Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-cand-3_07-cv-02857/USCOURTS-cand-3_07-cv-02857-1/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 360
Nature of Suit: Other Personal Injury
Cause of Action: 28:1332 Diversity-Personal Injury

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United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

DONALD WALKER, an individual,

Plaintiff,

 v.

PACIFIC PRIDE SERVICES, INC., an

Oregon Corporation,

Defendant.

 

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No. 07-2857 SC

ORDER DENYING

PLAINTIFF'S MOTION TO

REMAND ACTION TO THE

CALIFORNIA STATE

COURT 

I. INTRODUCTION

Before the Court is Plaintiff Donald Walker's ("Walker" or

"Plaintiff") Motion to Remand Action to the California State

Court. See Docket No. 18. Defendant Pacific Pride Services, Inc.

("Pacific Pride" or "Defendant") opposed this motion, and

Plaintiff replied. See Docket Nos. 31, 36. 

For the reasons set forth below, the Court DENIES Plaintiff's

Motion to Remand Action to the California State Court.

II. FACTUAL BACKGROUND

On September 14, 2006, Plaintiff filed suit against Defendant

in the Superior Court of the State of California, County of San

Francisco, asserting causes of action for negligence and premises

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United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

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liability. See Halloran Decl., Ex. A. Plaintiff subsequently

amended the complaint to add Richard K. Pooler as a defendant. 

See id., Ex. B. 

 Plaintiff voluntarily dismissed his claims against Richard

K. Pooler, an individual, with prejudice on May 2, 2007. Id. ¶ 8. 

Plaintiff then proceeded with claims against Richard K. Pooler,

Inc. Id. On May 29, 2007, Plaintiff accepted a settlement offer

from Richard K. Pooler, Inc., and dismissed that entity from the

suit. Id. ¶¶ 8-9. After the dismissal of Richard K. Pooler,

Inc., Pacific Pride was the only defendant named in the suit.

Mr. Walker is a California resident. Id. ¶ 2. Pacific Pride

is a business incorporated in the State of Oregon and maintains

its headquarters and principal place of business there. See

Condon Decl. ¶¶ 2-3. All of Pacific Pride's offices and the

majority of its employees are located in Oregon. Id. ¶ 3.

Mr. Walker seeks damages in the amount of $5,300,000.00. 

Halloran Decl., Ex. C. 

Plaintiff alleges that San Francisco Petroleum ("SF

Petroleum") is a real party in interest because it is a franchise

of Defendant and has agreed to indemnify Defendant. Mot. to

Remand, 4.

Plaintiff further alleges that State Compensation Insurance

Fund ("State Fund") is a real party in interest because it has

filed a lien against judgment in this case. Id. State Fund

supports Plaintiff's Motion to Remand because it believes

proceeding in State court "seems most likely to provide a timely

resolution." Pl.'s Reply, Ex. A.

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For the Northern District of California

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Pacific Pride filed a Notice of Removal pursuant to 28 U.S.C.

§ 1441(a) on June 1, 2007. See Docket No. 1. Plaintiff brought

the instant motion on June 12, 2007, and the Court agreed to rule

on an expedited schedule because of a pending trial date in the

Superior Court. See Docket Nos. 18, 29.

III. DISCUSSION

The burden of proving that removal from State court was

proper rests on Defendant. See Miller v. Grgurich, 763 F.2d 372,

373 (9th Cir. 1985); Gaus v. Miles, Inc., 980 F.2d 564, 566 (9th

Cir. 1992). Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1441(a), "any civil action

brought in a State court of which the district courts of the

United States have original jurisdiction, may be removed by the

defendant or the defendants, to the district court of the United

States for the district and division embracing the place where

such action is pending." 

Therefore, Pacific Pride must prove that the present dispute

is one over which the Court would have had original jurisdiction.

A. Diversity Jurisdiction

District courts have original jurisdiction over civil actions

where the amount in controversy exceeds $75,000.00 and the parties

are citizens of different States. See 28 U.S.C. § 1332(a). 

