Opinion ID: 6341325
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Timeliness of Intervention

Text: The decisive issue here is whether Miller’s motion to inter‐ vene was timely. Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 24 permits intervention on “timely motion.” We review timeliness deci‐ sions under Rule 24 for abuse of discretion, City of Chicago, 912 F.3d at 984, meaning that we will aﬃrm if the district court’s decision was a reasonable one under the circumstances, re‐ gardless of whether we would have made the same decision in the district court’s position. For intervention under Rule 24, timeliness “is not limited to chronological considerations but is to be determined from all the circumstances.” Lopez‐Aguilar v. Marion County Sheriﬀ’s Department, 924 F.3d 375, 388 (7th Cir. 2019), quoting City of Bloomington v. Westinghouse Electric Corp., 824 F.2d 531, 534 (7th Cir. 1987). Four factors are relevant to whether a motion to intervene is timely: “(1) the length of time the intervenor knew or should have known of his interest in the case; (2) the prejudice caused to the original parties by the delay; (3) the prejudice to the intervenor if the motion is denied; (4) any other unusual circumstances.” City of Chicago, 912 F.3d at 984, quoting Grochocinski v. Mayer Brown Rowe & Maw, LLP, 719 F.3d 785, 797–98 (7th Cir. 2013). This is essentially a reasona‐ bleness test: “potential intervenors need to be reasonably dil‐ igent in learning of a suit that might aﬀect their rights, and No. 21‐1536 9 upon so learning they need to act reasonably promptly.” Lopez‐Aguilar, 924 F.3d at 388, quoting Reich v. ABC/York‐Estes Corp., 64 F.3d 316, 321 (7th Cir. 1995).
Instead of engaging with this totality‐of‐the‐circumstances test, Miller argues that United Airlines, Inc. v. McDonald, 432 U.S. 385 (1977), established a bright‐line rule that makes his motion to intervene timely. In his view, a motion to intervene is timely so long as it is filed “within the applicable time for filing an appeal.” Id. at 396 n.16. Since Miller filed on the same day the district court entered its order of dismissal, he says, his motion was timely. The argument is not persuasive. Unlike Ali, the named plaintiﬀ in McDonald had brought the case as a class action from the beginning. She sued the airline on behalf of herself “and all other United stewardesses discharged because of the no‐marriage rule,” which required “female stewardesses to remain unmarried as a condition of employment.” 432 U.S. at 387–88. The district court had granted United’s motion to strike the class allegations in the complaint, finding that the numerosity requirement of Rule 23 was not satisfied. This court declined to accept an interlocutory appeal challenging that order. But the district court did allow “12 married stew‐ ardesses who had protested the termination of their employ‐ ment to intervene as additional parties plaintiﬀ.” Id. at 388. From there, the lawsuit had “proceeded as a joint suit on behalf of the original and the intervening plaintiﬀs.” 432 U.S. at 389. The district court eventually entered a judgment of dis‐ missal after the parties agreed to reinstatement and backpay for the plaintiﬀs. Respondent McDonald had been a member 10 No. 21‐1536 of the putative class as defined in the original complaint. When the plaintiﬀs settled, McDonald realized that they did not intend to appeal the denial of class certification. She filed a motion to intervene within the thirty‐day appeal period. The district court denied her motion as untimely, explaining that she had not sought any relief from the court during five years of litigation. This court reversed, holding that McDonald was entitled to intervene when she did, that the district court had erred years earlier in denying class certification, and that the class was entitled to relief. Romasanta v. United Airlines, Inc., 537 F.2d 915, 920 (7th Cir. 1976). Reviewing only the timeliness issue, the Supreme Court aﬃrmed. The Court held that “once the entry of final judg‐ ment made the adverse class determination appealable, [McDonald] quickly sought to enter the litigation.” McDonald, 432 U.S. at 394. And in every case, the “critical inquiry … is whether in view of all the circumstances the intervenor acted promptly after the entry of final judgment.” Id. at 395–96. This court has made clear that McDonald did not create a bright‐line rule for evaluating the timeliness of a motion to intervene. We have described the rule as follows: The motion [to intervene] is timely if filed promptly after the entry of the final judgment in the class action—at least in a case in which, be‐ cause “the named plaintiﬀs had attempted to take an interlocutory appeal from the order of denial at the time the order was entered, there was no reason for the respondent to suppose that they would not later take an appeal until she was advised to the contrary after the trial court had entered its