Court Opinion

ID: 9388854
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-04-21 20:00:48.555258+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:18:23.336028
License: Public Domain

USCA11 Case: 21-14139    Document: 52-1      Date Filed: 04/21/2023    Page: 1 of 10

                                                    [DO NOT PUBLISH]
                                    In the
                 United States Court of Appeals
                         For the Eleventh Circuit

                           ____________________

                                 No. 21-14139
                           Non-Argument Calendar
                           ____________________

        TARA MCCLUSKEY EL,
                                                     Plaintiff - Appellant,

        versus

        CELEBRITY CRUISES, INC.,
                                                    Defendant - Appellee.
                           ____________________

                  Appeal from the United States District Court
                      for the Southern District of Florida
                    D.C. Docket No. 1:20-cv-24706-KMW
                           ____________________
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        2                      Opinion of the Court                 21-14139

        Before ROSENBAUM, JILL PRYOR, and GRANT, Circuit Judges.
        PER CURIAM:
              Tara McCluskey El, proceeding pro se, sued Celebrity
        Cruises alleging negligence after a slip-and-fall accident on a cruise
        ship. We affirm the district court’s grant of summary judgment for
        Celebrity, as the action was filed outside the contractually agreed
        upon statute of limitations, and McCluskey El had constructive
        notice of that contract even if she never read it. None of
        McCluskey El’s arguments for equitable tolling are persuasive.
        And the district court did not abuse its discretion by denying
        McCluskey El’s post-judgment motions for reconsideration and to
        amend. We affirm the lower court in full.
                                          I.
               McCluskey El—a California native—slipped and fell while
        exiting the jacuzzi on September 29, 2019 during a cruise around
        Spain. She sued the ship’s operator, Celebrity Cruises, for
        negligence in November 2020. Her complaint notes that she is
        “submitting my claim a short time after September 29, 2020” due
        to the COVID-19 pandemic and her injury. Celebrity moved to
        dismiss, attaching a copy of the contract included with each ticket
        sale and an affidavit from an employee of Celebrity’s parent
        company. The contract bore the name Tara McCluskey, and said
        that maritime tort actions must be filed within one year of the date
        they occurred. And the affidavit explained that several days before
        the cruise, Life Journeys—who McCluskey El paid to book and
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        21-14139               Opinion of the Court                        3

        arrange her cruise as part of a group—requested (and received) a
        copy of the contract. The affidavit also states that the contract was
        always accessible on Celebrity’s website.
               McCluskey El asserted in a sworn statement that she neither
        received the contract pre- or post-cruise nor had an opportunity to
        become meaningfully informed about its modification to the
        default statute of limitations. But a forum selection clause in the
        contract required her to bring suit in the Southern District of
        Florida, which she did. Alternatively, she argued that the
        contractually imposed statute of limitations should be equitably
        tolled because the contract was unconscionable, because of the
        pandemic, because an attorney she consulted with said
        (incorrectly) that she had two years to file her claim, and because
        Celebrity failed to inform her about the statute of limitations.
        While she argues on appeal that she could have filed her complaint
        in California state court, where some statutes of limitations were
        equitably tolled during the pandemic, she did not raise this
        argument in the district court.
               The district court appointed a magistrate judge to consider
        the case, who construed the motion to dismiss as one for summary
        judgment under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(d). The
        magistrate judge gave McCluskey El multiple opportunities to
        submit whatever evidence she wished.              Ultimately, she
        recommended summary judgment for Celebrity. She found that
        Life Journeys was McCluskey El’s agent, and that she had
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        4                      Opinion of the Court                21-14139

        constructive notice of the contract when it was sent to Life
        Journeys. Alternatively, the magistrate judge noted that the
        contract was publicly available for viewing before, during, and after
        the cruise on Celebrity’s website. What mattered was the
        opportunity to read the contract, not whether McCluskey El had
        done so. Finding McCluskey El’s equitable tolling arguments
        equally unpersuasive, the district court accepted the
        recommendation and granted summary judgment for Celebrity.
               McCluskey El moved for reconsideration, which the district
        court denied for substantially the same reasons as its initial
        judgment.      She also moved to amend that motion for
        reconsideration and to correct a clerical error. The district court
        denied this as moot given the earlier dismissal of the
        reconsideration motion. McCluskey El timely appealed the district
        court’s decisions on these two motions, alongside its grant of
        summary judgment for Celebrity.
                                         II.
               This Court reviews de novo the district court’s grant of
        summary judgment. Josendis v. Wall to Wall Residence Repairs,
        Inc., 662 F.3d 1292, 1314 (11th Cir. 2011). Whether the terms of a
        cruise-ticket contract were adequately communicated to
        passengers is a question of law, so we review it de novo—just like
        our review of a district court’s decisions about equitable tolling.
        See Nash v. Kloster Cruise A/S, 901 F.2d 1565, 1567 (11th Cir.
        1990); Chang v. Carnival Corp., 839 F.3d 993, 996 n.4 (11th Cir.
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        21-14139               Opinion of the Court                        5

