Opinion ID: 752161
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: jurisdiction

Text: 15 Before we address these issues on the merits, we must determine that we have jurisdiction to do so. As a general rule, federal courts of appeal have jurisdiction only over final decisions of the district courts. See 28 U.S.C. § 1291 (granting federal appellate courts jurisdiction of appeals from all final decisions of the district courts). A final decision is one that ends the litigation on the merits and leaves nothing for the court to do but execute the judgment. Catlin v. United States, 324 U.S. 229, 233, 65 S.Ct. 631, 633, 89 L.Ed. 911 (1945) (citing St. Louis I.M. & S.R.R. v. Southern Express Co., 108 U.S. 24, 28, 2 S.Ct. 6, 8, 27 L.Ed. 638 (1883)). Accordingly, an order that determines liability but not damages is not a final decision, In re Frontier Properties, Inc., 979 F.2d 1358, 1362 (9th Cir.1992); nor is an order that adjudicates less than all claims a final decision, Chacon v. Babcock, 640 F.2d 221, 222 (9th Cir.1981). 16 The orders that the appellants appeal are precisely such orders. The CERCLA order determined that the defendants were liable under CERCLA for the costs that California incurred while investigating the contamination at the 20th Street Property, but it did not determine what those costs were. The state-law order resolved the nuisance and endangerment-to-the environment claims, but left several other claims unresolved. Thus, unless the summary adjudication orders fall under an exception to the final judgment rule, we have no jurisdiction to hear them.
17 The Supreme Court has recognized that  § 1291 permits appeals not only from a final decision by which a district court disassociates itself from a case, but also from a small category of decisions that, although they do not end the litigation, must nonetheless be considered 'final.'  Swint v. Chambers County Com'n, 514 U.S. 35, 42, 115 S.Ct. 1203, 1208, 131 L.Ed.2d 60 (1995) (citing Cohen v. Beneficial Indus. Loan Corp., 337 U.S. 541, 546, 69 S.Ct. 1221, 1225-26, 93 L.Ed. 1528 (1949)). This small category of decisions includes only decisions that are conclusive, that resolve important questions separate from the merits, and that are effectively unreviewable on appeal from the final judgment in the underlying action. Id. (citing Cohen, 337 U.S. at 546, 69 S.Ct. at 1225-26). 18 The summary adjudication orders establishing the defendants' CERCLA and state law liability are not among this small category of decisions because they do not satisfy the last factor of the test: they are not effectively unreviewable after final judgment. As the Supreme Court explained in Swint, an erroneous ruling on liability may be reviewed effectively on appeal from final judgment. Swint, 514 U.S. at 43, 115 S.Ct. at 1208. Accordingly, the orders granting California's summary adjudication motions are not appealable collateral orders. 19
20 In addition to final decisions and the small category of cases that must be considered final under the collateral order doctrine, federal appellate courts have jurisdiction over four types of interlocutory decisions. The courts of appeal can hear appeals from interlocutory orders granting, modifying, or dissolving injunctions; interlocutory orders appointing receivers or refusing orders to wind up receiverships; interlocutory orders determining the rights and liabilities of the parties to admiralty cases; and interlocutory orders that the district court certifies for immediate appeal because the orders are pivotal and debatable. See 28 U.S.C. § 1292. 21 The district court did not certify the CERCLA order or the state law order for immediate appeal, and neither order concerns receiverships or admiralty. Thus, to fall under the statutory provisions allowing immediate appeal of interlocutory orders, the summary adjudication orders must be orders granting, continuing, modifying, refusing or dissolving injunctions. 28 U.S.C. § 1292(a)(1). 22 After finding the defendants liable for creating a public nuisance and violating California's environmental laws, the district court issued an injunction requiring the defendants to abate the public nuisance that the trichloroethylene contamination had caused. Although the district court found that the defendants were also liable for California's investigation costs under CERCLA, it did not issue an injunction that required the defendants to reimburse California. Thus, the injunction that the court issued concerned the defendants' liability under state nuisance and environmental laws, not their liability under CERCLA. 23 We therefore have jurisdiction over the interlocutory order finding the defendants liable under state law because it is part of an order granting an injunction. The interlocutory order finding the defendants liable under CERCLA, on the other hand, is not part of the order granting the injunction. The CERCLA order therefore falls under none of the statutory provisions that allow for immediate interlocutory appeal.