final judgment.” No. 21‐1536 11 Larson v. JPMorgan Chase & Co., 530 F.3d 578, 582 (7th Cir. 2008), quoting McDonald, 432 U.S. at 393–94. In Larson, the would‐be intervenor sought to appeal a three‐and‐a‐half‐ year‐old summary judgment order. Id. at 580. But since that party “had no good excuse for failing to seek intervention (or bringing its own suit) years ago,” we held that the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying intervention. Id. at 583–84. In doing so, we expressly rejected the bright‐line rule that Miller proposes: “We do not read United Airlines as establishing an inflexible rule that a motion to intervene in a class action to appeal an earlier order in that action is always timely provided it is filed shortly after the final judgment in the class action.” Id. at 583. Miller’s case for post‐settlement intervention is even weaker than the intervention sought and rejected in Larson, which at least had been brought as a class action. See 530 F.3d at 580. In McDonald, moreover, the respondent promptly moved to intervene once it became clear that her interests “would no longer be protected by the named class represent‐ atives.” 432 U.S. at 394. In this case, however, as the district court observed, plaintiﬀ Ali was not a named class representa‐ tive and “never even successfully proposed a class action.” Ali, 2021 WL 1193791, at . He filed three complaints, but none included any class allegations or demands for class‐wide re‐ lief. Unlike the McDonald intervenor, therefore, Miller could not have been reasonably relying on any “named class repre‐ sentatives” to protect his interests because this case was not proceeding as a class action. Cf. McDonald, 432 U.S. at 392–93 (emphasizing that lawsuit “had been commenced by the timely filing of a complaint for classwide relief, providing United with ‘the essential information necessary to determine both the subject matter and size of the prospective 12 No. 21‐1536 litigation’”), quoting American Pipe & Construction Co. v. Utah, 414 U.S. 538, 555 (1974).2 To be sure, where a party has failed to intervene because she reasonably expected named plaintiﬀs or other relevant parties to protect her interests, that expectation is relevant to the timeliness inquiry. E.g., McDonald, 432 U.S. at 394 (ex‐ plaining that “there was no reason for [McDonald] to suppose that [the named plaintiﬀs] would not later take an appeal un‐ til she was advised to the contrary after the trial court had en‐ tered its final judgment”); Flying J, Inc. v. Van Hollen, 578 F.3d 569, 572 (7th Cir. 2009) (holding that post‐judgment motion to intervene was timely where state attorney general had been defending statute but then did not appeal district court’s rul‐ ing that it was unconstitutional). No such expectation would have been reasonable in this case. Ali was litigating only his own claim against the City; he was not representing Miller’s interests. The district court did not abuse its discretion in denying intervention.
In his reply brief, Miller argues that the lack of class alle‐ gations in Ali’s complaint is not relevant to the timeliness is‐ sue. According to Miller, “nothing in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure requires that a complaint include class 2 As Miller points out, McDonald also recognized in a footnote that post‐judgment intervention “has been found to be timely even in litigation that is not representative in nature.” 432 U.S. at 395 n.16. All that shows, however, is that intervention might be allowed as timely in such cases if the would‐be intervenor has acted promptly in light of all the circum‐ stances. That does not establish the bright‐line rule Miller urges nor indi‐ cate that the district court abused its discretion in denying Miller’s motion to intervene. No. 21‐1536 13 allegations.” In eﬀect, Miller’s position would allow a plaintiﬀ to bring a class action—and therefore give potential interve‐ nors a right to assert the reliance interests of class members— without including class allegations or demands for class‐wide relief in either the original complaint or an amended com‐ plaint. That is not how the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure work. Rule 23(a) says explicitly that class actions allow class mem‐ bers to “sue or be sued as representative parties.” Rule 23(c)(1)(A) provides that the district court must decide “[a]t an early practicable time after a person sues or is sued as a class representative … whether to certify the action as a class action.” The district court cannot make that determination early in the case if the plaintiﬀ is allowed to keep his class‐ action intentions hidden. We have also said that Rule 23(e) “presumptively applies to all complaints containing class alle‐ gations.” Baker v. America’s Mortgage Servicing, Inc., 58 F.3d 321, 324 (7th Cir. 1995) (emphasis added), quoting Glidden v. Chro‐ malloy American Corp., 808 F.2d 621, 626 (7th Cir. 1986).3 Rule 8 requires that a pleading contain “a short and plain statement of the claim” and “a demand for the relief sought.