Morris v. Sugarman
- Katherine Failla
- 1:23-cv-09327
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Morris v. Sugarman, Judge Failla dismissed the class claims under Rule 12(b)(1) and reopened discovery for the individual claims.
The plaintiffs’ proposed class claims were dismissed, while their individual claims remained in the case and became subject to reopened fact discovery. The defendant could depose the plaintiffs, and the plaintiffs could depose Kenneth Dean Sugarman about the individual claims.
What happened
In Morris v. Sugarman, the plaintiffs conceded that their proposed class claims did not meet the $5 million jurisdictional threshold required by the Class Action Fairness Act. They therefore did not oppose dismissal of those claims.
The plaintiffs’ individual claims remained in the Third Amended Complaint. The parties asked for 60 additional days to complete fact discovery, including depositions of the plaintiffs and another deposition of Kenneth Dean Sugarman concerning the individual claims.
Judge Katherine Polk Failla granted the motion to dismiss the class claims under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1) and granted the request to reopen fact discovery. The court set August 4, 2025, as the discovery deadline and said extensions would require compelling circumstances.
The detailed version
- Morris v. Sugarman · No. 1:23-cv-09327
- Katherine Failla
- June 5, 2025
Background
The plaintiffs’ counsel told the court that, in light of a New York Court of Appeals decision, the plaintiffs conceded that their claims on behalf of proposed classes could not satisfy the $5 million jurisdictional threshold under the Class Action Fairness Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1332(d). The plaintiffs therefore did not oppose the defendant’s motion under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1), which allows dismissal for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction.
The filing stated that the plaintiffs’ individual claims would remain for adjudication. The parties jointly requested 60 additional days to complete fact discovery. The defendant sought to depose the plaintiffs, and the plaintiffs sought to depose Kenneth Dean Sugarman again about issues concerning their individual claims. A prior court order had limited the plaintiffs’ earlier deposition of Mr. Sugarman to class-jurisdiction issues.
Rulings
The court granted the defendant’s motion to dismiss the plaintiffs’ class claims under Rule 12(b)(1). The court also granted the parties’ request to reopen fact discovery for an additional 60 days concerning the individual claims. Fact discovery was required to be completed by August 4, 2025, and the court stated that it would not extend that deadline absent compelling circumstances. The clerk was directed to terminate the motions at docket entries 83 and 84.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.