        2016). Conversely, we consider denials of motions to reconsider,
        amend, or correct clerical errors for abuse of discretion. See
        Lambert v. Fulton Cnty., Georgia, 253 F.3d 588, 598 (11th Cir.
        2001); Stansell v. López, 40 F.4th 1308, 1311 (11th Cir. 2022).
                                        III.
               McCluskey El is correct that in general, there is a three-year
        statute of limitations to file maritime tort actions. 46 U.S.C. §
        30106. However, federal statute permits parties to adjust that time
        period via contract. 46 U.S.C. § 30526(b)(2). Such adjustments are
        valid if they are reasonably communicated to passengers. See
        Krenkel v. Kerzner Int’l Hotels, Ltd., 579 F.3d 1279, 1281 (11th Cir.
        2009). So here, we assess if McCluskey El had the ability to become
        meaningfully informed of the contract’s terms and to reject them
        (though non-negotiated contracts are acceptable). Id.
                Our precedent states that whether a passenger “chose to
        avail themselves of the notices and to read the terms and conditions
        is not relevant to the reasonable communicativeness inquiry.” Est.
        of Myhra v. Royal Caribbean Cruises, Ltd., 695 F.3d 1233, 1246 n.42
        (11th Cir. 2012), superseded by statute on other grounds as stated
        in Caron v. NCL (Bahamas), Ltd., 910 F.3d 1359, 1364 n.2 (11th Cir.
        2018). The magistrate judge was correct in assessing whether
        McCluskey El had the opportunity to read it. Providing those
        terms in a travel packet was such an opportunity. Id. at 1246.
              Here, Life Journeys received that packet, not McCluskey El.
        While McCluskey El disputes how to label her relationship with
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        6                          Opinion of the Court                        21-14139

        Life Journeys, she does not dispute the substance of it—she paid
        the company to book and pay for her ticket on the vessel, which it
        did. And the record is full of examples of McCluskey El
        communicating with, and issuing specific instructions to, Life
        Journeys. That is the quintessential principal-agent relationship
        between a travel agent and their client. See, e.g., Stevens v.
        Premier Cruises, Inc., 215 F.3d 1237, 1238 (11th Cir. 2000). We
        generally hold that constructive notice exists when an agent
        accepts contract documents on behalf of their principal. See, e.g.,
        Windward Traders, Ltd. v. Fred S. James & Co., 855 F.2d 814, 820
        (11th Cir. 1988). Here, that notice to the agent is sufficient to
        provide constructive notice to McCluskey El.
              Even if not, we agree with the district court that McCluskey
        El never argued that anything prohibited her from accessing the
        terms of the contract online before, during, or after embarking on
        the cruise or suffering her alleged injuries. In short, there is no
        evidence that McCluskey El lacked constructive knowledge about
        the one-year statute of limitations in the ticket contract.1 To the

        1 McCluskey El argues that the affidavit was improperly considered, which
        created cumulative error. We need not decide whether cumulative error
        could apply in a civil case, because on appeal she only identifies this one error,
        which by definition is not cumulative. United States v. Leonard, 4 F.4th 1134,
        1147 (11th Cir. 2021). And regardless, the district court properly considered
        Celebrity’s affidavit. McCluskey El first objected to the entire affidavit in her
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        21-14139                   Opinion of the Court                                7

        contrary, she expressed familiarity with the contract in her
        complaint, which was filed in the correct venue and attempted to
        justify why it was submitted more than one year after the accident.
        Given that notice, the district court correctly concluded that
        McCluskey El’s suit was untimely under the agreed-upon statute
        of limitations.
             And we agree that none of McCluskey El’s equitable tolling
        arguments are compelling, as “tolling is an extraordinary remedy

