Opinion ID: 677795
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Matter of Lundy's Delay in Amending His Complaint

Text: 112 Moreover, I am driven to conclude that Lundy's lengthy, unexcused delay in amending his complaint does not affect the analysis of whether the Carlinos should have known that, but for a mistaken identity, Lundy would have named them in his original complaint. Although the Carlinos do not phrase it as such, they essentially argue that Lundy inexcusably neglected to name them as defendants for approximately eight months after Lundy learned that the Carlinos were Trop World's independent contractors. See Br. of Third Party Appellee at 8-9, 13. 15 The district court espoused a similar legal theory, and the majority also seems to latch onto it. See Maj.Op. at 1183; Slip Op. at 23, in Br. of Appellant at 67. 113 Some courts of appeals specifically include undue delay as a component of the should have known prong of the Rule 15(c) analysis. But those cases are in the main very different, because in them the parties to be added never had notice during the Rule 4(m) period that they were intended defendants in the action in question, and the plaintiff's procrastination occurred during the limitations period. 16 114 More on point is Seber v. Daniels Transfer Co., 618 F.Supp. 1311, 1313-14 (W.D.Pa.1985). There the court allowed the plaintiff to relate back his second amended complaint filed on August 6, 1984, to the date of his original complaint, March 30, 1984. The statute of limitations on plaintiff's age discrimination claim expired on April 1, 1984. The court found there was no undue delay despite the four months it took plaintiff to amend his complaint because counsel underwent a contentious period of discovery during which it may have been difficult to identify all responsible parties and their positions. Id. at 1314. The court did not find the delay dispositive, but held instead that the plaintiff here may take advantage of a rule designed to prevent overly technical applications of the statute of limitations where it appears that responsible parties will not be unfairly prejudiced in defending against an otherwise untimely lawsuit. Id. 115 As the Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit sagaciously pointed out in Anderson v. Deere & Co., 852 F.2d 1244, 1247-50 (10th Cir.1988), 17 so long as the defendant had notice, was not prejudiced, and should have known of plaintiff's mistake within 120 days of the expiration of the statute of limitations, the language of Rule 15(c) does not distinguish between timely and untimely amendments. See FED.R.CIV.P. 15(c) advisory committee note--1991 amendment (assuming the other requirements are met, a complaint may be amended at any time to correct a formal defect such as a misnomer or misidentification (emphasis supplied)). Conspicuously absent from Rule 15(c) is any hint that the complaint must be amended within the Rule 4(m) period--it speaks only of notice, lack of prejudice, and reason to know of a mistake within that time frame. S ee supra at 1179. Obviously receipt of service after amendment of the complaint would provide all three, but it is not a prerequisite. The courts to hold otherwise neglect the liberal policy supporting the Rules and essentially punish the plaintiff when no prejudice or harm results to the defendant. 116 Rule 15(c) is subject to Rule 15(a), which provides that a court shall freely give leave for a party to amend its pleadings when justice so requires. That subsection, not Rule 15(c), is the correct one to deal with the delay aspect of the amendment. No doubt undue delay causing prejudice could bar Lundy from amending his complaint to add a newly-named defendant under Rule 15(a) because in such situations justice would not require it. See, e.g., Adams v. Gould Inc., 739 F.2d 858, 867-68 (3d Cir.1984) ([U]nder the liberal pleading philosophy of the federal rules as incorporated in Rule 15(a), an amendment should be allowed whenever there has not been undue delay, bad faith on the part of the plaintiff, or prejudice to the defendant as a result of the delay.). This Court has often held that, absent undue or substantial prejudice, an amendment should be allowed under Rule 15(a) unless denial [can] be grounded in bad faith or dilatory motive, truly undue or unexplained delay, repeated failure to cure deficiency by amendments previously allowed or futility of amendment. Bechtel v. Robinson, 886 F.2d 644, 652-53 (3d Cir.1989) (internal quotation omitted); Heyl & Patterson Int'l, Inc. v. F.D. Rich Housing of V.I., Inc., 663 F.2d 419, 425 (3d Cir.1981) (same), cert. denied, 455 U.S. 1018, 102 S.Ct. 1714, 72 L.Ed.2d 136 (1982). 