Chartwell Pharmaceuticals LLC v. Woodfield Pharmaceutical, LLC
- Philip Halpern
- 7:20-cv-00099
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 4
In Chartwell Pharmaceuticals v. Woodfield Pharmaceutical, Judge Halpern denied reconsideration of an order transferring the case to Texas.
Chartwell Pharmaceuticals LLC’s request to undo the transfer was denied, so the prior order transferring the action to the Southern District of Texas remained in effect; Woodfield Pharmaceutical LLC opposed reconsideration.
What happened
Chartwell Pharmaceuticals LLC sued Woodfield Pharmaceutical LLC. After limited jurisdictional discovery, Woodfield asked the court to dismiss the case for lack of personal jurisdiction or transfer it. The court previously transferred the case to the Southern District of Texas.
Chartwell asked the court to reconsider that transfer. It repeated arguments about its preferred forum, where the key events occurred, and the locations of witnesses, evidence, and the parties. Chartwell also raised arguments and cited cases that it had not presented earlier.
Judge Philip M. Halpern denied reconsideration. He ruled that Chartwell had not identified controlling decisions or information the court overlooked and was instead repeating or expanding arguments already considered.
The detailed version
- Chartwell Pharmaceuticals LLC v. Woodfield Pharmaceutical, LLC · No. 7:20-cv-00099
- Philip Halpern
- Nov. 16, 2020
Background
After limited jurisdictional discovery, Woodfield Pharmaceutical LLC moved to dismiss Chartwell Pharmaceuticals LLC’s action for lack of personal jurisdiction or to transfer the case. Following oral argument, the court issued a bench ruling granting Woodfield’s motion to transfer venue to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas under 28 U.S.C. § 1404(a), and entered a transfer order on October 23, 2020.
Chartwell later sought a stay of the transfer order and permission to move for reconsideration. The court allowed Chartwell to file that motion, which Chartwell filed on November 6, 2020.
Reconsideration standard
The court described reconsideration as an extraordinary remedy that should be used sparingly. A motion for reconsideration generally requires the moving party to identify controlling decisions or information that the court overlooked and that could reasonably change the result. Reconsideration cannot be used to repeat rejected arguments, present new arguments that could have been made earlier, or relitigate issues already decided.
Court’s analysis
Chartwell challenged the court’s analysis of the nine factors considered under Section 1404(a). It repeated arguments about deference to its choice of forum, the location of the operative facts, and the location of witnesses, evidence, and the parties. It also attempted to add arguments that it had not made on the original transfer motion, including the significance of a forum-selection clause in a contract that was not the subject of this case.
The court concluded that Chartwell had not identified any controlling decision or information that it had overlooked. The additional cases cited by Chartwell were not controlling decisions overlooked by the court, and the information Chartwell presented was information the court had already considered.
Disposition
Judge Halpern denied Chartwell’s motion for reconsideration. The clerk was directed to terminate the motion. The opinion addresses the reconsideration motion and does not decide the underlying claims on their merits.
Read the full 4-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.