Guzman v. Evans Delivery Co. Inc.
- Ronnie Abrams
- 1:23-cv-03536
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 7
In Guzman v. Evans Delivery, Judge Abrams granted Mayol’s joinder, denied Guzman’s joinder, denied remand, and dismissed Kearny Point.
The plaintiffs’ requests to add Guillermo Mayol and Guzman as defendants and to return the case to state court were affected. Mayol was added, Guzman was not added as a defendant, the remand request was denied, and Kearny Point was dismissed from the action.
What happened
In Guzman v. Evans Delivery Co. Inc., three plaintiffs sued several defendants over a tractor-trailer accident. After the case was moved from state to federal court, the plaintiffs asked to add the truck driver and one plaintiff as defendants, and sought remand so the case could be combined with another state-court lawsuit.
The court said claims by Brito and Del Orden against their co-plaintiff Guzman must be brought as crossclaims instead of by making Guzman a defendant. It allowed the truck driver, Guillermo Mayol, to be added because the claims arose from the same accident. It rejected remand, finding that the plaintiffs’ requests did not fit the federal remand statute and that their delays did not justify sending the case back to state court.
Judge Ronnie Abrams granted Mayol’s joinder, denied Brito and Del Orden’s request to join Guzman, and denied the motion to remand on consolidation grounds. The court also dismissed Kearny Point from the action and allowed Brito and Del Orden to seek permission to file crossclaims against Guzman.
The detailed version
- Guzman v. Evans Delivery Co. Inc. · No. 1:23-cv-03536
- Ronnie Abrams
- Oct. 5, 2023
Background
Ana Disla Guzman, Renso Brito, and Hector Del Orden sued Evans Delivery Co. Inc., Pinnacle Freight Lines, US40 Logistics Inc., Sarmiento Truck Sales LLC, and Kearny Point in New York state court. They sought damages for injuries arising from a motor vehicle accident allegedly caused by the defendants’ negligence. Guzman was driving the vehicle, Brito and Del Orden were passengers, and the vehicle was allegedly struck by a tractor-trailer registered under defendants’ names. The tractor-trailer driver was later identified as Guillermo Mayol.
Brito and Del Orden later filed a separate state-court action against Guzman, alleging that she was also negligent. The defendants removed the first action to federal court based on diversity jurisdiction, which generally permits federal-court jurisdiction over certain disputes involving citizens of different states. The plaintiffs then filed motions seeking to remand the case to state court, join Guzman as a defendant, and join Mayol as a defendant.
Joinder of Guzman and Mayol
The court denied Brito and Del Orden’s request to join Guzman as a defendant. Because Guzman was already a co-plaintiff, the court held that any claims by Brito and Del Orden against her should be asserted as crossclaims under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 13(g). A crossclaim is a claim brought by one party against another party on the same side of the case. The court stated that Brito and Del Orden could request permission to file such crossclaims, and that crossclaims against a non-diverse co-party would not defeat subject-matter jurisdiction because the court could exercise supplemental jurisdiction over them.
The court granted the plaintiffs’ request to join Mayol as a defendant under Rule 20. That rule permits multiple defendants to be joined when the claims arise from the same transaction or occurrence or involve a common question of law or fact. The court found Mayol to be a proper party because the plaintiffs alleged that he was driving the tractor-trailer and was negligent when changing lanes.
The court also dismissed Kearny Point under Rule 21. The plaintiffs did not oppose that result, and the court found good cause based on the parties’ statements that Kearny Point was not a proper party and did not own, lease, control, manage, or operate the vehicles involved.
Motion to Remand and Consolidation
The plaintiffs sought remand so the federal action could be consolidated with the separate state-court action. The court found that request without merit. It discussed a federal statute, 28 U.S.C. § 1447(e), that permits a court to allow a plaintiff to add a defendant whose joinder would destroy federal subject-matter jurisdiction and then remand the case. The court explained that this procedure requires the proposed joinder to satisfy Rule 20 and requires consideration of fairness factors such as delay, prejudice, the likelihood of multiple litigation, and the plaintiff’s motivation.
The court concluded that § 1447(e) was not strictly available here. Brito and Del Orden were not properly seeking to join a diversity-destroying defendant because their claims against Guzman had to be brought as crossclaims. The joinder of Mayol also did not affect diversity jurisdiction because the parties agreed that he was diverse from the plaintiffs.
The court further found that Brito and Del Orden waited eight months before filing their separate action against Guzman and offered no explanation for that delay. The plaintiffs also did not seek consolidation until after the first action had been removed, even though the second action had already been filed. The court declined to extend the remand statute beyond its text and denied the motion to remand on consolidation grounds.
Disposition
The court granted the plaintiffs’ motion for leave to join Mayol as a defendant; denied Brito and Del Orden’s motion for leave to join Guzman as a defendant; and denied the plaintiffs’ motion to remand on consolidation grounds. The court dismissed Kearny Point from the action and stated that Brito and Del Orden could file a request to assert crossclaims against Guzman by October 19, 2023. The opinion addressed case-management, party-joinder, and remand issues; it did not decide which parties were liable for the accident.
Read the full 7-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.