Opinion ID: 4561242
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Further Leave to Amend

Text: Earles argues that the district court should have granted her leave to amend so she could plead a First Amendment retaliation claim—in what would effectively be a fourth amended complaint (the fifth overall). “The court should freely give leave [to amend] when justice so requires.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 15(a)(2). Thus, the district court’s discretion to deny leave in this context is confined to circumstances “such as undue delay, bad faith or dilatory motive on the part of the movant, repeated failure to cure deficiencies by amendments previously allowed, undue prejudice to the opposing party by virtue of allowance of the amendment, futility of amendment, etc.” Foman v. Davis, 371 U.S. 178, 182 (1962). Particularly relevant here, Courts will properly deny a motion to amend when it appears that the plaintiff is using Rule 15 to make the complaint a moving target, to salvage a lost case by untimely suggestion of new theories of recovery, to present theories seriatim in an effort to avoid dismissal, or to knowingly delay raising an issue until the eve of trial. Minter v. Prime Equip. Co., 451 F.3d 1196, 1206 (10th Cir. 2006) (internal quotation marks, brackets, and citations omitted). Save for raising a new theory on the eve of trial, this case embodies the foregoing quotation. Throughout the proceedings below, Earles continually modified her theories—often through briefing alone, rather than by amending the complaint. Earles has continued this approach on appeal. As previously noted, Earles represented to the district court that her First Amendment claim was really part of her 17 intentional infliction of emotional distress claim. Now, in her opening brief, she argues that she can satisfy the elements of a standalone First Amendment retaliation claim. And, in her reply brief, she asserts for the first time a new “class of one” Equal Protection theory. In short, the district court did not abuse its discretion in concluding that a fifth chance to state viable claims was unwarranted. It appropriately denied Earles the opportunity to plead a First Amendment retaliation claim.