Opinion ID: 2777843
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: District Court’s Denial of Leave to Amend

Text: On October 3, 2013, the district court sua sponte denied Mathis’s motion for leave to amend (“the October order”). The district court pointed out that Mathis 6 Case: 14-12038 Date Filed: 02/09/2015 Page: 7 of 20 had not indicated that Donley joined his motion, which was unlikely given that the motion was not signed by Donley’s attorney, Kenner. The district court further explained that “Donley must join any such motion and the complaint must be filed on behalf of both Plaintiffs.” F. Plaintiff Donley’s Motion to Sever and Settlement On November 15, 2013, after the district court ordered the parties to enter mediation to try to settle the case, counsel Kenner filed a motion to sever Donley’s case from Mathis’s case. In an affidavit, counsel Kenner averred that he and Mathis could not agree on trial strategy, including “how an Amended Complaint should be drafted.” Mathis opposed severance, and in his own affidavit averred that he, rather than Kenner, had performed most of the legal work for the case. Mathis also attached an affidavit from Donley asking the district court to deny Kenner’s motion to sever filed on her behalf. The district court denied the motion to sever. On November 25, 2013, Donley, with Kenner still representing her, settled Donley’s case. G. Mathis’s Second Pro Se Motion to Amend Complaint On December 1, 2013, almost eight months after the scheduling order’s deadline for amending the pleadings, Mathis filed a second pro se motion for leave to file an amended complaint, again seeking to allege a state-law malicious prosecution claim (“December motion”). Mathis argued that he should be allowed 7 Case: 14-12038 Date Filed: 02/09/2015 Page: 8 of 20 to amend his complaint now that Donley had settled her claims. Mathis did not attach a copy of his proposed amended complaint. 1 The Defendants opposed Mathis’s December motion for various reasons, including that: (1) Mathis’s proposed amendment was untimely under the district court’s scheduling order and he had not shown “good cause” to modify the scheduling order, as required by Federal Rule of Civil 16(b)(4); (2) Defendants would be prejudiced by a late amendment; and (3) Mathis had not attached a copy of his proposed amended complaint to his motion. In his reply, Plaintiff Mathis argued that he should be allowed to amend his complaint under Rule 15(a), but did not address the Defendants’ Rule 16(b)(4) argument or explain how he had shown “good cause” to excuse him from the scheduling order’s April 9, 2013 deadline to amend the pleadings. To his reply brief, Mathis attached a copy of his proposed Fourth Amended Complaint. On January 13, 2014, the district court denied Mathis’s December motion. (“January order”). The district court concluded that: (1) Mathis had not shown good cause under Rule 16(b)(4); (2) Mathis’s brief had not mentioned Rule 16(b)(4); (3) Mathis had not diligently pursued the fourth amendment; (4) Mathis’s motion had failed to comply with the procedural requirements for amending his 1 Mathis later sought to amend his December motion, wishing to add a § 1983 false arrest claim to his proposed Fourth Amended Complaint as well. The district court denied this request. On appeal, Mathis does not challenge that ruling on his false arrest claim, and we do not address it. 8 Case: 14-12038 Date Filed: 02/09/2015 Page: 9 of 20 complaint; and Mathis’s reply brief had attached a proposed Fourth Amended Complaint that contained 15 additional pages and 32 additional numbered paragraphs (compared to Mathis’s proposed Fourth Amended Complaint attached to his October motion), of which Defendants appeared to have had no notice. H. Mathis’s 2014 Motion to Alter or Amend the Judgment On February 2, 2014, Mathis filed a motion to alter or amend the judgment, citing Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 59(e) and 60(b). Mathis asked the district court to amend the “judgment entered on October 3rd, 2013, or in the alternative January 13th, 2014 denying Plaintiff’s inclusion of the state claim for malicious prosecution.” Mathis claimed that he had been diligent in his attempts to amend his complaint but that his former counsel Kenner refused to amend the complaint. Mathis submitted his affidavit and e-mail exchanges between Mathis and Kenner dating from April 30, 2013 through July 22, 2013. The Defendants opposed Mathis’s motion and submitted a deposition of Kenner. Kenner testified that he dropped the state-law malicious prosecution claim from the Third Amended Complaint because the Defendant City had not yet responded to the Plaintiffs’ ante litem notice. As a result, in January 2012, while preparing the Plan, Kenner and Mathis agreed they would amend the complaint to 9 Case: 14-12038 Date Filed: 02/09/2015 Page: 10 of 20 add the state-law malicious prosecution claim after discovery expired and then inserted language in the Plan that they believed would protect their ability do to so. In reply, Mathis submitted his and Donley’s affidavits disputing Kenner. According to Mathis and Donley, Mathis did not agree to wait until after discovery expired to amend the complaint and repeatedly asked Kenner to amend the complaint in April 2012, before the scheduling order deadline, but was ignored. The district court denied Mathis’s “motion for reconsideration.” The district court concluded that: (1) Rule 59(e) did not apply because neither the October order nor the January order was a “judgment”; (2) Mathis had not identified which subsection of Rule 60(b) entitled him to relief or cited any authority to support his argument; and (3) Mathis possessed the information about his dispute with Kenner prior to his October and December motions, but failed to explain why he did not include it with these motions or why he did not address Rule 16(b)(4)’s “good cause” requirement in those motions.