UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 14-1513

PNGI CHARLES TOWN GAMING, L.L.C., 

Petitioner - Appellant, 

v. 

TINA MAWING; THE CHARLES TOWN HORSEMEN’S BENEVOLENT 

PROTECTIVE ASSOCIATION, 

Respondents - Appellees. 

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern 

District of West Virginia, at Martinsburg. John Preston Bailey, 

Chief District Judge. (3:14-cv-00002-JPB) 

Submitted: January 30, 2015 Decided: March 4, 2015

Before NIEMEYER and AGEE, Circuit Judges, and HAMILTON, Senior 

Circuit Judge. 

Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion. 

Stacey A. Scrivani, STEVENS & LEE, P.C., Reading, Pennsylvania, 

for Appellant. David M. Hammer, HAMMER, FERRETTI & SCHIAVONI, 

Martinsburg, West Virginia; Harry P. Waddell, LAW OFFICE OF 

HARRY P. WADDELL, Martinsburg, West Virginia, for Appellees. 

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. 
2

PER CURIAM: 

PNGI Charles Town Gaming, L.L.C. (“PNGI”), appeals 

from the district court’s order denying its request under the 

Federal Arbitration Act (“FAA”) to vacate an October 2013 

arbitral award and confirming the award. We affirm. 

“In order for a reviewing court to vacate an 

arbitration award, the moving party must sustain the heavy 

burden of showing one of the grounds specified in the [FAA] or 

one of certain limited common law grounds.” MCI Constructors, 

LLC v. City Of Greensboro, 610 F.3d 849, 857 (4th Cir. 2010).1 

The grounds for vacating an arbitral award specified in the FAA 

are: “(1) where the award was procured by corruption, fraud, or 

undue means; (2) where there was evident partiality or 

corruption in the arbitrators, or either of them; (3) where the 

arbitrators were guilty of misconduct . . . ; or (4) where the 

arbitrators exceeded their powers, or so imperfectly executed 

them that a mutual, final, and definite award upon the subject 

matter submitted was not made.” 9 U.S.C. § 10(a) (2012). 

 1 In the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision in Hall Street 

Assocs., LLC v. Mattel, Inc., 552 U.S. 576 (2008), this court 

has recognized that considerable uncertainty exists “as to the 

continuing viability of extra-statutory grounds for vacating 

arbitration awards.” Raymond James Fin. Servs., Inc. v. Bishop, 

596 F.3d 183, 193 n.13 (4th Cir. 2010). However, as PNGI relies 

only on grounds specified in the FAA as the basis for 

overturning the district court’s order, any effect of 

Hall Street is not implicated in this appeal. 
3

A district court’s legal rulings on a motion to vacate 

an arbitral award under the FAA are reviewed de novo, while 

“[a]ny factual findings made by the district court in affirming 

such an award are reviewed for clear error.” 

Wachovia Sec., LLC v. Brand, 671 F.3d 472, 478 (4th Cir. 2012) 

(internal quotation marks omitted). Under the clear error 

standard of review, we will reverse only if “left with the 

definite and firm conviction that a mistake has been committed.” 

United States v. Chandia, 675 F.3d 329, 337 (4th Cir. 2012) 

(internal quotation marks omitted). 

“Judicial review of an arbitration award in federal 

court is substantially circumscribed.” Three S Del., Inc. v. 

DataQuick Info. Sys., Inc., 492 F.3d 520, 527 (4th Cir. 2007) 

(internal quotation marks omitted). In fact, “the scope of 

judicial review for an arbitrator’s decision is among the 

narrowest known at law because to allow full scrutiny of such 

awards would frustrate the purpose of having arbitration at 

all-the quick resolution of disputes and the avoidance of the 

expense and delay associated with litigation.” 

MCI Constructors, LLC, 610 F.3d at 857 (internal quotation marks 

omitted). “A court sits to determine only whether the 

arbitrator did his job—not whether he did it well, correctly, or 

reasonably, but simply whether he did it.” U.S. Postal Serv. v. 
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Am. Postal Workers Union, 204 F.3d 523, 527 (4th Cir. 2000) 

(internal quotation marks omitted). 