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2)–(3). The purpose of those requirements is “to provide a defendant with fair notice of the claims against him.” Hahn v. Walsh, 762 F.3d 617, 632 (7th Cir. 2014); 3 The “early practicable time” phrasing of Rule 23(c)(1)(A) was adopted in 2003, replacing an earlier requirement that the court decide class certification “as soon as practicable after commencement of an ac‐ tion.” See Fed. R. Civ. P. 23 advisory committee’s notes to 2003 amend‐ ment. The change was intended to give district courts more flexibility in managing putative class actions. It was certainly not intended to allow “stealth” class actions. 14 No. 21‐1536 see also 7B Wright & Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure § 1798 (3d ed.) (“As in all federal suits, the pleading stage of a class action is designed to inform the parties of the nature of the claims and defenses being asserted and the relief de‐ manded.”). Miller’s theory would contravene that purpose and the requirement that relief be demanded by allowing plaintiﬀs to spring “stealth” class actions on defendants late in a case, without earlier warning. A class action “must be brought as a class action.” LG Display Co. v. Madigan, 665 F.3d 768, 772 (7th Cir. 2011) (holding that state attorney general’s parens patriae action was not a class action under federal Class Action Fairness Act). The complaint should identify the case as a class action if the plaintiﬀ intends to pursue a class ac‐ tion.4 Miller rests his argument that class allegations need not be included in the complaint on Chapman v. First Index, Inc., 796 F.3d 783 (7th Cir. 2015), a class action complaining about un‐ wanted receipt of an advertiser’s faxes. The plaintiﬀ proposed in his complaint, and later moved to certify, a class of all per‐ sons who had received faxes from the defendant without giv‐ ing their consent. After the court denied the motion, the plain‐ tiﬀ proposed a diﬀerent class, this time including all persons who had received faxes without an opt‐out notice or with a deficient notice. The court declined to certify that class as well, 4That is not to say, of course, that the absence of class allegations in the original complaint controls all later developments. A plaintiff may move for leave to amend the complaint to assert a class claim, thus notify‐ ing the defendant of the possibility of class‐wide liability, as Ali eventually tried to do here (albeit too late in the district court’s view). Such amend‐ ments are governed by the generally liberal standards of Rule 15 for amending pleadings. No. 21‐1536 15 concluding that the plaintiﬀ could not change the focus of the litigation almost five years into the case. Id. at 784–85. On appeal, we observed that both parties and the district court had proceeded as if the second certification proposal re‐ quired an amendment to the complaint, but we could not see why: “A complaint must contain three things: a statement of subject‐matter jurisdiction, a claim for relief, and a demand for a remedy. Class definitions are not on that list.” 796 F.3d at 785 (internal citation omitted). Instead, we noted, “the obli‐ gation to define the class falls on the judge’s shoulders.” Id. Although the judge may ask the parties for help, “motions practice and a decision under Rule 23 do not require the plain‐ tiﬀ to amend the complaint.” Id. Those comments cannot bear the weight Miller tries to place on them. For one, they were dicta, as we said that the amendment issue did “not aﬀect the disposition.” 796 F.3d at 785; see also id. at 788 (aﬃrming denial of class certification). More fundamental, this case did not involve an eﬀort to mod‐ ify a class definition that was already in the case. Unlike the plaintiﬀ in Chapman, Ali did not bring his case as a class ac‐ tion. His complaint did not include “a claim for relief” and “a demand for a remedy,” see id. at 785, notifying the defendant that it faced the prospect of class‐wide liability. If Ali had filed such a complaint and had then later sought to change the def‐ inition of his class, Chapman suggests that amending the com‐ plaint would not have been necessary. That makes sense. As the district court here observed, proposed class definitions are often narrowed or expanded as the parties engage in discov‐ ery at the class certification stage. Cf. Beaton v. SpeedyPC Soft‐ ware, 907 F.3d 1018, 1023 (7th Cir. 2018) (“District courts may amend class definitions either on motion or on their own 16 No. 21‐1536 initiative.”); Schorsch v. Hewlett‐Packard Co., 417 F.3d 748, 750 (7th Cir. 2005) (“Litigants and judges regularly modify class definitions ….”). Since there was no operative class action complaint in Ali’s case, however, Chapman is not relevant on this point. The denial of Miller’s motion to intervene is AFFIRMED.