117 Similar in result is Skehan v. Board of Trustees, 590 F.2d 470 (3d Cir.1978), cert. denied, 444 U.S. 832, 100 S.Ct. 61, 62 L.Ed.2d 41 (1979), in which the district court had not even addressed Rule 15(c) since it refused to allow an amendment under Rule 15(a) regardless of whether Rule 15(c) would countenance it. There we held that [a]lthough district courts are required to allow amendments under the terms of [Rule 15(a) ], certain factors, such as undue prejudice to the other party and undue delay by the movant, have been found to establish sufficient justification for the denial of such motions. Id. at 492 (emphasis supplied). 18 That is because prejudice to the nonmoving party is the touchstone for the denial of the amendment. Arco Chem. Co., 921 F.2d at 488 (quoting Bechtel, 886 F.2d at 652) (internal quotations omitted); see Evans Prods. Co. v. West Am. Ins. Co., 736 F.2d 920, 923 (3d Cir.1984) (The primary consideration in determining whether leave to amend under FED.R.CIV.P. 15(b) should be granted is prejudice to the opposing party.). But as discussed above, see supra Part I.B.2, the Carlinos were not prejudiced by Lundy's delay. 118 Moreover, this Court has repeatedly stated outright that unexcused delay unaccompanied by real detriment to the defendant or to the judiciary does not constitute undue delay. 19 That is because undue delay refers solely to delay in the proceedings, not to delay in amending the pleadings. 20 The animating spirit of Rule 15, in short, does not sanction a ruling that would punish a party for delaying an amendment to the complaint. See Anderson, 852 F.2d at 1248-49 & n. 15 (suggesting, though, that Rule 11 sanctions may be appropriate). 119 To summarize, in this case the Carlinos suffered no actual prejudice, and, the amendment having occurred before trial was scheduled, there was no undue delay in the proceedings. Hence Lundy's delay in amending his complaint to name the Carlinos as defendants is completely beside the point. Consequently, I conclude that the district court should have allowed Lundy to amend his complaint to add the Carlinos as original party defendants. 21 120 As a final note on the delay factor, it has not eluded me that the Carlinos were intent on not getting themselves involved in this lawsuit. At no time did they seek or receive assurances that Lundy would not add them as defendants. For this reason, I do not believe the delay was material to what the Carlinos should have known: once having been put on notice during the limitations period, the absence of a quick amendment did not take them off notice. Cf. Kilkenny, 800 F.2d at 857 (plaintiff was informed of the proper defendants long before expiration of the limitations period) (A plaintiff's failure to amend its complaint to add a defendant after being notified of a mistake concerning the identity of a proper party ... may cause the unnamed party to conclude that it was not named because of strategic reasons rather than as a result of plaintiff's mistake. (emphasis supplied)); Potts v. Allis-Chalmers Corp., 118 F.R.D. 597, 608-09 (N.D.Ind.1987) (same). 121 Moreover, considering the parties' repeated and close interactions, the Carlinos could easily have set their minds at ease, but did not, perhaps in the hope that they would obtain the outcome the majority now hands them. Hence I do not agree with the majority that the Carlinos' suspicions evaporated over time (even assuming that were relevant), or, indeed, with its hyperbole that the Carlinos had affirmative reason to believe that the Lundys did not wish to assert liability against [them]. Maj.Op. at 1183. 122 Based on the foregoing, I would vacate the district court's order and decision denying Lundy's motion to relate back the amendment of his pleadings to add the Carlinos as original party defendants, and remand with instructions to reconsider the magistrate judge's recommendation using the proper legal standards. 