Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca8-05-02172/USCOURTS-ca8-05-02172-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 791
Nature of Suit: Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA)
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE EIGHTH CIRCUIT

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No. 05-2172

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William Dieser,

Appellee,

v.

Continental Casualty Company,

doing business as CNA Insurance

Company; CompuCom Systems,

Inc.,

 Appellants.

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Appeal from the United States

District Court for the Eastern

District of Missouri.

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Submitted: November 16, 2005 

 Filed: March 2, 2006 

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Before MURPHY, BOWMAN and GRUENDER, Circuit Judges. 

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GRUENDER, Circuit Judge.

Continental Casualty Company (“Continental”) and CompuCom Systems, Inc.

(“CompuCom”) appeal the August 26, 2004, and March 22, 2005, orders of the

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The Honorable Stephen N. Limbaugh, United States District Judge for the

Eastern District of Missouri.

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The district court’s memorandum opinion of August 26 indicates that the 441-

day period encompasses February 27, 2001, through May 14, 2002.

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district court.1

 As discussed below, neither of these orders was a final, appealable

order. Therefore, we dismiss the appeal for lack of jurisdiction. 

Appellee William Dieser, a former employee of CompuCom, brought an action

under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (“ERISA”), 29 U.S.C.

§ 1001 et seq., against Continental and CompuCom to recover benefits under a shortterm disability benefits plan funded by CompuCom and a long-term disability policy

provided by Continental. On August 26, 2004, the district court issued a

memorandum opinion and entered a separate order partially granting Dieser’s motion

for summary judgment and denying Continental and CompuCom’s cross-motion for

summary judgment (“August 2004 order”). The August 2004 order also awarded

Dieser past-due short-term disability benefits in the amount of $1,730.76 from

CompuCom; past-due long-term disability benefits in the amount of $82,788.00 from

Continental; statutory penalties against CompuCom under 29 U.S.C. § 1132(c) in the

amount of $18 per day for 441 days,2

 totaling $7,938.00; and an unspecified amount

of pre-judgment interest. Finally, in that order the district court set a bench trial to

resolve the remaining issues of additional statutory penalties for failure to provide

plan documents after May 14, 2002; the precise amount of pre-judgment interest; and

attorney’s fees and costs under 29 U.S.C. § 1132(g).

After an evidentiary hearing was held on November 5, 2004, and the parties

filed post-trial briefs, the district court issued a second memorandum opinion and

entered a separate order on March 22, 2005 (“March 2005 order”). In the March 2005

order, the district court awarded Dieser additional statutory penalties against

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CompuCom pursuant to § 1132(c) in the amount of $6,642.00, representing an award

of $18 per day from May 26, 2002, until May 30, 2003; attorney’s fees in the amount

of $33,949.38; and costs in the amount of $150.00. In the March 2005 order, the

district court also ordered that Dieser “shall show cause on or before March 27, 2005,

if any, as to the precise dollar amount of pre-judgment interest that he is requesting

by providing that total amount in addition to providing the mathematical computations

upon which the total requested amount is based.” Additionally, the district court

provided that Continental and CompuCom could respond to Dieser’s request for prejudgment interest by April 3, 2005. 

Accordingly, on March 25, 2005, Dieser filed a request for pre-judgment

interest, explaining his position on how the interest should be determined, including

setting forth the applicable statute governing pre-judgment interest, 28 U.S.C. § 1961;

the applicable interest rate; various beginning and ending dates; and the specific

calculations. On April 1, 2005, Continental and CompuCom filed a response to

Dieser’s request, disputing the applicable dates and arguing that Dieser’s calculations

and resulting numbers were flawed and that Dieser failed to respond appropriately to

the district court’s March 2005 order.

 Continental and CompuCom filed a notice of appeal on April 21, 2005, thirty

days after the March 2005 order. Continental and CompuCom appealed from the

memorandum opinion and the order entered on August 26, 2004, and the

memorandum opinion and the order entered on March 22, 2005. Continental and

CompuCom’s notice of appeal also indicated that the district court “has not yet ruled

on Plaintiff/Appellee’s motion for pre-judgment interest; however,

Defendants/Appellants intend to include in their appeal any award of pre-judgment

interest.” The district court did not certify either order for appeal under 28 U.S.C. §

1292(b) or expressly direct entry of a final judgment as to fewer than all claims or

parties under Fed. R. Civ. P. 54(b).

