit finding that “managing the trial court docket so as to handle all of the pending [asbestos] cases without paralyzing the functioning of the court is an important state interest that implicates the state courts’ ability to perform their judicial function”) (alteration added). Once a trial date is imminent, any occurrence that requires a continuance of a trial date may put a case behind numerous other cases on an already clogged asbestos docket and the delay may be significant.12 See Eagle-Picher Indus, v. Balbos, 84 Md.App. 10, 26, 578 A.2d 228, 235-36 (1990) (Court of Special Appeals stating the “[t]he pre-trial order is the guiding light upon which each party is entitled and encouraged to rely. Its importance, especially in complex and mass tort cases, cannot

be overstated ”) (emphasis added); see also Stacey v. Bangor Punta Corp., supra at 784-85 (refusing to grant continuance in products liability action on grounds that rescheduling of eight to ten day trial would produce “very adverse effect” on court’s calendar and would require “complete restructuring” of established docket for next two-and-a-half months). Such delay can undoubtedly prejudice a plaintiff in an asbestos case. See Godwin, 340 Md. at 422, 667 A.2d at 159 (stating, in an asbestos case, “the maxim has remained constant that, ordinarily, DELAY FAVORS THE DEFENDANT”).

Here, the trial was scheduled to begin on June 25, 2002, according to the thoroughly delineated “Consolidation Order and Pre-Trial Schedule.” Petitioners’ request for admissions had been electronically filed on April 5, 2002. Under Rule 2-424(b) any responses by Garlock to this request were due by May 6, 2002. Garlock did not file its motion to withdraw or amend its deemed admissions until June 17, 2002. The pretrial hearing, which concerned, inter alia, Garlock’s motion to withdraw or amend was held on June 21, 2002, a mere four days before the scheduled start of the trial. Because the trial court found it likely that prejudice would result if Garlock were to be allowed to withdraw or amend its admissions in that petitioners’ reliance on those admissions in developing its case against Garlock would thereafter be negated, we do not find that the trial court abused its discretion in making its judgment to deny Garlock’s motion.

The fact that the trial court’s decision to deny Garlock’s motion to withdraw or amend was based on its reasonable discretion is further elucidated by the fact that, as we noted, supra, on June 11, 2002, as the aforementioned pre-trial hearing transcript indicates, the trial court heard arguments concerning similar motions to withdraw or amend deemed admissions13 from two other corporations involved in the

asbestos litigation, Hopeman Brothers, Inc. and Hampshire Industries, Inc.,14 and granted both companies’ motions to withdraw or amend those admissions, which, had they not been withdrawn, would have conclusively established that the companies were involved with asbestos-containing products and that Wilson had inhaled asbestos fibers from these products — admissions little different in substance from those of Garlock. At that time, two weeks before the scheduled trial, the trial court, in its discretion, found that no unfair prejudice would be visited upon petitioners if the motions for withdrawal or amendment were granted. Ten days later, however, when Garlock was before that same trial court arguing that it too should be allowed to withdraw or amend its deemed admissions, the trial court found the situations to be different. As the trial court indicated, the timing of the filing of Garlock’s motion was very different in relation to scheduled trial dates. An application of Rule 2-424 by a trial court, under these circumstances, does not amount to an abuse of that court’s discretion.15

Moreover, in reaching any decision regarding withdrawal or amendment of admissions in relation to allegedly inadvertent admissions, it is imperative that courts consider whether the party seeking the withdrawal or amendment has acted with due diligence. In more general terms, courts should seek to ascertain whether the aggrieved party was careless in not timely filing its responses to valid requests for admissions. See Branch Banking, 120 F.R.D. at 660 (federal district court, in explaining why it declined to permit withdrawal of admission, stating that the record disclosed “no reason why defendants, with due diligence, could not have [timely] denied plaintiffs request ... or, if they were uncertain of how to respond, state the reasons why they could not truthfully admit or deny the matter at that time”) (alteration added).

Garlock was unable to provide the trial court with any legitimate excuse as to why it did not answer petitioners’ request for admissions within the temporal confines of Rule 2-424(b). Affidavits were filed by Garlock’s counsel that suggested that its failure to respond was due to an oversight by both a paralegal who had the task of monitoring new filings in the eFiling system and the supervising attorney of that paralegal. In its memorandum in support of its motion to withdraw or amend its admissions, Garlock further casts some of the blame on the “blizzard of electronic filings” that the eFiling system has effected. We are not prepared at this time to find that a court has committed an abuse of its broad discretion in denying a party’s motion to withdraw or amend its admissions where that party’s only excuse as to why it did not timely respond to a request for admissions amounts to a plea that, because the particular attorney or firm has undertaken a large number of clients or cases, he or it cannot adequately control or oversee the proper responses to pleadings. Attorneys are required not to undertake representations unless they can adequately monitor the pleadings. This is no less so in asbestos litigation.

Furthermore, the fact that Garlock, on June 4, 2002, received, through the eFiling system, both Hopeman’s and Hampshire’s motions to withdraw or amend any request for admissions deemed to have been admitted under Rule 2-424(b), as well as those corporations’ late responses to petitioners’ request for admissions, should have alerted Garlock that a serious issue may have existed with its own filings or lack thereof. It is very likely that Garlock, if it had recognized its mistake in not filing a response to petitioners’ April 5, 2002 request for admissions and thereafter filed a similar motion and response to that of Hopeman and Hampshire, could have participated in the June 11, 2002 motions hearing and not had its earlier admissions be “conclusively established.” However, for reasons which we can only attribute to a lack of due diligence, Garlock was oblivious to these additional filings by Hopeman and Hampshire and waited until mere days before the scheduled start of trial to file its own motion to withdraw or amend.

However characterized, Garlock’s fáilure to respond to petitioners’ request for admissions was a result of oversight. Therefore, we hold that the trial court did not abuse its discretion when it denied Garlock’s motion to withdraw or amend its admissions.

As a matter of procedure, we note that, because we hold that the Court of Special Appeals erred in holding that the trial court committed an abuse of its discretion, and the intermediate appellate court did not decide petitioners’ remaining issues because of the preclusive nature of that specific holding, we shall remand this case to the Court of Special Appeals for it to decide, as may be necessary, those issues left unaddressed.16

JUDGMENT OF THE COURT OF SPECIAL APPEALS REVERSED AS TO PETITIONER WILSON’S CASE.

CASE REMANDED TO THAT COURT TO DECIDE THE ISSUES RAISED BY THE PARTIES BUT NOT ADDRESSED BY THE COURT OF SPECIAL APPEALS. COSTS IN THIS COURT TO BE PAID BY RESPONDENTS.