Opinion ID: 215922
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The First IDEM Suit

Text: We turn next to the effect of the first IDEM suit, which was filed before the plaintiffs filed their citizen suit. Under the terms of 42 U.S.C. § 6972(b)(1)(B), the earlier government action bars this suit if it was a suit to require compliance with such permit, standard, regulation, condition, requirement, prohibition, or order, i.e., if it sought to require compliance with the same requirements that the plaintiffs seek to enforce in this suit. If it was, then the plaintiffs' citizen suit is barred under RCRA. If it was not, then RCRA allows the two suits to proceed simultaneously. Based on a close examination of the lawsuits, including the state court's rejection of the plaintiffs' efforts to pursue their claims by intervening in the first IDEM suit, we conclude that RCRA allows the plaintiffs to pursue their claims that are beyond the scope of the first IDEM suit. We look to the plaintiffs' federal complaint and we take judicial notice of matters within the public record: specifically, the 2007 Agreed Order between VIM and IDEM, IDEM's complaint in its first suit, court documents associated with the plaintiffs' intervention in the first IDEM suit, and documents from the second IDEM suit. [4] The first IDEM suit sought enforcement of the IDEM/VIM Agreed Order, which, in turn, dealt primarily with dumping, processing, and disposal of C grade waste and waste piles. See AO ¶¶ II(3), (4), (5), (6), (9). In this case, the plaintiffs allege RCRA violations that are based in part on VIM's dumping, processing, and disposal of C grade waste. See Complaint ¶ 168(a)-(e). To the extent that the plaintiffs' RCRA claims overlap with the claims IDEM asserted in its first suit with respect to the C grade waste, the district court found, and we agree, that they cannot be pursued in this citizen action because of 42 U.S.C. § 6972(b)(1)(B). But to the extent that the plaintiffs' claims do not overlap with those asserted in the first IDEM suit, the plaintiffs' claims are not precluded under 42 U.S.C. § 6972(b)(1)(B). The plaintiffs' RCRA claims in this federal citizen suit also seek relief for A grade waste, B grade waste, and other types of solid waste that were not expressly addressed by IDEM's allegations in its first suit. VIM argues in this federal suit, and the district court found, that IDEM's different grades of waste are not different at all but fall under the general umbrella of solid waste. Following this logic, VIM would have us conclude that the first IDEM suit, which addressed only the C grade waste, actually encompassed the other types of waste as well, and its scope completely overlaps the violation claims in the plaintiffs' RCRA citizen suit. Three aspects of the record undermine VIM's argument. First, when the plaintiffs attempted to intervene in IDEM's 2008 lawsuit, VIM successfully objected to their attempts to broaden the scope of that suit beyond the C grade waste to address the other solid wastes that VIM was dumping and processing at the Elkhart site. The state court sustained VIM's objection and prevented the plaintiffs from expanding the scope of the case beyond the allegations of IDEM's complaint to bring in their additional claims. If the plaintiffs' proposed claims had truly overlapped IDEM's allegations in their entirety, VIM's objection (and the court's ruling) would have been moot. Having convinced the state court to limit the case to IDEM's narrower C grade waste allegations, VIM cannot be permitted to take the opposite position in federal court and claim that there is no difference between the cases. This conclusion applies the familiar equitable principle of judicial estoppel: a party who prevails on one ground in a prior proceeding cannot turn around and deny that ground in a later proceeding. E.g., Butler v. Village of Round Lake Police Dep't, 585 F.3d 1020, 1022-23 (7th Cir.2009); Levinson v. United States, 969 F.2d 260, 264-65 (7th Cir. 1992). VIM is simply trying to have it both ways. We reject the tactic and conclude that IDEM's allegations in its 2008 lawsuit do not seek to require compliance with such permit, standard, regulation, condition, requirement, prohibition or order that the plaintiffs seek to enforce in their RCRA citizen suit. Second, the plaintiffs' RCRA allegations in this case encompass A grade waste. A grade waste is regulated as a solid waste under RCRA but is not regulated by Indiana state law. See 329 Ind. Admin. Code § 11-3-1(7) (exempting uncontaminated and untreated natural growth solid waste from state solid waste regulations). All of IDEM's allegations in its first suit against VIM were brought under Indiana state law. IDEM brought no claims against VIM under RCRA. IDEM's first lawsuit and the plaintiffs' RCRA citizen suit simply cannot overlap with respect to A grade waste. Third, it is clear beyond reasonable dispute that IDEM's first C grade waste lawsuit did not also encompass VIM's violations of Indiana law with regard to its treatment and handling of B grade waste. Just over a year after it filed its first lawsuit, IDEM filed its second lawsuit (discussed above) in which it sought an injunction to stop VIM from violating Indiana law in its dumping and processing of B grade waste. See 2009 IDEM Complaint ¶ 6(a)-(e). If IDEM's allegations in its first lawsuit regarding VIM's dumping and processing of C grade waste were indeed broad enough to cover all the solid waste at the site, as VIM now contends, then IDEM's second lawsuit would have been unnecessary. IDEM itself interprets VIM's treatment and handling of C grade waste and B grade waste as distinct violations of Indiana's solid waste regulations. We too conclude that plaintiffs' RCRA allegations about B grade waste and C grade waste do not overlap. For all three of these reasons, we conclude that 42 U.S.C. § 6972(b)(1)(B) does not bar the plaintiffs from bringing this citizen suit seeking to enforce RCRA against VIM with respect to solid wastes other than the C grade wastes. [5] Perhaps a more detailed factual record could reveal that, contrary to our reading of the procedural history of the various lawsuits against VIM, the different grades of waste are in fact properly regulated as undifferentiated solid waste. Perhaps, for instance, IDEM's decisions to file the first lawsuit in 2008 addressing the C grade waste and the second lawsuit in 2009 addressing the B grade waste had nothing to do with the grades of waste at all but were part of its overall enforcement strategy. These and other relevant issues may be properly addressed on remand with more information than is available from the limited record on a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim. Based on the existing record, however, including VIM's success in preventing the plaintiffs from raising their claims as intervenors in the first IDEM suit, section 6972(b)(1)(B) does not bar the plaintiffs' RCRA violation claim in this citizen suit.