Ameriway Corporation v. Chen
- Vernon Broderick
- 1:19-cv-09407
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 7
In Ameriway v. Chen, Judge Broderick denied Chen’s request to revisit an earlier dismissal and denied without prejudice her request to consolidate a related case.
May Yan Chen, whose request to revisit the dismissal of her Third-Party Complaint was denied, and the Third-Party Defendants, whose dismissal remained in place. Chen’s request to consolidate the cases was denied without prejudice.
What happened
In Ameriway Corporation v. Chen, the court had earlier dismissed May Yan Chen’s claims against the third-party defendants after she did not timely respond to their motion. Chen later asked the court to reconsider that dismissal.
Chen argued that the court should give her another opportunity to present her opposition under a federal rule allowing relief from a judgment. Alternatively, she asked the court to consolidate this case with a separate case involving substantially similar claims.
Judge Vernon S. Broderick denied the motion because requests for reconsideration were untimely and did not meet the required standard. He also denied without prejudice the request to consolidate, allowing the parties to raise consolidation again if the separate case survived its initial proceedings.
The detailed version
- Ameriway Corporation v. Chen · No. 1:19-cv-09407
- Vernon Broderick
- Apr. 9, 2024
Background
Third-Party Defendants had moved to dismiss May Yan Chen’s Third-Party Complaint. Chen did not timely oppose that motion, request an extension, or show good cause for her failure to respond. On October 7, 2021, Judge Broderick ruled that the motion would be treated as unopposed. On December 27, 2021, he granted the Third-Party Defendants’ motion under Rule 12(b)(6), which permits dismissal for failure to state a legally sufficient claim.
Chen later filed a motion under Rule 60 asking the court to reconsider the matters addressed in the December 27 decision. In the alternative, she asked under Rule 42 to consolidate this case with a separate action in which she asserted substantially similar claims against the Third-Party Defendants.
Reconsideration Request
The court held that any request for reconsideration based on Local Civil Rule 6.3 was untimely. That rule requires such a motion to be served within 14 days after the court’s decision on the original motion. The earlier dismissal was entered on December 27, 2021, but Chen did not begin seeking relief until February 1, 2022.
The court also considered whether Chen’s request could be treated as a motion under Rule 60(b). The court stated that this request might have been timely under Rule 60(b), which allows relief from a final judgment in certain circumstances, including mistake, inadvertence, surprise, or excusable neglect. However, the court held that Rule 60(b) did not provide Chen another opportunity to brief opposition to the dismissal after she had failed to respond on time. The court relied on authority stating that a party generally cannot obtain relief based on an attorney’s ignorance of court rules or inability to manage a caseload.
Consolidation Request and Disposition
The court denied without prejudice Chen’s request to consolidate this action with the separate action. The parties could raise consolidation again if that separate action survived its initial motions or court orders addressing whether it could proceed.
Judge Broderick’s conclusion states that Chen’s Motion was DENIED. The Clerk was directed to terminate the open motion at Docket 99. The opinion addressed the requested reconsideration and consolidation relief; it did not revisit the merits of the claims dismissed in the earlier decision.
Read the full 7-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.