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The district court then entered a third order on June 27, 2005 (“June 2005

order”), granting Dieser $104.86 in pre-judgment interest on past-due short-term

disability benefits from CompuCom and $2,689.20 in pre-judgment interest on pastdue long-term disability benefits from Continental. With the June 2005 order, all

issues of liability and all amounts of monetary awards had been specified by the

district court, and nothing was left for the district court to do but execute the

judgment. See Borntrager v. Cent. States, Southeast & Southwest Areas Pension

Fund, 425 F.3d 1087, 1091 (8th Cir. 2005). Continental and CompuCom did not file

another notice of appeal subsequent to the entry of this final, appealable order. 

“[J]urisdiction issues will be raised sua sponte by a federal court when there is

an indication that jurisdiction is lacking, even if the parties concede the issue.”

Thomas v. Basham, 931 F.2d 521, 523 (8th Cir. 1991). Generally, a party in a civil

case must file a notice of appeal “within 30 days after the judgment or order appealed

from is entered.” Fed. R. App. P. 4(a)(1)(A). The requirement of a timely notice of

appeal is mandatory and jurisdictional. Arnold v. Wood, 238 F.3d 992, 995 (8th Cir.

2001). Dieser argues that the August 2004 order was a final judgment, making

Continental and CompuCom’s notice of appeal untimely as to the August 2004 order

but timely as to the March 2005 order. Therefore, Dieser contends that we have

jurisdiction to review only the amount of additional statutory penalties and the amount

of attorney’s fees awarded in the March 2005 order. Continental and CompuCom

contend that their appeal was timely as to the entire adjudication of the case by the

district court because “there was not a final judgment from which an appeal could be

taken until (at the earliest) March 22, 2005.”

The notice of appeal filed on April 21, 2005, was premature because the August

2004 order and the March 2005 order were not final, appealable orders. See 28 U.S.C.

§ 1291 (“The courts of appeal . . . shall have jurisdiction of appeals from all final

decisions of the district courts of the United States.”). A final decision within the

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This is not a case where the determination of specific amounts would be

“mechanical and uncontroversial,” such that “only a ‘ministerial’ task remains for the

district court to perform.” St. Mary’s Health Ctr. v. Bowen, 821 F.2d 493, 498 (8th

Cir. 1987) (quoting Parks v. Pavkovic, 753 F.2d 1397, 1404 (7th Cir. 1985)) (holding

that an order granting partial summary judgment but not disposing of claims for

injunctive relief and for damages was not a final order). As demonstrated by the

parties’ submissions to the district court, the determination of the amount of prejudgment interest by the district court was more than a ministerial task and was

controversial.

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meaning of § 1291 “ends the litigation on the merits and leaves nothing for the court

to do but execute the judgment.” Borntrager, 425 F.3d at 1091 (quoting Cunningham

v. Hamilton County, 527 U.S. 198, 204 (1999)). “A judgment awarding damages but

not deciding the amount of the damages or finding liability but not fixing the extent

of the liability is not a final decision within the meaning of § 1291.” Maristuen v.

Nat’ l States Ins. Co., 57 F.3d 673, 678 (8th Cir. 1995); see also Parke v. First

Reliance Standard Life Ins. Co., 368 F.3d 999, 1002 n.2 (8th Cir. 2004) (holding that

an order explicitly reserving the determination of the amount of attorney’s fees and

pre-judgment interest did not become final until the district court later issued an order

fixing the amounts); Lee v. L.B. Sales, Inc., 177 F.3d 714, 717-18 (8th Cir. 1999)

(holding that an order awarding sanctions but reserving determination of the amount

of sanctions was not appealable until the subsequent entry of an order fixing the

amount of sanctions). The August 2004 and March 2005 orders did not purport to

dispose of all issues in the case. On its face, the August 2004 order indicated that the

amounts of additional statutory penalties, pre-judgment interest and attorney’s fees

and costs remained unresolved. Similarly, the March 2005 order indicated that the

amount of pre-judgment interest was yet to be determined.3

 Thus, the April 21, 2005,

notice of appeal was not taken from a final, appealable order and was ineffective to

confer appellate jurisdiction upon this Court.

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We next address whether the prematurely filed notice of appeal can be saved

by Fed. R. App. P. 4(a)(2), which provides that a “notice of appeal filed after the court

announces a decision or order–but before the entry of the judgment or order–is treated

as filed on the date of and after the entry.” We conclude that this rule does not save

the notice of appeal in this case. 

