Court Opinion

ID: 9475599
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 05:32:10.415661+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:39:22.852306
License: Public Domain

LIVELY, Chief Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent because I believe the dismissal was premature. The plaintiff had completed his medical proof, but had not had the opportunity to address fully the issue of jurisdiction. Full discovery might well have developed a record that supported FELA jurisdiction.
The majority concludes that the district court arrived at the right answer, but for the wrong reasons. The district court found that the defendant is not a common carrier because it does not satisfy the third prong of the Lone Star formula, that is, that Wyandotte is not “performing as part of a system of interstate rail transportation by virtue of common ownership between itself and a railroad or by a contractual relationship with a railroad, and hence ... is [not] deemed to be holding itself out to the public....” 380 F.2d at 647. Rejecting this reasoning, the majority concludes that Wyandotte is an “in-plant system.” This may be the ultimate conclusion after the facts are developed, but the conclusion is not clear at this point.
The plaintiff filed an affidavit in which he described the movement of railroad cars containing various substances from the interchange tracks of the admitted common carriers (D.T. & I. and Conrail) to the plants of Diversey Wyandotte Corporation and the Du Pont Carbide plant. The movements were performed by employees of Wyandotte operating Wyandotte equipment. Kieronski described his duty of completing switching cards following such switching and transferring operations and further stated, under oath:
I was informed by the yardmaster for Wyandotte Terminal Railroad Company that these switching cards were used by the Wyandotte Terminal Railroad Company to bill Wyandotte Diversy [sic] Corporation and Dupont Carbide for the rail services that we had provided for them.
The yardmaster also informed me that this was one method Wyandotte Terminal Railway Company’s financing its day to day operations and that it was very important that we fill out the switching cards because they were the only record we had of performing railroad work for another company.
The plaintiff also filed as an exhibit with his pretrial brief a copy of Wyandotte’s petition for authority to be exempted from certain ICC requirements of formality and a summary application to abandon all of its railroad lines. This petition and application were filed pursuant to 49 U.S.C. § 10505 (1982). The exemption provisions of § 10505 refer to matters “related to a rail carrier providing transportation subject to the jurisdiction of the Interstate Commerce Commission under this subchapter....” The definitions applicable to the subchapter are contained in § 10102. In § 10102(4) “common carrier” is defined as “an express carrier, a pipeline carrier, a rail carrier, a motor common carrier, a water common carrier, and a freight forwarder.” (Emphasis supplied). In § 10102(19) “rail carrier” is defined as “a person providing railroad transportation for compensation.”
There appears to be no dispute that Wyandotte performs rail transportation for compensation in switching and moving cars *111destined for Diversey Wyandotte and Du Pont Carbide. Thus it comes within the definition of a “rail carrier,” which, in turn, is within the definition of a common carrier.
Given the concern repeatedly expressed by Congress and the courts that railroad employees be compensated for work-related injuries under the liberal rules of the FELA rather than the more restrictive rules of general tort law, I believe it was error for the district court to dismiss this action sua sponte at the pretrial stage. I would vacate the judgment of the district court and remand for further proceedings.