Opinion ID: 689957
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Which case has priority?

Text: 24 The Saline County action was filed by AECI on July 13, 1993. The federal district court action was filed by Federated on December 6, following remand of the Saline County action. The third action (that is now consolidated with the December 6 action) was filed on October 11, 1993, in the Pulaski County Circuit Court, and Federated was served on January 5, 1994. Although the chronology indicates that the Saline County suit was initiated a few months prior to the federal suit, priority should not be measured exclusively by which complaint was filed first, but rather in terms of how much progress has been made in the two actions. Moses H. Cone, 460 U.S. at 21, 103 S.Ct. at 940; see, e.g., USF & G, 21 F.3d at 263 (state suit had priority despite its filing a few months after federal suit because state suit made more progress, in part ... because of the District Court's stay order). 25 In terms of the progress made in the respective actions, we believe that the federal action has made essentially as much progress as the state action. The Saline County action was stayed pending resolution of the removal and remand dispute, so it did not begin to proceed until October 1993. In January 1994, AECI filed a motion for partial summary judgment in the Saline County action, which Federated opposed partly on the basis that it needed to conduct further discovery. Moreover, at the July 26 summary judgment hearing, the Saline County court stayed proceedings concerning the as damages issue pending the Arkansas Supreme Court's decision in Diaz Refinery. There has been some subsequent discovery in the Saline County case and summary judgment was denied on some issues, but in essence, the Saline County action remains in the discovery phase. The federal action, by contrast, is capable of final resolution under NEPACCO without any additional discovery. Thus, we believe that the Saline County action does not have priority over the federal action. 26