24 The defendants argue that the CERCLA order is nevertheless appealable because it is inextricably intertwined with the injunction. They invoke the doctrine of pendent appellate jurisdiction that the Supreme Court alluded to in Swint v. Chambers County Commission, 514 U.S. 35, 115 S.Ct. 1203, 131 L.Ed.2d 60 (1995). 25 Swint was a civil rights case against the Chambers County Commission and three police officers. The police officers argued that they were entitled to qualified immunity, and the Commission argued that it was not liable because the sheriff who authorized the alleged civil rights violations was not the county's final policy-maker. The district court summarily adjudicated both parties' defenses and found that neither party was entitled to judgment. 26 Both parties immediately appealed even though the district court had not issued a final judgment. The Eleventh Circuit held that it had jurisdiction over the police officers' appeal under Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 530, 105 S.Ct. 2806, 2817-18, 86 L.Ed.2d 411 (1985), which held that an order denying qualified immunity is immediately appealable. The Eleventh Circuit then held that it had pendent appellate jurisdiction over the Commission's claims even though the Commission's claims were not independently appealable. 27 The case then came before the Supreme Court. The Court agreed that the Eleventh Circuit had jurisdiction over the police officers' appeal, but held that the Circuit Court did not thereby gain authority to review the denial of the Chambers County Commission's motion for summary judgment. Swint, 514 U.S. at 38, 115 S.Ct. at 1206. In other words, there [was no] 'pendent party' appellate authority to take up the Commission's case. Id. 28 In so holding, the Court noted that the federal courts of appeals have endorsed the doctrine of pendent jurisdiction. Id. at 44 n. 2, 115 S.Ct. at 1209 n. 2. The Court also acknowledged the parties' argument that § 1291's final decision requirement is designed to prevent parties from interrupting litigation by pursuing piecemeal appeals and that once litigation has already been interrupted by an authorized pretrial appeal, there is no cause to resist the economy that pendent jurisdiction promotes. Id. at 45, 115 S.Ct. at 1209. 29 But the Court stated that [t]hese arguments drift away from the statutory instructions Congress has given to control the timing of appellate proceedings. Id. If courts of appeals had discretion to hear pendent appeals, then Congress' statutory arrangement would be undermined. Id. at 45-48, 115 S.Ct. at 1209-11 (discussing 28 U.S.C. § 1292, which lists certain interlocutory appeals that are immediately appealable, and § 2072(c) of the Rules Enabling Act, 28 U.S.C. § 2071 et seq., which grants the Supreme Court rulemaking authority to proscribe which interlocutory orders are appealable). 30 Despite this strong language against pendent appellate jurisdiction, the Court left open a loophole for inextricably intertwined rulings. The Court stated that it need not definitively or preemptively settle here whether or when it may be proper for a court of appeals with jurisdiction over one ruling to review, conjunctively, related rulings that are not themselves independently appealable. Id. at 50-51, 115 S.Ct. at 1212. The Court noted that the parties did not contend that the District Court's decision to deny the Chambers County Commission's summary judgment motion was inextricably intertwined with that court's decision to deny the individual defendants' qualified immunity motions. Id. at 51, 115 S.Ct. at 1212. Nor, the Court noted, did the parties contend that review of the former decision was necessary to ensure meaningful review of the latter. Id. 31 Given the Supreme Court's criticism of pendent appellate jurisdiction, the Court's inextricably intertwined exception should be narrowly construed. Under such a construction, the CERCLA order is not inextricably intertwined with the injunction. As explained above, the district court granted the injunction to abate the public nuisance that was caused by the trichloroethylene contamination at the 20th Street Property. We can easily address the defendants' state law liability without discussing the defendants' CERCLA liability. Just because the same facts are involved in both issues does not make the two issues inextricably intertwined. See Swint, 514 U.S. 35, 115 S.Ct. 1203, 131 L.Ed.2d 60; United States v. Stanley, 483 U.S. 669, 676-78, 107 S.Ct. 3054, 3059-61, 97 L.Ed.2d 550 (1987); Abney v. United States, 431 U.S. 651, 662-63, 97 S.Ct. 2034, 2041-42, 52 L.Ed.2d 651 (1977) (all holding that appellate court with interlocutory jurisdiction over one ruling lacked jurisdiction to review factually-related rulings that were not independently appealable). 32 In sum, the interlocutory CERCLA order does not fall under the collateral order doctrine, the interlocutory-appeal statute, or the inextricably intertwined doctrine. We therefore lack jurisdiction to hear the CERCLA portion of this appeal. Accordingly, we will now turn to the portions of the appeal over which we do have jurisdiction: the appeal from the district court's order finding the defendants liable under state law and the appeal from the district court's order issuing an injunction against the defendants. 33