Lanners v. State of Minnesota

Background

Cassandra and Weston Lanners, representing themselves, filed a notice seeking to remove Hennepin County Juvenile Court Case No. 27-JV-19-1016 to the federal district court. Their filing described the removal as being “for cause” based on alleged due-process violations and referred to the Fifth and Seventh Amendments. The submission included a separate “removal for cause” document, an affidavit, and several collections of documents. The court found the filings difficult to follow and said they did not clearly explain why removal was sought.

The court noted that the filings were essentially duplicates of documents filed earlier in a related proceeding. In that earlier proceeding, the federal court had remanded the case to Hennepin County District Court because it lacked jurisdiction. After reviewing the filings in both matters, the court concluded that the same disposition was appropriate here.

Removal and jurisdiction

Federal removal generally allows a defendant to move a state-court civil action to federal court when the action could originally have been filed in federal court. The party seeking removal has the burden of showing that removal is proper. Federal defenses or federal constitutional issues cannot simply be added to a state-law case to create federal jurisdiction.

The court identified at least two reasons removal was improper. If the Lanners were plaintiffs in the state case, they could not remove it because removal is generally available only to defendants. If they were defendants in the state case, the pleadings still did not establish a basis for removal. The court found no apparent diversity jurisdiction because the parties appeared connected to Minnesota and the amount in controversy did not exceed $75,000. It also found no federal-question jurisdiction because the filings did not show that the underlying state case involved a question of federal law.

The court rejected the attempt to use alleged due-process violations and references to the Fifth and Seventh Amendments to create federal jurisdiction. It also stated that, if the Lanners intended to bring a new federal lawsuit based on federal claims, they would need to file an independent complaint that complied with the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure rather than use a notice of removal.

Ruling

Judge John R. Tunheim concluded that the federal court lacked jurisdiction to hear the matter as a properly removed civil action. The court REMANDED the case to Hennepin County Juvenile Court. It denied Cassandra Lanners’ motion to proceed in forma pauperis—meaning to proceed without paying the filing fee—as moot.