The Supreme Court explained in FirsTier Mortgage Co. v. Investors Mortgage

Ins. Co., 498 U.S. 269, 274 (1991), that Rule 4(a)(2) “permits a notice of appeal filed

from certain nonfinal decisions to serve as an effective notice from a subsequently

entered final judgment.” However, the Supreme Court held that Rule 4(a)(2) applies

“only when a district court announces a decision that would be appealable if

immediately followed by the entry of judgment.” Id. at 276. By contrast, Rule 4(a)(2)

does not save a premature appeal “from a clearly interlocutory decision–such as a

discovery ruling or a sanction under Rule 11,” because a “belief that such a decision

is a final judgment would not be reasonable.” Id. In FirsTier, the Supreme Court

found that Rule 4(a)(2) saved a premature notice of appeal filed after the district court

announced from the bench that it was granting summary judgment to the defendant

on all claims. Id. at 270-71, 277. The plaintiff-appellant’s belief in the finality of the

oral ruling was reasonable because the bench ruling disposed of all claims and was a

decision that would have been “final” under § 1291 and, therefore, appealable, had the

judge immediately set forth the judgment and the clerk entered the judgment on the

docket. Id. at 276-77.

As construed by FirsTier, Rule 4(a)(2) is inapplicable to the present situation.

Neither the August 2004 order nor the March 2005 order was one “that would be

appealable if immediately followed by the entry of judgment.” Id. at 276. Because

the August 2004 order expressly left unresolved the amounts of additional statutory

penalties, pre-judgment interest and attorney’s fees and costs, and the March 2005

order called for further submissions from the parties to determine the method of

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In Miller, this Circuit also declined to adopt the doctrine of “cumulative

finality,” under which a premature appeal is not dismissed if the district court resolves

the case prior to final resolution by the court of appeals. Miller, 369 F.3d at 1035.

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calculation and the amount of pre-judgment interest, these orders could not reasonably

be believed to be final within the meaning of § 1291.

Our prior decisions support this conclusion. We held in Miller v. Special

Weapons, L.L.C., 369 F.3d 1033, 1033-35 (8th Cir. 2004), that a premature notice of

appeal could not be saved by Rule 4(a)(2) where the notice of appeal was filed after

the district court entered summary judgment but before the district court entered a

judgment on a pending counterclaim. Rule 4(a)(2) was inapplicable because the

summary judgment order entered was not one that “would be appealable” under

FirsTier. Miller, 369 F.3d at 1035. “The infirmity in Mr. Miller’s appeal . . . does not

lie in the fact that the district court had failed to issue its final order on the summary

judgment that it announced but rather in the fact that there was an unresolved claim

pending in the district court when Mr. Miller filed his notice of appeal.”4

 Id.; see also

Thomas, 931 F.2d at 522-23 (holding that the court lacked appellate jurisdiction where

the notice of appeal was filed after the entry of a non-appealable summary judgment

order but before the dismissal of pending counterclaims and the appellant failed to file

a new notice of appeal after the judgment became final and appealable); Detherage

v. Barnhart, 91 Fed. Appx. 520 (8th Cir. 2004) (unpub. per curiam) (dismissing an

appeal for lack of jurisdiction because Rule 4(a)(2) could not cure the premature

notice of appeal where the order appealed from was not one that “would be

appealable” under FirsTier and a new notice of appeal was not filed after the district

court subsequently entered a final, appealable order). But see Hill v. St. Louis Univ.,

123 F.3d 1114, 1120-21 (8th Cir. 1997) (finding, without mention of FirsTier, that

pursuant to Rule 4(a)(2), a notice of appeal filed from a sanctions order that did not

quantify the amount of sanctions and from a final, appealable order of summary

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To the extent that our circuit’s decisions regarding the premature filing of a

notice of appeal are in conflict, we are “free to choose which line of cases to follow.”

Kostelec v. State Farm Fire and Cas. Co., 64 F.3d 1220, 1228 n. 8 (8th Cir. 1995).

We believe the narrower view of Rule 4(a)(2) is more faithful to the Supreme Court’s

decision in FirsTier. 

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judgment later became effective as to the sanctions order when the amount of

sanctions was later quantified).5

Other circuits also have found that Rule 4(a)(2) does not always operate to save

a premature notice of appeal where the order or judgment appealed from subsequently

becomes final prior to the disposition of the appeal. For instance, based on facts

similar to this case, the Ninth Circuit in In re Jack Raley Construction, Inc., 17 F.3d

291, 294 (9th Cir. 1994), dismissed an appeal for lack of jurisdiction because the

prematurity of the notice of appeal was not cured by Rule 4(a)(2) and the appellants

failed to file a fresh appeal after entry of final judgment. The order appealed was not

one that “would be appealable” under FirsTier because the district court did not

decide the matter of pre-judgment interest until long after the notice of appeal had

been filed and the decision on pre-judgment interest was not merely a ministerial act

but an adjudication of a contested issue. Id.; see also United States v. Cooper, 135