123 II. DUTIES A LANDOWNER OWES A BUSINESS INVITEE IN NEW JERSEY 124 Although I concur with the majority in its disposition of Lundy's claim against Trop World in Part III.A of the majority opinion, I write separately to express my disagreement with the majority's conclusion in Part III.B that under New Jersey tort law Trop World would be entitled to summary judgment even if Nurse Slusher had been its employee. See Maj.Op. at 1179-80, 1180-81. Although the precise holding reached by the majority escapes me, see infra at 1191-92, the majority appears to conclude that Trop World fully satisfied its duties toward Lundy when it called for emergency help. 125 Because I conclude that Trop World was under a duty to take reasonable affirmative steps to assist Lundy when he suffered a cardiac arrest in addition to summoning emergency care, a position the majority at points appears to accept hypothetically to be the law, see Maj.Op. at 1179-80, 1180-81, I do not believe that New Jersey's Good Samaritan Act, 2A N.J.STAT.ANN. Sec. 62A-1, would shield Trop World (according to the majority's hypothetical) from liability were it Nurse Slusher's employer, or the Carlinos from liability had they effectively been made defendants in this case. I also believe that the question whether Nurse Slusher behaved reasonably under the circumstances when she refused to retrieve the intubation kit from her office when Dr. Greenberg requested it is a question a jury should answer.A. General Principles of New Jersey Tort Law 126 Absent a duty, a party cannot be held liable for negligent conduct under principles of New Jersey negligence law. See Weinberg v. Dinger, 106 N.J. 469, 524 A.2d 366, 373-74 (1987). In New Jersey, the question whether a duty exists is a matter of law and rests largely on questions of fairness and public policy. Cheng Lin Wang v. Allstate Ins. Co., 125 N.J. 2, 592 A.2d 527, 534 (1991); Kelly v. Gwinnell, 96 N.J. 538, 544, 476 A.2d 1219, 1222 (1984).  'The inquiry involves a weighing of the relationship of the parties, the nature of the risk, and the public interest in the proposed solution.'  Cheng Lin Wang, 592 A.2d at 534 (quoting Kelly, 96 N.J. at 544, 476 A.2d at 1222). I bear in mind that the New Jersey Supreme Court values flexibility, see Wytupeck v. Camden, 25 N.J. 450, 462, 136 A.2d 887 (1957), and that in New Jersey the question whether or not a duty exists will depend on the facts of each case, Cheng Lin Wang, 592 A.2d at 534. 127 New Jersey has set the standard of care a landowner owes another based on the relationship or status between the parties. See Snyder v. I. Jay Realty Co., 30 N.J. 303, 153 A.2d 1, 5 (1959). New Jersey distinguishes among invitees, who first come by invitation, express or implied; licensees, who are not invited but whose presence is suffered; and trespassers, who are neither invited nor suffered. Id. (internal quotations omitted). All parties agree that Lundy was a business invitee. See Br. of Appellant at 17; Br. of Appellee at 13. With this background in mind, I will tackle the formidable question whether a jury could find that the Carlinos (or Trop World, assuming it was Nurse Slusher's employer) breached a standard of care they owed to Lundy. 22 128 B. Duties Arising from the Landowner-Invitee Relationship 129 Neither the parties nor I has found any decision by the New Jersey Supreme Court, or any other New Jersey court, treating the question presented, namely, the scope of a business' duty, if any, to aid or assist a business invitee when an invitee requires emergency aid through no fault of the landowner. 23 In this predicament I cannot help but resort to treatises and decisions in sister jurisdictions to divine how the New Jersey Supreme Court would rule, keeping in mind its general policies toward tort liability. 24 130 As the majority notes, the early common law of England, later transposed to the United States, did not recognize a duty to rescue or assist another who was too ill to take care of him- or herself. A sense of rugged individualism combined with the harsh realities of industrialization formed an impenetrable shield of immunity around all who failed to help, even those who could, with the greatest of ease, prevent the most violent and senseless of deaths. Over the years, as commentators decried these decisions as revolting and an outrage to the moral conscience, courts worked widening inroads on that antiquated and perverse doctrine. 