Section 1332(a) requires complete diversity of citizenship, so

each plaintiff in an action must be a citizen of a different state

from each of the defendants. See Morris v. Princess Cruises,

Inc., 236 F.3d 1061, 1067 (9th Cir. 2001). 

The inquiry focuses on diversity of citizenship at the time

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In his Reply Brief, Plaintiff alleges without support that

Defendant "regularly does business" in California through its

franchises. Pl.'s Reply, 2. This is immaterial to the issue of

jurisdiction. See Lincoln Prop. Co. v. Roche, 546 U.S. 81, 94

(2005) ("Congress surely has not directed that a corporation, for

diversity-of-citizenship purposes, shall be deemed to have acquired

the citizenship of all or any of its affiliates.")

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of removal. See Spencer v. U.S. Dist. Ct. for the N. Dist. of

Cal., 393 F.3d 867, 871 (9th Cir. 2004). Where removal is not

based on federal question jurisdiction, it is only proper "if none

of the parties in interest properly joined as defendants is a

citizen of the State in which such action is brought." 28 U.S.C.

§ 1441(b). 

The parties do not dispute that the amount in controversy in

the present matter exceeds the required $75,000.00. Nor do they

dispute that Plaintiff is a citizen of California and Defendant a

citizen of Oregon.1 See 28 U.S.C. § 1332(c)(1) (For the purposes

of determining diversity jurisdiction, "a corporation shall be

deemed to be a citizen of any State by which it has been

incorporated and of the State where it has its principal place of

business. . . ."). The only issue for the Court to resolve, then,

is the significance of two other potentially interested parties:

SF Petroleum and State Fund.

Neither party's purported involvement defeats diversity. Mr.

Walker acknowledges that Pacific Pride is the "sole defendant." 

Mot. to Remand, 7. Plaintiff's own authority makes it clear that

the determination of diversity jurisdiction is based on those

parties who have actually been joined, which SF Petroleum and

State Fund have not. See Henderson v. Wash. Nat'l Ins. Co., 454

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F.3d 1278, 1281 (11th Cir. 2006) ("When a defendant removes a case

to federal court on diversity grounds, a court must remand the

matter back to state court if any of the properly joined parties

in interest are citizens of the state in which the suit was

filed."). Henderson relies on a recent Supreme Court decision

which addressed a situation comparable to the present matter. In

Lincoln Property Co., the Roches, Virginia residents, sued

Lincoln, a Texas corporation, in Virginia State Court. 546 U.S.

at 84. Lincoln removed the case to federal court. Id. The

Roches moved to remand, arguing that Lincoln was not a Texas

corporation, but a partnership with affiliates in Virginia,

defeating diversity. See id. at 87. The district court denied

the motion, but the Fourth Circuit reversed. Reversing the Fourth

Circuit, the Supreme Court agreed with the district court's

ruling:

In any event, we emphasize, the Fourth Circuit had no

warrant in this case to inquire whether some other person

might have been joined as an additional or substitute

defendant. See [Knapp v. Railroad Co., 87 U.S. 117,]

122, 22 L. Ed. 328 [(1874)] (federal courts should not

"inquir[e] outside of the case in order to ascertain

whether some other person may not have an equitable

interest in the cause of action"); Little [v. Giles], 118

U.S. [596], at 603, 7 S. Ct. 32, 30 L. Ed. 269 [(1886)]

(if named party's interest is real, the fact that other

interested parties are not joined "will not affect the

jurisdiction of the [federal courts]"); 16 Moore, supra,

§ 107.14[2][c], p 107-67 ("Ordinarily, a court will not

interfere with the consequences of a plaintiff's selection

in naming parties, unless the plaintiff has impermissibly

manufactured diversity or used an unacceptable device to

defeat diversity."). 

Id. at 93. 

