Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca10-88-01914/USCOURTS-ca10-88-01914-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 890
Nature of Suit: Other Statutory Actions
Cause of Action: 

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r 

PUBLISH 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

TENTH CIRCUIT 

WILLIAM M. CHAPMAN, et al., ) 

) 

Plaintiffs-Appellants, ) 

) 

vs. ) 

) 

CONTINENTAL ILLINOIS NATIONAL) 

BANK & TRUST COMPANY OF ) 

CHICAGO, a National Banking ) 

Association, and as ) 

Administrator for the Federal ) 

Deposit Insurance Corp., ) 

) 

Defendant-Appellee. ) 

No. 88-1509 

J?ILED 

United States Court of Appeals 

Tenth Circuit 

SEP 2 2 1989 

ROBERT L. HOECKER 

Clerk 

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF OKLAHOMA 

(D.C. No. CIV-87-294-W) 

Submitted on the briefs:* 

Sandra L. Dougherty and Thomas H. Dahlk of Fitzgerald, Schorr, 

Barmettler & Brennan, for Plaintiffs-Appellants. 

James w. Gladden, Jr. and Christopher T. Van Wagner, of Counsel, 

of Mayer, Brown & Platt, for Defendant-Appellee. 

Before LOGAN, SEYMOUR and BALDOCK, Circuit Judges. 

BALDOCK, Circuit Judge. 

* After exam1n1ng the briefs and appellate record, this panel has 

determined unanimously that oral argument would not materially 

assist the determination of this appeal. See Fed; R. App. P. 

34(a); 10th Cir. R. 34.1.9. The cause therefore is ordered 

submitted without oral argument. 

Appellate Case: 88-1914 Document: 01019910519 Date Filed: 09/22/1989 Page: 1 
The issue in this case is whether a notice of appeal from a 

district court order, disposing of part of a consolidated matter, 

is adequate to confer appellate jurisdiction on this court, when 

at the time the notice of appeal is filed, suminary judgment has 

been granted on the remainder of the action, but a Fed. R. Civ. P. 

59 motion is pending on that latter grant. 

The litigation at the district court essentially consisted of 

two parts. In August 1986, appellee Federal Deposit Insurance 

Corporation (FDIC) filed suit in Oklahoma federal district court, 

seeking from the appellants payment on indebtedness assigned to 

the FDIC. This suit was numbered CIV-86-1695-W on the district 

court's docket. In anticipation of such a suit, appellants had 

filed an action in Nebraska against appellee Continental Illinois 

National Bank & Trust Co. of Chicago (Continental), alleging for 

reasons not here relevant that Continental should be required to 

indemnify appellants for any liability they might incur with 

respect to the FDIC. The latter action was transferred to the 

Western District of Oklahoma, styled as CIV-87-294-W, and 

consolidated with the main FDIC suit, CIV-86-1695-W. 

Although consolidated, the "parts" proceeded on relatively 

independent courses, with orders and accompanying judgments as to 

each part entered separately on the district court docket. The 

district court granted summary judgment in favor of both 

Continental and the FDIC. It is jurisdiction over the appeal of 

the grant of summary judgment in favor of Continental, 

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Appellate Case: 88-1914 Document: 01019910519 Date Filed: 09/22/1989 Page: 2 
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CIV-87-294-W, that we here consider. The procedural history is 

most conveniently summarized in chart form. 

DATE CIV-87-294-W CIV-86-1695-W 

1/ 8/88 District court grants 

summary judgment for 

Continental 

1/18/88 Appellants file Rule 59 

motion 

3/ 3/88 Rule 59 motion denied; District court grants 

final judgment entered summary judgment for 

FDIC, and grants Rule 

54(b) certification 

3/16/8a Rule 59 motion filed 

3/30/88 Notice of appeal filed 

4/27/88 Rule 59 motion denied 

5/26/88 Notice of appeal 

filed 

6/ 7/88 Joint notice of appeal filed (CIV-87-294-W 

& CIV-86-1695-W) 

This court raised sua sponte the issue of whether the notice 

of appeal filed March 30, 1988, regarding CIV-87-294-W, is 

sufficient to confer appellate jurisdiction. We have adopted the 

absolute rule in this circuit that a judgment in a consolidated 

action that does not dispose of all claims shall not operate as a 

final, appealable judgment under 28 u.s.c. § 1291. Trinity 

Broadcasting Co. v. Eller, 827 F.2d 673, 675 (10th Cir. 1987) (per 

cur iam), cert. denied, 108 S. Ct. 2883 ( 1988). "To obtain review 

of one part of a consolidated action, appellant must obtain 

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Appellate Case: 88-1914 Document: 01019910519 Date Filed: 09/22/1989 Page: 3 
certification under Fed. R. Civ. P. 54(b)." Id. In the instant 

case, on March 3, 1988, prior to the filing of the notice of 

appeal in question, the district court had entered final judgment 

in CIV-87-294-W, and had granted summary judgment in CIV-86-1695-

w.1 The crucial complication arose on March 16, 1988, however, 

when appellants filed a Fed. R. Civ. P. 59 motion to vacate, alter 

or amend the March 3 grant of summary judgment in CIV-86-1695-W. 

Fed. R. App. P. 4(a)(4) states in part that: 

"[i]f a timely motion under the Federal Rules of Civil 

Procedure is filed in the district court by any party: 

(iii) under rule 59 to alter or amend the judgment; or 

(iv) under Rule 59 for a new trial, the time for appeal 

for all parties shall run from the entry of the order 

denying a new trial or granting or denying any other 

such motion. A notice of appeal filed before the 

disposition of any of the above motions shall have no 

effect. A new notice of appeal must be filed within the 

prescribed time measured from the entry of the order 

disposing of the motion as provided above. 