131 The clearly prevailing view today is that social policy justifies the imposition of a duty to act if one of a burgeoning group of special relationships exists between the parties. See generally W. PAGE KEETON ET AL., THE LAW OF TORTS Sec. 56, at 373-76 (5th ed. Lawyers ed. 1984); 3 FOWLER V. HARPER ET AL., THE LAW OF TORTS Sec. 18.6, at 718-21 (2d ed. 1986). Absent such a special relationship, the unquestionably widely prevailing view still is that there is no duty to rescue the helpless. See, e.g., REST.2D TORTS Sec. 314 & cmt. c (1965). See generally Jay Silver, The Duty to Rescue: A Reexamination and Proposal, 26 WM. & MARY L. REV. 423 (1985). 132 The special relationship bearing on this case is that between a business and an invitee. S ee supra at 1191. The Restatement (Second) of Torts Sec. 314A 25 succinctly explains the business' duty in that context: 133 (1) A common carrier is under a duty to its passengers to take reasonable action 134 (a) to protect them against unreasonable risk of physical harm, and 135 (b) to give them first aid after it knows or has reason to know that they are ill or injured, and to care for them until they can be cared for by others. 136 . . . . . 137 (3) A possessor of land who holds it open to the public is under a similar duty to members of the public who enter in response to his invitation. 138 REST.2D TORTS Sec. 314A (emphasis supplied). The essential imperative to be drawn from this language is the directive of reasonable action. 139 Contrary to the apparent holding of the majority, see infra at 1191-1192, I deduce from the case law that reasonable action may exceed the mere summoning of emergency care. The modern, general common law recognizes that, where the law imposes a duty to rescue, in harmony with general principles of negligence law it demands of those subject to the duty of reasonable care under the circumstances. See KEETON ET AL., THE LAW OF TORTS Sec. 56, at 377. For example, one renowned commentator writes that the one owing the duty will seldom be required to do more than give such first aid as he reasonably can, and take reasonable steps to turn the sick person over to a doctor or to those who will look after him until one can be brought. Ibid. (emphasis supplied); accord REST.2D TORTS Sec. 314A cmt. f. 26 140 Based on these sources, I believe that the New Jersey Supreme Court would recognize that a business owes its invitees a duty thus circumscribed. But I cannot canvass only learned works, but must sojourn forth beyond New Jersey's frontiers to survey its sister jurisdictions in order to gain a sense of how this duty has played out in similar situations. Though I have located no case on all fours with the one sub judice, the cases I have found generally support the views of the commentators and the Restatement quoted above, and many are close enough to provide fruitful guidance. I enumerate them in the margin. 27 141 Although, as already stated, no New Jersey case directly on point has been found, some older, related decisions confirm that the New Jersey Supreme Court would likely announce the duties as I have described them. The most pertinent case is Szabo v. Pennsylvania R.R. Co., 132 N.J.L. 331, 40 A.2d 562 (1945), in which the predecessor court to the New Jersey Supreme Court pinpointed the standard of care an employer owes an employee: 142 It is conceded that in this and other jurisdictions the law is, that in the absence of a contract or a statute, there rests no duty upon an employer to provide medical service or other means of cure to an ill, diseased or injured employee, even though it result[s] from the negligence of the master. 143 In our judgment there is a sound and wise exception to this rule, founded upon humane instincts. 144 That exception is, that where one engaged in the work of his master receives injuries, whether or not due to the negligence of the master, rendering him helpless to provide for his own care, dictates of humanity, duty and fair dealing require that the master put in the reach of such stricken employee such medical care and other assistance as the emergency, thus created, may in reason require, so that the stricken employee may have his life saved or may avoid further bodily harm. This duty arises out of strict necessity and urgent exigency. It arises with the emergency and expires with it. 145 Szabo, 40 A.2d at 562 (citations omitted) (emphasis supplied); accord Lanier v. Kieckhefer-Eddy Div. of Weyerhaeuser Timber Co., 84 N.J.Super. 