        amended response to the defendant’s motion to dismiss. But in a subsequent
        sworn statement, McCluskey El did not dispute Celebrity’s claims in the
        affidavit that it provided the contract to Life Journeys before the cruise. And
        rather than dispute the existence of an online contract, she only asks “[h]ow
        would Plaintiff know” about it. Finally, in her objections to the report and
        recommendation and on appeal, she asserts that the entire affidavit is
        fraudulent. Her bare and baseless assertions of fraud, unsupported by fact or
        legal arguments, are abandoned. Sapuppo v. Allstate Floridian Ins. Co., 739
        F.3d 678, 681–82 (11th Cir. 2014). On appeal, she does not raise any arguments
        about the legally relevant portions of the affidavit—that Celebrity emailed Life
        Journeys the contract before the cruise, and that it was available on the website
        regardless—other than fraud. That is a sufficient reason to affirm, as “issues
        not briefed on appeal by a pro se litigant are deemed abandoned.” Timson v.
        Sampson, 518 F.3d 870, 874 (11th Cir. 2008). Even if we considered her
        arguments disputing the substance of the affidavit, McCluskey El’s sworn
        statement never disputes the affidavit’s legally relevant claims—she only
        denies knowledge of the online contract, and asserts that she cannot verify that
        Celebrity emailed Life Journeys the contract. Drawing inferences in
        McCluskey El’s favor and assuming that she did not read either the online or
        emailed contract, she still had several reasonable opportunities to become
        informed of the terms if she chose to do so. See Est. of Myhra, 695 F.3d at
        1246 n.42.
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        8                      Opinion of the Court                21-14139

        which should be extended only sparingly.” Justice v. United States,
        6 F.3d 1474, 1479 (11th Cir. 1993). First, the contract was not
        unconscionable. Federal statute explicitly permits parties to use
        contracts to agree to a one-year statute of limitations for maritime
        tort actions. 46 U.S.C. § 30526(b)(2). We have interpreted that
        statute to be valid. Nash, 901 F.2d at 1566.
              Second, generalized assertions that the COVID-19 pandemic
        was a just cause for equitable tolling are insufficient. McCluskey El
        identifies no Eleventh Circuit precedent where the pandemic
        resulted in equitable tolling of a statute of limitations. To the
        contrary, as the lower court noted, McCluskey El “filed her
        Complaint despite these obstacles, without an attorney, in the
        midst of the pandemic, in November 2020.” Nor did she assert any
        individualized facts about her situation that would make her case
        analogous to past instances where we have waived the statute of
        limitations in the maritime tort context. See, e.g., Booth v.
        Carnival Corp., 522 F.3d 1148, 1149–50 (11th Cir. 2008).
              Third, though McCluskey El points out that California state
        courts waived statutes of limitations for 180 days in response to the
        pandemic, that argument is legally irrelevant. She first raised this
        issue on appeal, which is too late to preserve it. Walker v. Jones,
        10 F.3d 1569, 1572 (11th Cir. 1994). And, in any event, California is
        not in the Eleventh Circuit—its state-court decisions are persuasive
        authority at best for this Federal Court of Appeals.
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        21-14139                Opinion of the Court                         9

               Fourth, it is unfortunate for McCluskey El that an attorney
        she spoke with erroneously told her she had two years to file her
        claim. But this kind of error is insufficient to create equitable
        tolling. Cadet v. Florida Dep’t of Corr., 853 F.3d 1216, 1227 (11th
        Cir. 2017).
               Finally, McCluskey El argues that Celebrity did not tell her
        about the statute of limitations, even when it knew that she
        intended to file a claim. But would-be defendants are under no
        duty to inform potential plaintiffs that the statute of limitations is
        running. Raziano v. United States, 999 F.2d 1539, 1542 (11th Cir.
        1993). The district court correctly determined that each of these
        arguments was an insufficient basis to equitably toll the statute of
        limitations, and dismissal of the action as untimely was thus
        proper.
                As for the post-judgment motions, we likewise find no error.
        There was no newly discovered evidence or manifest errors of law
        or fact, so the district court properly denied McCluskey El’s motion
        for reconsideration. Arthur v. King, 500 F.3d 1335, 1343 (11th Cir.
        2007). These motions may not be used to relitigate matters “that
        could have been raised prior to the entry of judgment.” Michael
        Linet, Inc. v. Vill. of Wellington, 408 F.3d 757, 763 (11th Cir. 2005).
        And the later motion to correct and amend the reconsideration
        motion impermissibly attempted to correct substantive errors, so
        it was also properly denied. See Stansell, 40 F.4th at 1311.
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        10                    Opinion of the Court               21-14139

                                 *      *      *
              We AFFIRM the district court’s grant of summary judgment
        for Celebrity Cruises, and its denial of McCluskey El’s subsequent
        motions.