Kosachuk v. Selective Advisors Group, LLC
- Denise Cote
- 1:19-cv-04844
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 5
In Kosachuk v. Selective Advisors Group, Judge Cote denied reconsideration of dismissal under the rule barring federal review of state-court judgments.
Chris Kosachuk and NLG, LLC were affected because the court denied their motion for reconsideration, leaving the prior dismissal of their complaint in place. Selective Advisors Group, LLC was the defendant.
What happened
In Kosachuk v. Selective Advisors Group, Chris Kosachuk and NLG, LLC sought a declaration that a 2012 New York state-court judgment against NLG was invalid because it resulted from fraud and violated due process. The court had previously dismissed their complaint.
Kosachuk and NLG asked the court to reconsider that dismissal. They argued, among other things, that the rule barring federal review of state-court judgments did not apply to allegedly invalid judgments and challenged some descriptions of the case record.
Judge Denise Cote denied the motion for reconsideration. She found that the parties had not identified a legal or factual error warranting reconsideration, and held that their claims remained barred by the rule known as Rooker-Feldman.
The detailed version
- Kosachuk v. Selective Advisors Group, LLC · No. 1:19-cv-04844
- Denise Cote
- Nov. 13, 2019
Background
Chris Kosachuk, the founder and sole manager of NLG, LLC, sought a declaration under 28 U.S.C. § 2201 that a 2012 judgment by confession entered against NLG in New York Supreme Court was invalid from the beginning. Kosachuk and NLG alleged that the judgment was obtained through fraud and violated due process. They acknowledged that the judgment was final and could no longer be appealed, but had filed multiple motions in New York Supreme Court seeking to vacate it. They abandoned most of those motions before a decision on the merits and withdrew four fully submitted motions in favor of this federal action.
The court's September 30, 2019 opinion dismissed the complaint because the claims were barred by the Rooker-Feldman doctrine, which generally prevents a federal district court from reviewing or undoing a state-court judgment. The court also dismissed the complaint in the alternative because the claims were filed too late under the New York statute of limitations for an action to vacate a judgment by confession.
Motion for Reconsideration
On October 11, 2019, Kosachuk and NLG moved under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59 for reconsideration. The court construed the motion as one under Rule 59(e) and Local Rule 6.3 because Rule 59(a) does not provide a vehicle for reconsidering an order granting a motion to dismiss.
Reconsideration is available only in limited circumstances, such as an intervening change in controlling law, newly available evidence, or the need to correct a clear error or prevent serious unfairness. It is not a vehicle for presenting new arguments, relitigating issues already decided, or seeking a second opportunity to argue the case.
Court's Analysis
The court found that Kosachuk and NLG had not identified a legal or factual error warranting reconsideration. The court concluded that they principally raised new arguments or attempted to revive arguments that the September opinion had already considered and rejected. It also stated that reconsideration could not substitute for an appeal or permit arguments that had not been made in opposition to the motion to dismiss.
The court rejected the parties' argument that Rooker-Feldman does not apply to allegedly invalid judgments, finding the bankruptcy decisions on which they relied inapplicable. It also found that any imprecise descriptions of the record were not shown to be material to the dismissal. The court concluded that the claims remained barred by Rooker-Feldman.
Disposition
The October 11, 2019 motion for reconsideration was denied.
Read the full 5-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.