282, 201 A.2d 750, 753-54 (1964). The court explained that, while the foreman was not called upon to correctly diagnose decedent's particular ailment, he should have known of decedent's inability to care for himself, and it was a question for the jury whether the employer breached his duty by simply delivering decedent to his home, where he was left helpless and alone, instead of to his family, a physician, or a hospital. See Szabo, 40 A.2d at 562-63; accord Burns v. Bakelite Corp., 17 N.J.Super. 441, 86 A.2d 289, 290-91, certif. denied, 9 N.J. 335, 88 A.2d 366 (1952). I read Szabo and its progeny as fully in support of my view that, under New Jersey Law, a business has a duty to summon medical aid and take other reasonable steps to assist its invitees who fall helplessly ill, but not actually to prepare for such contingencies or to provide medical aid beyond the pre-existing abilities of those who happen to be present. 146 I therefore conclude that the New Jersey Supreme Court would, if presented with a case like this one, hold that the business owed the invitee a (preexisting) duty to summon medical aid reasonably promptly and to take other reasonable steps under the circumstances to save its invitees from emergencies beyond the invitee's or his or her companions' capacity to ward off, but would not further require the business to afford the invitee first aid or emergency medical care or equipment beyond that which happens to be reasonably available at the time of the emergency. 28 147 As already said, I agree with the majority, in light of the arguments raised in Lundy's brief, that Trop World did not breach its duty to summon medical assistance promptly. 29 But I am far less convinced that Nurse Slusher acted reasonably in refusing to fetch the intubation kit located close by when Dr. Greenberg requested it, enough so that I believe a jury should be empaneled to consider this point. 148 The pertinent facts established by the deposition testimony are as follows. An intubation kit, or at least enough of the equipment to make do, was inventoried in Nurse Slusher's office, one floor above the pit where Lundy lay fighting for his life. App. at 217a (Dep. of Dr. Greenberg); App. at 153a, 154a-55a (Dep. of Nurse Slusher). After Nurse Slusher arrived at the scene, Dr. Greenberg identified himself as a doctor and requested an intubation kit. App. at 212a, 215a (Dep. of Dr. Greenberg); App. at 241a-42a (Dep. of Mrs. Greenberg). Nurse Slusher responded that Trop World policy prevented her from employing an intubation kit, and she apparently misrepresented that no intubation kit was on the premises. App. at 216a (Dep. of Dr. Greenberg); App. at 241a-42a (Dep. of Mrs. Greenberg). Because there were two doctors and another registered nurse in attendance, App. at 159a, 161a-62a (Dep. of Nurse Slusher), and because the other registered nurse alternated using the ambu-bag on Lundy with Nurse Slusher, App. at 240a-41a (Dep. of Mrs. Greenberg), a jury could reasonably conclude that someone other than Nurse Slusher could have operated her ambu-bag while she made haste to secure the intubation kit such a short distance away from a dying man. 149 Of course, insofar as Trop World was under no preexisting duty to render first aid to Lundy in the first place, to the extent it did so New Jersey's Good Samaritan Act would shield it from liability (so long as it acted in good faith). See Maj.Op. at 1179-80. Again, I emphasize that I think there is a jury question of negligence here only because a jury could view getting the intubation kit from the office and handing it to Dr. Greenberg to be a reasonable step (and hence one which would fall within its preexisting duty), as it does not encompass rendering first aid beyond the actual preexisting ability of anyone present in the normal course of things to perform. That is, if the jury were to view that step as reasonable in light of the proximity of the intubation kit and the medical emergency at hand, then Trop World would have been under a preexisting duty to take that step, and the Good Samaritan Act would not shelter its failure to do so. See Praet v. Borough of Sayreville, 218 N.J.Super. 