Aldana v. Gamestop, Inc.
- Laura Swain
- 1:22-cv-07063
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 1
In Aldana v. Gamestop, Judge Broderick ordered GameStop to state whether its pending dismissal motion became moot after plaintiffs amended their complaint.
The plaintiffs and GameStop were affected because the plaintiffs' amended complaint changed the procedural posture of GameStop's pending motion to dismiss, and GameStop was required to state how it wanted the court to proceed.
What happened
In Aldana v. Gamestop, Inc., the plaintiffs filed an amended complaint while GameStop’s motion to dismiss was still pending.
The court explained that it could either treat the pending motion as no longer relevant or evaluate it using the allegations in the amended complaint.
Judge Vernon S. Broderick ordered GameStop to file a letter within seven days choosing between those options; the court did not decide the motion to dismiss in this order.
The detailed version
- Aldana v. Gamestop, Inc. · No. 1:22-cv-07063
- Laura Swain
- Nov. 7, 2022
Background
On November 4, 2022, the plaintiffs filed an amended complaint under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(a)(1)(B). GameStop had already filed a motion to dismiss, and that motion was still pending.
Issue and procedure
The court stated that when a plaintiff properly amends a complaint while a motion to dismiss is pending, the court may either deny the pending motion as moot or evaluate it based on the amended complaint. “Moot” means that the motion no longer requires a ruling because the amended complaint has replaced the earlier complaint.
Order
Judge Vernon S. Broderick ordered GameStop to file a letter within seven days stating whether it wanted the court to treat its current motion to dismiss as moot, without prejudice to filing a new motion under Rule 15(a)(3), or whether the court should evaluate the current motion using the amended complaint’s allegations. The order did not rule on the merits of the motion to dismiss or the claims.
Effect
The order required GameStop to choose how to proceed with its pending motion. It did not grant or deny that motion and did not decide the underlying dispute.
Read the full 1-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.