### IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 14

- 60238 Summary Calendar

THERESA DEGRUY, Administratrix of the Estate of Martha James, Deceased , Plaintiff

− Appellant ,

versus DR. TARENCE E. WADE; DR. DENNIS WAYNE AUST , Defendants

− Appellees

.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Mississippi USDC No. 4:12

- CV

- 25

Before SMITH , WIENER , and ELROD , Circuit Judges

. PER CURIAM : *

Theresa DeGruy appeals on two grounds. First, she claims that the

* Pursuant to 5 TH C IR . R. 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion should not be published and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set forth in 5 TH C IR . R. 47.5.4. United States Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit 

### FILED September 11, 2014 Lyle W. Cayce Clerk Case: 14-60238 Document: 00512765164 Page: 1 Date Filed: 09/11/2014No. 14

- 60238 dismissal of her 42 U.S.C. § 1983 claim with prejudice was improper because the district court first should h ave considered the jurisdictional ground on
which her state

- law claims were eventually dismissed. Second, she challenges
the denial of her motion to amend the judgment under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59(e )

. Because the district court had jurisdicti on over the § 1983 action and did not abuse its discretion in denying the motion to amend , we affirm.

I. This appeal arises from a suit relating to the death of Martha James. The facts underlying the original action are not the subject of this appeal and will therefore not be repeated.
I n April 2012, Theresa DeGruy , in her role as administratrix of James’s estate, sued two doctors, Tarence Wade and Den nis Aust , alleging a claim under § 1983 and state

- law medical negligence. DeGruy asserted federal

quest ion, diversity, and supplemental jurisdiction.
I n July 2012, Aust moved to dismiss the § 1983 claim for failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted. On August 27, DeGruy filed a response in opposition to th e motion ; Wade joined the motion o n August 31,
and the defendants filed a joint reply brief that same day. On March 15, 2013, the district court granted the motion to dismiss the § 1 983 action. On March 27, the defendants moved to dismiss the supplemental state

law claim. On April 26, DeGruy filed her response to that motion. Because she had also asserted diversity jurisdiction, the district court , on May 16, ordered supplemental brief ing on whether it had jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1332

. The defendant s filed a supplemental brief on May 24 that included an affidavit from one of the m averring that he was a Mississippi domiciliary. Because DeGruy was also domiciled there, the court did not have diversity jurisdiction. 2 Case: 14-60238 Document: 00512765164 Page: 2 Date Filed: 09/11/2014No. 14

- 60238 On June 25, the court granted the m otion to dismiss and closed the case. The court found that it lacked diversity jurisdiction, leaving it to consider whether to continue to exercise its supplemental jurisdiction over the remain

ing state law claim. Because the court had dismissed the § 198 3 claim

— the only claim over which i t had original jurisdiction

— i t decided not to exer cise supplemental jurisdiction. On July 18, DeGruy filed motions to amend the judgment under Rule 59(e) and t o amend the complaint under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 1 5(a). She wanted to add parties and assert new causes of action

. She did not include a draft of her proposed amended complaint. The defendants filed a response opposing the Rule 59(e) motion on August 1. DeGruy filed a reply brief on Aug ust 26, includ ing for the first time a proposed amended complaint. 1 On March 26, 2014, the district court denied the motion to amend the judgment , except that it granted the motion in part to clarify that the dismissal of federal claims was with prejudice and the dism issal of the state claims was without prejudice

. D eGruy asserts two grounds for reversal. First, s he
maintains that the court erred when it dismissed the federal claim with preju

dice despite decid ing that it lacked subject

- matter jurisdiction over the state

law claims

. Sec ond, DeGruy asserts that the court should have applied Rule 15(a)’s stan dard for denying amendments instead of Rule 59(e)’s less deferen

tial standard.

II. DeGruy c ontends that the district court erred in dismiss ing the fede ral

1 A mag is trate judge had denied the Rule 15(a) motion on July 22. Dis missal of a case terminates the ability to file a Rule 15(a) motion, Rosen zweig v. Azurix Corp. , 332 F.3d 854, 864 (5th Cir. 2003), so DeGruy had to rely on her Rule 59(e) motion. 3 Case: 14-60238 Document: 00512765164 Page: 3 Date Filed: 09/11/2014No. 14

- 60238
claim under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) before considering the jurisdictional defect on which the state

- law claim would eventually be dis

missed. It is true that a court cannot rule on the merits if it lacks subject

matter jurisdiction. I n this case, however, the court had jurisdiction over the federal claim under federal

- question jurisdiction, see § 1332, and that jurisdic

tion was not impaired by the later lack of jurisdiction over the state claim. The state and federal claims had differ ent bases of jurisdiction: federal

question jurisdiction for the federal claim and diversity and supplemental jur

is diction for the state

- law claims. There was no defect in jurisdiction over the federal claim , which assert ed that the defendant s had violat ed the Four teenth Amendment. DeGruy has not demonstrated that the court at any time lacked subject

- matter jurisdiction over th at claim, and we cannot find one.
The state

- law claim, meanwhile, satisfied neither diversity nor supple

men tal jurisdiction. The court found that there was not complete diversity, a
determination DeGruy has not appealed. And the court exercised its discretion under 28 U.S.C. § 1367(c) to decline to exercise supplemental jurisdiction because the federal claim had been dismissed

. Neither of these fac ts impacted federal

- question jurisdiction over the § 1983 claim

. The district court had proper jurisdiction over the federal claim throughout the pendency of the entire

case , and it made no error in the order in which it considered the jurisdictional and substantive challenges to the two claims.

