Snyder v. Does 1 through 50, Inclusive

Background

Larry Snyder filed a proposed class action on behalf of truck drivers exposed to benzene while driving commercial trucks and people diagnosed with medical conditions related to benzene poisoning. He alleged that he worked as a union truck driver in Texas, Louisiana, and California, and as an herbicide applicator in Oregon, from October 1989 through July 1997. He alleged exposure to chemicals containing benzene, inadequate warnings, and a later diagnosis of multiple myeloma.

The first amended complaint asserted five causes of action: strict liability, failure to warn, negligence, negligent infliction of emotional distress, and fraudulent concealment. Monsanto Company, PBI-Gordon Corporation, and The Dow Chemical Company separately moved to dismiss under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(2), for lack of personal jurisdiction, and Rule 12(b)(6), for failure to state a legally sufficient claim.

Personal Jurisdiction

The court held that Snyder had not sufficiently alleged either specific or general personal jurisdiction over the moving defendants. Snyder did not address specific jurisdiction in his oppositions, so the court treated that issue as conceded for purposes of the motions. The court stated that he could allege facts supporting specific jurisdiction in an amended complaint.

The court also found that the allegations supporting general jurisdiction were too vague. The complaint did not state the defendants’ states of incorporation or allege that their principal places of business were in California. It also did not identify specific facts showing that each defendant had continuous and systematic contacts with California. The court therefore dismissed the complaint under Rule 12(b)(2) with leave to amend.

Claims

The court found that all claims suffered from the same pleading problem: the complaint did not identify specific conduct by each named defendant and instead grouped the defendants together. The court also found that the claims relied on formulaic statements of legal elements rather than sufficient factual allegations.

The court dismissed the strict-liability and failure-to-warn claims with leave to amend. The complaint did not clearly identify the product-liability theory and did not allege facts about the individual defendants, the products involved, the warnings that were missing, or how the alleged failure to warn caused Snyder’s injuries. The court stated that, if Snyder was asserting strict liability only under a failure-to-warn theory, he should not plead a separate failure-to-warn cause of action.

The court found that the negligence claim did not specifically plead facts concerning each named defendant. It also held that the negligent-infliction-of-emotional-distress claim lacked facts describing the nature and extent of Snyder’s emotional or mental suffering. The court dismissed that claim without leave to amend, while stating that specific facts about emotional distress could be pleaded under the negligence claim.

The court dismissed the fraudulent-concealment claim with leave to amend. Because fraud claims must be pleaded with particularity, Snyder had to identify the specific misconduct by each defendant, when it occurred, and when the alleged fraud was discovered. The court rejected grouping the defendants together as sufficient under that standard.

Issues Not Decided

The defendants argued that the state-law claims were preempted—meaning displaced—by the Federal Hazardous Substances Act or the Hazardous Materials Transportation Act. Because the court granted dismissal with leave to amend for lack of personal jurisdiction, it did not decide the preemption argument. The court also declined to address whether the proposed class allegations should be dismissed.

Disposition

The court granted the defendants’ motions to dismiss with leave to amend and ordered Snyder to file a second amended complaint within 21 days. The opinion states that the negligent-infliction-of-emotional-distress claim was dismissed without leave to amend; it does not use a separate with-prejudice or without-prejudice label for the overall order.