Rosario v. Burnsed Trucking Inc.
- Rearden
- 1:21-cv-07347
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Rosario v. Burnsed Trucking Inc., Judge Rearden ordered Rosario to document citizenship so the court could assess diversity jurisdiction.
Joan Rosario and Burnsed Trucking Inc.; the order specifically requires Rosario to provide citizenship information relevant to whether the federal court has subject-matter jurisdiction.
What happened
In Rosario v. Burnsed Trucking Inc., Burnsed Trucking removed the case from New York state court and relied on diversity jurisdiction, which generally requires parties to be citizens of different states or countries. The court previously found that the filings did not adequately allege the parties’ citizenship.
Burnsed Trucking submitted materials saying Rosario was a permanent resident alien and that Burnsed Trucking was a citizen of Florida. But the court said Burnsed Trucking had not identified the specific foreign country of which Rosario was a citizen. Rosario did not respond to the court’s order or Burnsed Trucking’s submission.
Judge Jennifer H. Rearden ordered Rosario to file, by July 12, 2023, an affidavit stating his country of citizenship when the state-court case began and when the case was removed. The order did not decide whether the case would ultimately remain in federal court or address the underlying dispute.
The detailed version
- Rosario v. Burnsed Trucking Inc. · No. 1:21-cv-07347
- Rearden
- June 28, 2023
Background
The case was removed from the Supreme Court of New York, Bronx County, to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. The complaint and removal petition invoked diversity jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1332(a). Diversity jurisdiction generally requires the parties to have the required citizenship differences and also requires the amount-in-controversy and other statutory requirements.
On March 27, 2023, the court ordered Burnsed Trucking Inc. to show why the case should not be sent back to state court for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction. The court directed Burnsed Trucking to submit an affidavit addressing the parties’ citizenship when the state case began and when the case was removed. Rosario was allowed to respond with an affidavit addressing those facts.
Citizenship Allegations
Burnsed Trucking submitted a declaration and supporting documents. It asserted that Rosario was a permanent resident alien and therefore a citizen of a foreign country, and that Burnsed Trucking was a citizen of Florida. Burnsed Trucking also asserted that Rosario had lived in the Dominican Republic before moving to his current residence in New York. But the court held that Burnsed Trucking had not identified the specific foreign country of which Rosario was a citizen. The court explained that residency alone does not establish citizenship for diversity-jurisdiction purposes.
Rosario did not respond to the court’s order or to Burnsed Trucking’s submission.
Order
The court ordered Rosario to file an affidavit by July 12, 2023, addressing his country of citizenship when he filed the complaint in state court and when Burnsed Trucking removed the case. The order did not determine whether federal subject-matter jurisdiction existed, did not order remand, and did not resolve the underlying dispute. The court stated that it would address the parties’ joint request to extend expert-discovery deadlines if it did not dismiss the action for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.