Like the Roches, Mr. Walker could have sued the other parties

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2Because State Fund is not a party to the suit, the Court need

not address in depth Plaintiff's 11th Amendment argument. In the

interest of thoroughness, the Court notes that Plaintiff offered no

evidence to show that State Fund is an agency of the State entitled

to 11th Amendment protections. 

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he now claims are potential defendants. Mr. Walker clearly knew

of SF Petroleum's involvement from the beginning of this dispute,

but chose not to name them as defendants. See Halloran Decl.,

Exs. A, B. It is not incumbent on Pacific Pride to "propose as

additional defendants persons [Walker] as master[] of [his]

complaint, permissively might have joined." Lincoln Prop. Co.,

546 U.S. at 94.2 

Diversity between Mr. Walker and Pacific Pride is complete,

and the amount in controversy exceeds the statutory minimum. As

such, removal was proper.

B. Equitable Considerations

Plaintiff argues that the equities support remand even if

technical application of the law does not. Mot. to Remand, 8-10. 

This position has no merit.

The legal authorities on which Plaintiff relies do not

support an equitable exception to the well-established rules of

diversity jurisdiction. In Kona Enterprises, Inc. v. Estate of

Bishop, 179 F.3d 767, 770 (9th Cir. 1999), the court refused to

find an equitable exception to the rules governing standing or to

create one specifically for the facts of that case. Contrary to

Plaintiff's assertion, the court clearly did not hold that "a

technical lack of standing may be overcome by equitable

considerations." See Mot. to Remand, 10. In Tedford v. WarnerCase 3:07-cv-02857-SC Document 39 Filed 06/29/07 Page 6 of 8
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Lambert Co., 327 F.3d 423, 427-28 (5th Cir. 2003), the Fifth

Circuit allowed an equitable exception to the one-year deadline

for removal because it was the plaintiff's own misconduct that

caused defendant to file the removal notice after the deadline. 

The Court also relied on a long line of precedent for allowing

equitable exceptions for issues related to filing deadlines. See

id. at 426-27. Although Pacific Pride filed for removal at an

advanced stage of the State court proceedings, it did so promptly

after the conditions supporting removal came about, and there are

no allegations of fraudulent joinder as there were in Tedford.

Even if the legal authorities supported an equitable

exception, the facts presently before the Court do not. First,

the supposed "equitable considerations" on which Plaintiff relies

are a list of unsupported and otherwise irrelevant assertions. 

For example, Plaintiff says that his own motion pending before the

Superior Court was "likely to be granted" while Defendant's

summary judgment motion was "likely to be defeated." Mot. to

Remand, 9. The Superior Court did not rule, and this Court will

not presume to rule in its stead. Plaintiff also raises the issue

of Defendant's franchises and affiliates. Id. As noted above,

these are not material to the question of diversity jurisdiction. 

Plaintiff argues that remand is justified because California law

will be applied regardless of forum. Id. That the Court will

apply California law is not a basis for remand, however, and

Plaintiff provides no authority to the contrary.

In short, Plaintiff's primary "equitable" concern is that the

parties had agreed to a trial date of July 9, 2007, in the

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Superior Court, and that trial will no longer take place if this

Court does not remand. While Mr. Walker's desire to have his case

heard as soon as possible is understandable, Pacific Pride had a

statutory right to remove the case, which it exercised in a timely

fashion. See 28 U.S.C. § 1446(b) (notice of removal must be filed

within thirty days of receiving the pleadings or within thirty

days of receiving notice of the conditions supporting removal).

IV. CONCLUSION

Plaintiff is a citizen of California. Defendant is a citizen

of Oregon. Plaintiff seeks damages in excess of $75,000.00. 

Therefore, the Court would have had original jurisdiction over

this case, so removal from the Superior Court was proper. For all

of the foregoing reasons, Plaintiff's Motion to Remand Action to

the California Superior Court is hereby DENIED.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

June 29, 2007

____________________________

UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

Case 3:07-cv-02857-SC Document 39 Filed 06/29/07 Page 8 of 8