Opinion ID: 203152
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The First Summary Judgment Motion

Text: Desrosiers's first argument on appeal is that the district court committed reversible error in its handling of the first summary judgment motion when it improperly relied on new facts contained in the affidavit submitted with Hartford's reply. It is important to note that this argument is based entirely on the district court's reliance on the second Smith affidavit, rather than a challenge to the result reached after the allegedly improper reliance. In other words, Desrosiers implicitly concedes that if the district court did not err in relying on the second Smith affidavit, then its decision to treat her complaint as an ERISA matter must be affirmed. We review the district court's consideration of evidence on summary judgment for abuse of discretion. Hoffman v. Applicators Sales & Service, Inc., 439 F.3d 9, 13 (1st Cir.2006). We will not set aside the decision without strong evidence that the district court indulged in a serious lapse in judgment. Id. at 14 (citation and quotations omitted). In support of her argument, Desrosiers cites a host of cases which stand for the proposition that a party seeking summary judgment may not add new facts or legal arguments in a reply. Hartford does not dispute this general premise. Instead, Hartford argues that Desrosiers waived the argument by not raising it in the district court. [8] Desrosiers ostensibly argues that she was under no obligation to bring the issue to the court's attention. She contends that the no new facts rule is self-executing, and that the district court should therefore have ignored the second affidavit on its own initiative. To the contrary, however, we have consistently required some affirmative action from the aggrieved, litigant to preserve such an argument. In Davis v. Sears, Roebuck & Co., 708 F.2d 862 (1st Cir.1983), we held that if a party does not move to strike an inadmissible affidavit, any objections to its consideration are deemed to have been waived and it may properly be considered by the court when ruling on the motion. Id. at 864. To be sure, we do not always require a written motion to strike, as we did in Davis. Nevertheless, some action is required. Our approach was summed up in Perez v. Volvo Car Corp., 247 F.3d 303 (1st Cir.2001): We believe that what is required to preserve a party's rights vis-á-vis an allegedly deficient affidavit is for the dissatisfied party to (a) apprise the trial court, in a conspicuous manner and in a timely fashion, that she considers the affidavit defective; and (b) spell out the nature of the ostensible defects clearly and distinctly. Whether the dissatisfied party fulfills these requirements by means of a motion to strike or in some substantially equivalent way (say, by an objection, or as here, in a legal memorandum . . .) is of little moment. Id. at 314. Here, Desrosiers had ample opportunity to object to Hartford's reply and accompanying affidavit, which were filed April 2, 2004. Oral argument took place almost exactly four months later, on August 3, 2004. Desrosiers took no action during that time. Nor did she act following oral argument, after which more than five months passed before the district court issued its ruling in January 2005. During that accumulated nine months, Desrosiers might have, for example, moved to strike the second affidavit or the reply in its entirety, filed a motion to lift the existing discovery stay, invoked Rule 56(f) to seek additional discovery, or moved for leave to file a sur-reply containing a supplemental affidavit of her own. In the absence of some form of objection, the district court was not required to ignore the second affidavit sua sponte. Alternatively, in her reply brief before this court, Desrosiers for the first time points to statements made by her counsel during the summary judgment hearing which purport to register an objection to the second affidavit. We disagree that sufficient objection was made. During the hearing, Desrosiers's counsel bemoaned the additional information in the second affidavit; when the district court asked whether he was requesting discovery now, he replied, Well, we would very much like an opportunity here in Court or through deposition to conduct inquiry of Mr. Smith. This statement was both the first and last time that Desrosiers raised the issue in the district court between April 2, 2004 (when the reply was filed) and January 27, 2005 (when Hartford's motion was granted). We disagree with Desrosiers's assertion that this lone comment constituted a sufficient objection to the affidavit. In our view, this falls far short of the seasonable, strenuous and specific oral objection we have, in the past, required to preserve the issue. See Perez, 247 F.3d at 315 (noting that an objection was preserved where the complaining party pointed specifically to critical portions of the affidavit on the ground that those excerpts violated Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56(e) and thus straightforwardly brought the claimed shortcomings in the affidavit to the district court's (and the plaintiffs) attention in a timeous manner). While we do not suggest any nefarious purpose in this case, reversing a summary judgment in the absence of a sufficient objection to an allegedly improper affidavit runs the risk of allowing parties to `play dog in the manger, making no response to a movant's affidavits, with the chances of both . . . defeating the motion and, if unsuccessful, of later setting it aside.' Id. at 314-15 (quoting Lacey v. Lumber Mutual Fire Ins. Co., 554 F.2d 1204, 1205 (1st Cir. 1977)). Against this factual and legal backdrop, the district court's reliance on the second affidavit was not an abuse of discretion, and we thus affirm the first summary judgment ruling, finding ERISA preemption.