Opinion ID: 221459
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Denial of Leave to Add Defendants

Text: The Crawfords' fourth and final claim deserves little attention. They moved to add Bank of America, a once-removed parent organization to Countrywide, as another defendant. The proposed addition to the second amended complaint required leave of the district court, see Fed.R.Civ.P. 15(a)(2), and the district court denied their motion. [9] We review that decision for an abuse of discretion. Foster v. DeLuca, 545 F.3d 582, 583 (7th Cir.2008). The district court had broad discretion regarding leave to add defendants, especially in light of the patent futility of the Crawfords' motion and their repeated failure to cure deficiencies in their pleadings. See Hukic v. Aurora Loan Servs., 588 F.3d 420, 432 (7th Cir. 2009). The district court noted that the Crawfords neither made any direct allegations against Bank of America nor argued that Countrywide was a mere alter ego of Bank of America so as to pierce liability protection offered by their separate corporate structure. On appeal, the Crawfords devote many pages to proving that a merger occurred, but not a single line to arguing why that alone renders the district court's denial abusive. We find the district court's reasoning sound and conclude that it did not err in denying the Crawfords' motion to add Bank of America as a defendant.