Reeves v. Leasure

Background

Kathleen Kathryn Reeves sued several employees and other defendants in the Superior Court of Alameda County, California. Her Second Amended Complaint asserted ten federal and state causes of action, including fraud by concealment, violations of the Federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and the Computer Data Access and Fraud Act, and breach of fiduciary duty. Reeves later named Kelly Gamble as Doe 7 and served Gamble with the summons and Second Amended Complaint on July 13, 2020.

Gamble filed a demurrer in state court. On November 19, 2020, the state court sustained the demurrer because the complaint did not describe Gamble’s or Doe 7’s role in the events supporting Reeves’s claims. The state court allowed Reeves 30 days to file a further amended complaint explaining Gamble’s connection to the causes of action. Reeves filed and served the Third Amended Complaint on December 15, 2020. Gamble filed a notice of removal on January 13, 2021, and the defendants served with the Third Amended Complaint consented to removal.

Reeves’s Motion to Remand

Reeves moved to remand, meaning to return the case to state court. She argued that Gamble’s removal was untimely, that the notice of removal contained procedural defects, and that the state court’s concurrent jurisdiction prevented federal jurisdiction. The opinion states that the parties did not dispute the federal court’s original jurisdiction, although the court rejected Reeves’s argument that concurrent state jurisdiction barred removal.

Untimely Removal

The court held that Gamble’s removal was untimely. Under 28 U.S.C. § 1446, a defendant generally must file a notice of removal within 30 days after receiving the initial pleading or being served with the summons, whichever period is shorter.

Gamble argued that her 30-day period began when she became a named defendant and received the Third Amended Complaint on December 15, 2020. The court rejected that argument. Reeves had served Gamble with both a summons and the Second Amended Complaint on July 13, 2020, identifying her as Doe 7. The court held that this service triggered Gamble’s ability to remove the case. Gamble also participated in the state-court litigation before the Third Amended Complaint, including by filing a demurrer, showing that she knew she was a defendant.

The court further held that the Second Amended Complaint revealed a basis for federal jurisdiction because it expressly asserted federal causes of action. The state court’s later amendment did not restart the removal deadline because the causes of action remained the same; the amendment only more precisely connected Gamble to those claims. Gamble therefore had to remove within 30 days of the July 13, 2020 service, but did not do so until January 13, 2021.

Procedural Defects in the Removal Papers

Reeves also argued that Gamble’s notice of removal was defective because it omitted copies of the First Complaint, the Second Amended Complaint, and other state-court papers required by 28 U.S.C. § 1446(a). The court agreed that these documents were missing but held that the omissions were procedural defects, not defects that required remand by themselves. The court stated that the defects could have been corrected in federal court if the removal had been timely.

Disposition

The court granted Reeves’s motion to remand because Gamble’s removal was untimely. The court did not treat the missing documents as independently fatal. The court resolved the matter without oral argument and vacated the hearing scheduled for April 8, 2021. The order was signed by Judge Charles R. Breyer.