Legal Question in Civil Litigation in California
What happens if the plaintiffs lawyer gave the defendants lawyer an extra 30 days to respond to the
initial complaint without notifying the court of the agreement and now 5 months have passed without any response? Plaintiffs lawyer refuses to do anything about the defendant (default or notify the court of extension or extensions I guess) and now wants to withdraw all of a sudden.
1 Answer from Attorneys
You don't generally notify the court about extensions. The only time you would do so is if you have a Case Management Conference coming up and you are filling out the Case Management Conference Statement. There's a part of that form where you state that all defendants have been served and have either filed answers, or the plaintiff has taken their default, or you explain why neither of those things has happened. Responsive pleading deadlines are pretty casually ignored until a party or the court makes an issue about it.
Far more serious is the plaintiff's lawyer wanting to withdraw.