F.3d 960, 962-63 (5th Cir. 1998) (applying the criminal counterpart to Rule 4(a)(2),

stating that “FirsTier allows premature appeals only where there has been a final

decision, rendered without a formal judgment” and overruling pre-FirsTier cases to

the extent they allowed a premature appeal of a non-final decision where judgment

became final prior to disposition of the appeal); Kennedy v. Applause, Inc., 90 F.3d

1477, 1483 (9th Cir. 1996) (holding that Rule 4(a)(2) could not save a premature

appeal from an order that left attorney’s fees and costs to be determined and where the

district court had requested further submissions from both parties to assist in this

determination); Flynn v. Ohio Bldg. Restoration, Inc., No. 04-7091, slip op. at 1(D.C.

Cir. Jun 27, 2005) (unpub. per curiam) (holding that Rule 4(a)(2) could not rescue a

premature appeal because it was taken from a summary judgment order that did not

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quantify damages; consequently, the appellants could not have reasonably believed

that the summary judgment order was a final judgment, and the order was not a

decision that “would be appealable” under FirsTier); Stoney Point Prods., Inc. v.

Underwood, 15 Fed. Appx. 828, 830-31 (Fed. Cir. 2001) (unpub.) (holding that Rule

4(a)(2) has limited applicability after FirsTier and could not save a premature notice

of appeal filed from an order that was not final and appealable).

Additionally, Continental and CompuCom do not fall within the group that Rule

4(a)(2) was intended to protect: “the unskilled litigant who files a notice of appeal

from a decision that he reasonably but mistakenly believes to be a final judgment,

while failing to file a notice of appeal from the actual final judgment.” FirsTier, 498

U.S. at 276. In their April 1, 2005, response to Dieser’s request for pre-judgment

interest filed in compliance with the March 2005 order, Continental and CompuCom

disputed Dieser’s position on the appropriate beginning date for pre-judgment interest

under 28 U.S.C. § 1961, which provides that “interest shall be calculated from the date

of the entry of the judgment.” In that context, Continental and CompuCom admitted

that “the August 26, 2004 Order was not a final appealable Order, as it failed to

resolve all issues between the parties,” and with regard to the March 2005 order, they

“further submit[ted] that no final Order and Judgment has been issued in this matter.”

Defendant Continental Casualty Company’s and Defendant CompuCom Systems,

Inc.’s Response to Plaintiff’s Response to Order to Show Cause Regarding

Prejudgment Interest at 4. Even in the absence of their admissions, we would be

reluctant to find that Continental and CompuCom could reasonably believe that the

August 2004 order or the March 2005 order was final because, as in Jack Raley, the

parties were in disagreement over pre-judgment interest. See Jack Raley, 17 F.3d at

294 (“We are unwilling to conclude that the Appellants were lulled into the reasonable

but mistaken belief that their . . . notice of appeal was efficacious. They could not rely

on the teachings of FirsTier under circumstances in which they challenged the

proposed award of pre-judgment interest.”).

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We note that because the June 2005 order was properly entered on the civil

docket pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 79(a), even if it did not satisfy the separatedocument requirement of Fed. R. Civ. P. 58(a)(1), the time for filing an effective

notice of appeal has lapsed. Continental and CompuCom had at most 180 days from

the entry of the order on the docket on June 27, 2005, in which to file a notice of

appeal. See Fed. R. App. P. 4(a)(7)(A)(ii) (providing that if a separate document is

required by Fed. R. Civ. P. 58(a)(1), the order is deemed entered for purposes of

determining the time to file an appeal at the earlier of two events: (1) the order is set

forth on a separate document or (2) if a separate document is not filed, 150 days have

run since the order was entered on the docket).

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When Continental and CompuCom filed their notice of appeal several weeks

later on April 21, 2005, they knew that “no final Order and Judgment ha[d] been

issued in this matter” because the district court had not quantified the amount of prejudgment interest owed to Dieser. Continental and CompuCom even noted in their

notice of appeal that the district court had not yet determined the amount of prejudgment interest and stated that they “intend to include in their appeal any award of

pre-judgment interest.” This statement of intent is insufficient to satisfy the

requirement that the notice of appeal be filed “within 30 days after the judgment or

order appealed from is entered.” Fed. R. App. P. 4(a)(1)(A) (emphasis added).

Continental and CompuCom’s April 21, 2005, notice of appeal was filed prematurely,

and they did not file a new notice of appeal after the district court entered the June

2005 order, which disposed of all issues in the case and was a final, appealable order.6

Accordingly, the appeal is dismissed for lack of jurisdiction.

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