Thus, according to Fed. R. App. P. 4(a)(4), when pursuant to Rule 

59 a party requests relief from a judgment, that judgment is not 

final for the purposes of appellate jurisdiction until entry of an 

order granting or denying the Rule 59 motion. See Osterneck v. 

Ernst & Whinney, 109 S. Ct. 987, 990 (1989). This requirement, 

coupled with our holding in Trinity that finality in a 

consolidated case does not accrue until all claims have been 

finally disposed of (in the absence of a Rule 54(b) 

certification), leads us to conclude that the March 30, 1988, 

1 On the same date, the trial court also took the apparently 

redundant step of granting Rule 54(b) certification in 

CIV-86-1695-W, although all claims in the consolidated action had 

then been disposed of through the grants of summary judgment. 

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Appellate Case: 88-1914 Document: 01019910519 Date Filed: 09/22/1989 Page: 4 
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notice of appeal was not sufficient to confer upon this court 

jurisdiction to consider the order disposing of CIV-87-294-w. 2 

We must consider the effect on this case of our holding in 

Lewis v. B.F. Goodrich Co., 850 F.2d 641 (10th Cir. 1988) (en 

bane). Prior to Lewis, we had held that a premature notice of 

appeal was not cured by a subsequent final judgment or later entry 

of a Rule 54(b) certification. See id. at 643. Recognizing that 

such a "hard-line rule would have denied appellant any appeal at 

any time,". id. at 644, and considering other Tenth Circuit 

precedent,~we held that Fed. R. App. R. 4(a)(2) 3 permitted the 

subsequent termination of litigation or entry of a Rule 54(b) 

certification to ripen and save the premature notice of appeal, 

id. at 645. We have noted, however, that "any pending motion 

falling within Fed. R. App. P. 4(a)(4) places a case in a 

different posture for purposes of an effective notice of appeal." 

Federal Sav. & Loan Ins. Corp. v. Huff, 851 F.2d 316, 320 n.4 

(10th Cir. 1988) (en bane). By its own terms, Fed. R. App. P. 

2 The notice of appeal filed on May 26, 1988 in CIV-86-1695-W was 

timely with respect to that case, but because it failed to specify 

an intent to appeal from CIV-87-294-W, we cannot construe it as a 

joint notice. See Fed. R. App. P. 3(c) (notice of appeal shall 

designate the judgment appealed from). Furthermore, the joint 

notice of appeal from both cases filed on June 7, 1988 was 

untimely and thus ineffective because it was filed more than 

thirty days after the Rule 59 motion was denied in CIV-86-1695-W. 

3 Fed. R. App. P. 4(a)(2) provides: 

Exce·pt as provided in (a) ( 4) of this Rule 4, a notice of 

appeal filed after the announcement of a decision or 

order but before the entry of the judgment or order 

shall be treated as filed after such entry and on the 

day thereof. 

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Appellate Case: 88-1914 Document: 01019910519 Date Filed: 09/22/1989 Page: 5 
4(a)(2) does not permit the revival of a premature notice of 

appeal when, as here, Fed. R. App. P. 4(a)(4) is applicableo 

We understand that had appellants not filed a Rule 59 motion 

in CIV-86-1695-W, the entire consolidated litigation would have 

been final on all claims, and the notice of appeal would have 

conferred jurisdiction. In this circuit, however, the finality of 

an order disposing of part of a consolidated action depends on the 

finality of the entire action, which in turn depends here on the 

effect of Fed. R. App. P. 4(a)(4). Had the district court granted 

the Rule 59 motion and displaced the grant of summary judgment in 

CIV-86-1695-W, the necessity of further district court proceedings 

clearly would have deprived the consolidated action of the 

finality required to support jurisdiction over the appeal in CIV87-294-W. See Trinity, 827 F.2d at 675. It is that possibility 

that provides the rationale for Rule 4(a)(4). See Notes of 

Advisory Committee on Appellate Rules. 

The relation of Rule 4(a)(4) to finality for the purposes of 

appellate jurisdiction is clear: 

Rule 4(a)(4) of the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure 

provides that a notice of appeal filed while a timely 

Rule 59(e) motion is pending has no effect. Together, 

these rules work to implement the finality requirement 

of 28 u.s.c. § 1291 by preventing the filing of an 

effective notice of appeal until the District Court has 

had an opportunity to dispose of all motions that seek 

to amend or alter what otherwise might appear to be a 

final judgment. 

Osterneck, 109 s. Ct. at 990. The requirements of Rule 4(a)(4) 

are "mandatory and jurisdictional," and we are not empowered to 

override a congressional mandate on the ground that it is 

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Appellate Case: 88-1914 Document: 01019910519 Date Filed: 09/22/1989 Page: 6 
inconveniently and mechanically applied. Griggs v. Provident 

Consumer Discount Co., 459 U.S. 56, 61 (1982) (per curiam) (given 

plain language of Rule 4(a)(4), courts of appeal do not retain 

discretion to waive conceded defects in premature notice of 

appeal). 

Based on the foregoing, we conclude that the March 30, 1988, 

notice of appeal was not sufficient to confer jurisdiction upon 

this court to consider the merits of CIV-87-294-W, and we 

therefore DISMISS that appeal. We order the appeals from CIV-86-

1695-W be placed on a future argument calendar. 

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