Davis v. Odn I Gmbh
- Garnett
- 1:24-cv-01463
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Davis v. ODN I GMBH, Judge Garnett found missing citizenship allegations and set deadlines to establish diversity jurisdiction or dismiss Contrarian.
Eugene Davis and Defendant Contrarian Capital Management, LLC; the order gives Davis deadlines to obtain information, amend the complaint, or voluntarily dismiss Contrarian, and provides for Contrarian’s later dismissal if the jurisdictional defect is not resolved.
What happened
In Eugene Davis v. ODN I GMBH, et al., the court examined whether the complaint adequately showed diversity of citizenship, which can support federal jurisdiction. The complaint identified Contrarian Capital Management, LLC as organized under Delaware law but did not identify its members or their citizenship.
The court allowed Davis 14 days to serve one question on Contrarian seeking information about its members and their citizenship. Within 45 days, Davis may file an amended complaint supplying the required information or voluntarily dismiss Contrarian. If Davis does neither, or does not truthfully allege complete diversity, Contrarian will be dismissed from the case for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction without further notice.
Judge Margaret M. Garnett issued this order on March 1, 2024. The order did not immediately dismiss Contrarian; it provided a chance to correct the jurisdictional allegations or remove Contrarian from the action.
The detailed version
- Davis v. Odn I Gmbh · No. 1:24-cv-01463
- Garnett
- Mar. 1, 2024
Background
The court addressed subject-matter jurisdiction at the beginning of the case. The complaint appears to rely on diversity of citizenship, which requires the pleadings to clearly allege the citizenship of the relevant parties.
The complaint stated that Defendant Contrarian Capital Management, LLC was an entity organized and existing under Delaware law. But because Contrarian is a limited liability company, the complaint also needed to identify its members and allege the citizenship of each individual member. If a corporation is a member, it needed to state that corporation’s place of incorporation and principal place of business. The court also noted that alleging residence, rather than citizenship, would not be enough.
Order
Within 14 days of the order, Davis may serve a single interrogatory—a written question used to obtain information in a case—on Contrarian seeking the identity of its members, the citizenship of any individual members, and the required corporate information for any corporate member. Contrarian must respond within 14 days.
Within 45 days of the order, Davis may file an amended complaint identifying Contrarian’s members and truthfully alleging the information needed to establish complete diversity of citizenship. Alternatively, Davis may voluntarily dismiss Contrarian within that period.
If Davis does not amend the complaint to truthfully allege complete diversity or voluntarily dismiss Contrarian within 45 days, the order states that Contrarian will be dismissed from the action for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction without further notice. The order did not itself dismiss Contrarian immediately.
Disposition and Classification
Judge Margaret M. Garnett issued an order requiring correction or resolution of the complaint’s jurisdictional allegations. This is a procedural order because it concerns whether the federal court has subject-matter jurisdiction and does not decide the underlying claims.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.