III. DeGruy insists that the dis trict court erred in denying her motion to amend the judgment under Rule 59(e) , reason ing that it should have applied the more permissive standard of Rule 15(a). We agree that the court’ s discre

tion to deny the Rule 59(e) motion was limited to the narrower reasons for denial permissible under Rule 15(a). The court, however, analyzed the motion
4 Case: 14-60238 Document: 00512765164 Page: 4 Date Filed: 09/11/2014No. 14

- 60238 under each rule and came to the same conclusion to deny, and we cannot co n
clude that i t abused its discretion in denying the amendment. Ordinarily, a district court has greater discretion to deny a motion under Rule 59(e) than under Rule 15(a). Rule 59(e) motions “must clearly establish either a manifest error of law or fact or must present newly discovered evi

dence.” Rosenzweig , 332 F.3d at 864

. A motion to amend under Rule 15(a), however, “permit[s] liberal amendment to facilitate determination of claims on the merits,” Dussouy v. Gulf Coast Inv. Corp. , 660 F.2d 594, 598 ( Former 5th Cir. Nov. 1981) , imposing serious restrictions on the judge’s discretion to deny
the motion , i d. Absent a strong, declared reason for the denial, a reviewing court will hold the denial of a Rule 15(a) motio n to be an abuse of discretion. 2
In l imited circumstances that apply here, this court has held that Rule 15(a)’s limitations on judicial discretion apply to Rule 59(e) motions. Whe re a district court has entered a judgment on the pleadings and the plaintiff moves under Rule 59(e) to vacate th e judgment and amend the complaint, the court should analyze the motion under the Rule 15(a) standard. Rosenzweig , 332 F.3d at 864 ; Dussouy , 660 F.2d at 597 n.1. Here the court was required to apply the Rule 15(a) standard in its order denying the Rule 5 9(e) motion

. DeGruy fails to demonstrate that the district court abused its discretion
under the Rule 15(a) standard. It evaluated the motion under both Rule 15(a) and Rule 59(e) and reached the same conclusion each way , pro viding this court with an adequ ate explanation of its exercise of discretion. Under the framework set out by the Supreme Court and this court, the district court did

2 Foman v. Davis , 371 U.S. 178, 182 (1962) (“[O]utright refusal to grant the leave with out any justifying reason appearing for the denial is not an exercise of dis cretion; it is merely abuse of that discretion.”); Dussouy , 660 F.2d at 598 (“[U]nless there is a substantial reason to deny leave to amend, the discretion of the district court is not broad enough to per mit denial.”). 5 Case: 14-60238 Document: 00512765164 Page: 5 Date Filed: 09/11/2014No. 14

- 60238
not abuse its discretion. The court based its rejection under Rule 15(a) on DeGruy’s unjus tifiable delay , a de cis ion bas ed on adequate evidence and matching estab lished case

law. In Foman , 371 U.S. at 182, the Court identified “undue delay” and “dil a
tory motive” as grounds on which a district court can justifiably deny leave to amend under Rule 15(a). And this court has further clarified what can consti

tute undue delay and dilatory motive. In Whitaker v. City of Houston , 963 F.3d 831, 837 (5th Cir. 1992), we held that it was not an abuse of discretion to deny leave to amend under Rule 15(a) whe re the plaintiff had n ot amended his com

plaint during the eleven months a motion to dismiss was pending and had waited an additional two months to provide a p ro posed amended complaint. The procedural history of the instant case provides an even starker

exam ple of delay. DeG ruy did not seek to amend in the seven months the ini

tial motion to dismiss the federal claim was pending or in the three months between the dismissal of the federal claim and the dismissal of the case. And
she did not provide a proposed amended complain t until her August reply brief, two months after the court had entered its June judgment and a full year after DeGruy was put on notice that her complaint was poten ti ally inadequate. The district court justifiably concluded that this plaintiff had not d iligently prose
cuted her case. Once the court had decided that the delay was from lack of diligence, the burden shifted to DeGruy to show that it “‘was due to oversight, inadve rtence, or excusable neglect.’” 3 DeGruy gave the district court no explanation that was grounded in oversight, inadvertence, or excusable neglect and has likewise provided no such explanation here. We cannot conclude that the court abused

3 Gregory v. Mitchell , 634 F.2d 199, 203 (5th Cir. Jan. 1981) (quoting Frank Adam Elec. Co. v. Westinghouse Elec. & Mfg. Co. , 146 F.2d 165, 167 (8th Cir. 1945)). 6 Case: 14-60238 Document: 00512765164 Page: 6 Date Filed: 09/11/2014No. 14

- 60238 its discretion in denying the motion to amend

. DeGruy cites a number of cases for the proposition that this court has a “best case doctrine” that “require[s] notice prior to a sua sponte dismissal for failure to state a claim, unless the plaintiff has already been given a prior
chance to allege his ‘best case ’ or the dismissal is without prejudice.” Reliance on those cases is unavailing, however, because the dismissal of the federal
claim was not sua sponte , and DeGruy had ample opportu nity to seek amend

ment before final dismissal. In sum, the district cou rt did not abuse its discre

tion in finding that DeGruy’s lack of diligence caused serious delay and that

s he had not provided an adequate explanation for the delay that would require
the court to permit amendment. Because there is no defect in jurisdiction and no abuse of discretion , the judgment is AFFIRM ED

.

7 Case: 14-60238 Document: 00512765164 Page: 7 Date Filed: 09/11/2014