Everest Stables, Inc. v. Porter, Wright, Morris, & Arthur LLP
- Elizabeth Cowan Wright
- 0:21-cv-02289
- U.S. District Court · District of Minnesota
- 3
In Everest Stables v. Porter, Judge Wright denied defendants leave to seek reconsideration because they offered arguments available earlier.
The ruling affected defendants Porter, Wright, Morris, & Arthur LLP and Christopher D. Cathey by denying them permission to file a reconsideration motion; it also left plaintiffs Everest Stables, Inc. and Jeffrey Nielsen opposing that request.
What happened
Everest Stables, Inc. v. Porter, Wright, Morris, & Arthur LLP involved defendants’ request for permission to ask the court to reconsider an earlier order. That earlier order had granted in part and denied in part the defendants’ motion to dismiss.
The defendants argued that Ohio’s one-year deadline for legal-malpractice claims required dismissal of Counts VII and VIII. The court noted that the defendants had previously supported applying Minnesota law to those counts and had not substantially made the new argument in their earlier motion.
The court denied the defendants’ request for permission to file a reconsideration motion. Judge Wilhelmina M. Wright concluded that the defendants had not shown the compelling circumstances required by the court’s local rule.
The detailed version
- Everest Stables, Inc. v. Porter, Wright, Morris, & Arthur LLP · No. 0:21-cv-02289
- Elizabeth Cowan Wright
- Sept. 29, 2022
Background
The defendants, Porter, Wright, Morris, & Arthur LLP and Christopher D. Cathey, asked for permission to file a motion asking the court to reconsider its August 29, 2022 order. That earlier order had granted in part and denied in part the defendants’ motion to dismiss. Everest Stables, Inc. and Jeffrey Nielsen opposed the request.
Arguments and analysis
Local Rule 7.1(j) requires a party to obtain the court’s permission before filing a reconsideration motion. Permission requires a showing of “compelling circumstances.” The court explained that reconsideration has a limited purpose: correcting a clear legal or factual error or addressing newly discovered evidence. It cannot be used to repeat earlier arguments, present evidence or arguments that could have been presented earlier, or introduce a new legal theory.
The defendants did not claim to have newly discovered evidence. Instead, they argued that the court had made legal errors or omissions, including failing to dismiss Counts VII and VIII under Ohio’s one-year statute of limitations for legal-malpractice claims. The court observed that the defendants had endorsed applying Minnesota law to those counts and had not substantially argued that the counts should be treated as part of the plaintiffs’ malpractice claims, even though they could have made that argument when they filed their motion to dismiss.
Ruling
The court concluded that the defendants were seeking to raise arguments that could have been made earlier or to present new legal theories. It held that the defendants had not shown the compelling circumstances required by Local Rule 7.1(j).
Judge Wilhelmina M. Wright denied the defendants’ request for leave to file a motion to reconsider. The order did not itself decide the underlying malpractice claims or alter the earlier order’s disposition of the motion to dismiss.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.