An amendment to Illinois Supreme Court Rule 213 that became effective Jan. 1 “makes it clear that one can have a supplemented opinion at a discovery deposition, not an evidence deposition.”

Chicago attorney Steven G. Pietrick, who made that observation last month, was chair of the ISBA Committee on Professional Conduct when the issue was discussed during a Supreme Court Rules Committee hearing in 2006.

The amendment is “consistent with the position which we took in front of the committee,” he pointed out. It is intended to correct a 5th District appellate interpretation in the 2003 opinion in Morgan v. Richardson.

In that case, the opinions of an opinion witness were disclosed in response to Rule 213 interrogatories. No discovery deposition was taken.

Before trial, the plaintiff took the evidence deposition and solicited opinions from the witness that had not been disclosed previously. The defendant moved to bar the new opinions.

The court denied defendant's motion in reliance on Rule 213(g), that a party cannot get opinions from a witness that were not disclosed in the answer to an interrogatory, or at deposition.

The court noted that the rule did not limit a deposition to a discovery deposition, and reasoned that a party could bring out new opinions in an evidence deposition.

But in its amendment to the rule on Dec. 6, the Supreme Court stipulated: “Except upon a showing of good cause, information in an evidence deposition not previously disclosed in a Rule 213(f) interrogatory answer or in a discovery deposition shall not be admissible upon objection at trial.”