Gallina v. Target Corporation
- Lewis Kaplan
- 1:25-cv-04658
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 3
In Gallina v. Target, Judge Kaplan remanded the action because the amended removal notice did not adequately establish diversity jurisdiction.
Gallina, Target Corporation, WB Imico Lexington Lessee, LLC, and VNO 86 Lex LLC; the case returns to the state court, and the opinion does not resolve the underlying negligence claims.
What happened
Gallina sued Target Corporation and others in New York state court. The defendants removed the case to federal court, claiming that the parties were citizens of different states, but the court found that the removal notice did not adequately allege the citizenship of Gallina or two limited liability company defendants.
The amended notice argued that WB Imico Lexington Lessee, LLC’s citizenship did not matter because it had sold the premises years earlier and Gallina allegedly agreed to its dismissal. It also argued that VNO 86 Lex LLC was improperly added because Target had agreed to defend and indemnify it. The court rejected the argument about VNO, explaining that a later defense or indemnification agreement did not establish that VNO was improperly added and that the defendants had not shown that Gallina had no possible claim against VNO.
The court remanded the action to the state court because it lacked subject-matter jurisdiction. Judge Lewis A. Kaplan did not decide whether the notice adequately alleged Gallina’s citizenship or whether WB had been improperly added.
The detailed version
- Gallina v. Target Corporation · No. 1:25-cv-04658
- Lewis Kaplan
- June 27, 2025
Background
Gallina began this action in New York Supreme Court. The defendants later removed it to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, purportedly based on diversity jurisdiction, which generally requires the parties to be citizens of different states and the federal court to have subject-matter jurisdiction over the dispute.
The court previously found that the notice of removal did not adequately allege the citizenship of Gallina or of two limited liability company defendants: WB Imico Lexington Lessee, LLC (WB) and VNO 86 Lex LLC (VNO). The court directed the defendants to file an amended notice correcting those deficiencies and stated that it would remand the action if they did not do so.
Arguments and Analysis
The amended notice still did not adequately allege the citizenship of the LLC defendants. It argued that WB’s citizenship was irrelevant because WB had sold the premises in 2010 and Gallina allegedly had agreed to its dismissal. The court stated that WB’s joinder might possibly be considered fraudulent because it allegedly sold the premises long before the accident, meaning Gallina might not be able to state a negligence claim against WB, but the court did not decide that issue.
The amended notice also argued that VNO had been fraudulently joined. Fraudulent joinder is a legal argument that a non-diverse defendant was added only to defeat federal jurisdiction. The party making that argument must show, by clear and convincing evidence, either outright fraud in the pleadings or that there is no possibility that the plaintiff could state a claim against the defendant in state court.
The court rejected the argument concerning VNO. It explained that diversity must exist both when the action was filed in state court and when it was removed. The fact that Target allegedly agreed after removal to defend and indemnify VNO did not remove VNO from the case. The court also found that Target had offered only a conclusory assertion that VNO had no role in maintaining the Target store’s interior or addressing the temporary water condition on which Gallina allegedly fell. That was insufficient to show fraudulent joinder.
Disposition
The court remanded the action to the court from which it had been removed for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction. The opinion did not state that the court decided the underlying negligence claims. It also expressly left open the adequacy of the allegation concerning Gallina’s citizenship and did not decide whether WB was fraudulently joined.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.