After review of the record and the parties’ briefs, we 

conclude that PNGI fails to establish reversible error in the 

district court’s confirmation ruling. We reject as without 

merit PNGI’s contention that two of the three arbitrators 

exceeded their authority in issuing the arbitral award without 

the participation and input of the third arbitrator. The 

district court’s determination that the parties received the 

benefit of their bargain to arbitrate before a three-member 

arbitration panel was premised on a finding that the third 

arbitrator participated in and signed the award prior to his 

death from leukemia. While PNGI contends that the third 

arbitrator’s illness prevented him from participating in the 

arbitration after the date on which billing records for his 

services cease, there is nothing in the record to suggest 

“definite[ly]” or “firm[ly]” that the district court’s factual 

findings to the contrary are mistaken. Chandia, 675 F.3d at 

337. Consequently, because the third arbitrator participated in 

and signed the arbitral award prior to his death, the parties 

received the benefit of their agreement to arbitrate before a 
5

three-member panel,2 and the district court thus did not 

reversibly err in rejecting PNGI’s contention that vacatur of 

the arbitral award was required because two arbitrators exceeded 

their powers in issuing the award without the benefit of the 

third arbitrator’s input. 

We also reject PNGI’s contention that vacatur of the 

arbitral award is required because it is not a final and 

definite award. Cases addressing this provision have vacated 

arbitration awards on this ground only when the arbitrator 

either failed to resolve an issue presented to him or issued an 

award that was so unclear and ambiguous that a reviewing court 

could not engage in meaningful review of the award. 

Bell Aerospace Co. Div. of Textron, Inc. v. Local 516, 500 F.2d 

921, 923 (2d Cir. 1974) (ambiguous award); Galt v. 

Libbey-Owens-Ford Glass Co., 397 F.2d 439, 442 (7th Cir. 1968) 

(arbitrators failed to mention a defense presented to them). 

 2 PNGI’s reliance on Szuts v. Dean Witter Reynolds, Inc., 

931 F.2d 830 (11th Cir. 1991), and Cia De Navegacion Omsil, 

S. A. v. Hugo Neu Corp., 359 F. Supp. 898 (S.D.N.Y. 1973), in 

support of this contention is misplaced. In those cases, an 

arbitrator died or was disqualified before decisions could be 

rendered, and the parties did not receive the benefit of their 

agreement to arbitrate before a three-member arbitration panel. 

Szuts, 931 F.2d at 830, 832; Cia De Navegacion Omsil, 

359 F. Supp. at 899. In this case, by contrast, the third 

arbitrator died after the issuance of the award and participated 

in its issuance prior to his death. 
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Here, however, the arbitrators ruled on the procedural 

and substantive matters presented to them, found liability by 

PNGI, found that damages were owed, that a particular rate for 

damages was warranted, that the claimed loss amount had to be 

offset by certain ascertainable amounts, directed the parties to 

calculate damages due in light of such offsets, found that 

attorney’s fees were warranted, directed Appellee Mawing to 

submit a petition for attorney’s fees and costs, and retained 

jurisdiction—pursuant to rules to which the parties themselves 

agreed—to resolve future disputes only in the event that the 

parties disagreed about the calculation of the ordered damages 

and fees. The award clearly informs the parties of the conduct 

required of them, and PNGI does not suggest any reason why the 

offset, attorney’s fees, and cost amounts are not easily 

ascertainable or calculable. We therefore reject as without 

merit PNGI’s contention that vacatur of the arbitral award was 

required because it was not final and definite. See Smart v. 

Int’l Bhd. of Elec. Workers, Local 702, 315 F.3d 721, 725-26 

(7th Cir. 2002); Flender Corp. v. Techna-Quip Co., 953 F.2d 273, 

280 (7th Cir. 1992). 

Accordingly, we affirm the district court’s judgment. 

We dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal
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contentions are adequately presented in the materials before 

this court and argument would not aid the decisional process. 

AFFIRMED