218, 527 A.2d 486, 489 (1987) (holding that the Good Samaritan Act does not immunize one who has either a contractual, relational, or a transactional duty to render assistance (emphasis supplied)). Here, Nurse Slusher did not retrieve the intubator kit available to her when Dr. Greenberg requested it, an act which would not itself comprise the furnishing of medical care but which a jury could reasonably consider to be simply a reasonable step not too dissimilar from summoning emergency care. 150 I am puzzled by the majority's opinion in this respect. First, it seems to assume, for the sake of argument, that Trop World owed Lundy the preexisting duty to provide such first aid prior to the arrival of qualified assistance as the [casino's] employees are reasonably capable of giving. Maj.Op. at 1179-80. Moreover, operating under its hypothetical that Nurse Slusher was a Trop World employee, it assigns those same duties to Nurse Slusher. Maj.Op. at 1180-81. But then it decides that Nurse Slusher's assumed duty to provide such first aid as she was reasonably capable of giving does not include running up a flight of stairs to retrieve a medical device for a doctor attending a critically ill patient. See Maj.Op. at 1180-81. 151 Although the majority does not spell it out, I surmise that it did not mean to say that Nurse Slusher was not reasonably capable of running up a flight of stairs to retrieve the potentially life-saving intubation kit. Thus, it must have concluded Nurse Slusher breached no duty toward Lundy because, as a matter of law, it is not first aid for a nurse to retrieve a nearby medical instrument for a doctor in an emergency. That conclusion, however, leaves me perplexed, even leaving aside any notion of the greater includes the lesser (that is, that the greater duty to provide reasonable first aid includes the lesser duty to take reasonable steps other than the provision of minimal emergency medical care, § ee supra at 1200 n. 27 (discussing cases)). I simply do not understand why the majority concludes as a matter of law that Nurse Slusher breached no preexisting duty toward Lundy. 152 Based on the fact pattern in this case, I conclude that a jury should properly determine whether Nurse Slusher's employer (by operation of respondeat superior ) acted reasonably under the circumstances as described or whether it breached its duty toward Lundy. Accordingly, I respectfully dissent from the majority's contrary conclusion. III. CONCLUSION 153 Because I believe that Rule 15(c) authorizes the relation back of amendments adding a new party and that the Carlinos were afforded proper notice of the institution of this action when served with Lundy's Complaint by Trop World in its Third-Party Complaint, I would reverse the district court's contrary legal conclusions and remand for its reconsideration using the correct legal standard of the magistrate judge's findings of fact and conclusions of law. Therefore I respectfully dissent from the majority's judgment affirming the district court's refusal to permit Lundy to amend his Complaint to relate back his addition of the Carlinos as defendants. 154 I also note my disagreement with the majority's conclusion that, even were Trop World Nurse Slusher's employer, it would be entitled to summary judgment. Nevertheless, because Nurse Slusher was employed by an independent contractor (the Carlinos), and because Lundy has not appealed the district court's ruling that under New Jersey law Trop World could not be held accountable for their conduct, I concur with the majority's judgment that Trop World is entitled to summary judgment. SUR PETITION FOR REHEARING Aug. 12, 1994 155 BEFORE: SLOVITER, Chief Judge, BECKER, STAPLETON, MANSMANN, GREENBERG, HUTCHINSON, SCIRICA, COWEN, NYGAARD, ALITO, ROTH, LEWIS, and McKEE, Circuit Judges, and RESTANI,  Judge, United States Court of International Trade. 156 The petition for rehearing filed by appellants in the above-entitled case having been submitted to the judges who participated in the decision of this Court and to all the other available circuit judges of the circuit in regular active service, and no judge who concurred in the decision having asked for rehearing, and a majority of the circuit judges of the circuit in regular active service not having voted for rehearing by the court in banc, the petition for rehearing is denied.