Nafziger v. McDermott Intern., Inc.

• Decision Date: 20 October 2006
• Docket Number: No. 05-4181.,05-4181.
• Citation: 467 F.3d 514
• Parties: George NAFZIGER et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. McDERMOTT INTERNATIONAL, INC. et al., Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit

467 F.3d 514

George NAFZIGER et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. McDERMOTT INTERNATIONAL, INC. et al., Defendants-Appellees.

No. 05-4181.

United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit.

Argued: September 18, 2006.

Decided and Filed: October 20, 2006.

ARGUED:

John J. Scaccia, Law Office of John J. Scaccia, Dayton, OH, for Appellant. Suzanne K. Richards, Vorys, Sater, Seymour & Pease, Columbus, OH, for Appellee.

ON BRIEF:

John J. Scaccia, Law Office of John J. Scaccia, Dayton, OH, for Appellant. Suzanne K. Richards, Vorys, Sater, Seymour & Pease, Columbus, OH, for Appellee.

Before GUY, GILMAN, and ROGERS, Circuit Judges.

OPINION

RONALD LEE GILMAN, Circuit Judge.

Twenty-eight former employees of BWX Technologies (BWXT) and BWXT of Ohio (BWXTO) brought suit against their employers and related corporations, alleging various contract- and discrimination-related causes of action. In response to two motions to dismiss brought by the defendants, the district court held that (1) the plaintiffs' pleadings had failed to identify, in violation of Rule 8 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, which individual plaintiffs were asserting various causes of action against which individual defendants, (2) the court lacked personal jurisdiction over five of the defendants, and (3) the plaintiffs, without good cause, had failed to serve process on one defendant, thus requiring dismissal of all claims against it under Rule 12(b)(5) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Subsequent to these dismissals, the district court denied the plaintiffs' motion for leave to file their amended complaint out of time, citing the standard for "excusable neglect" and finding that the standard had not been met. The plaintiffs appeal both this denial and the various pretrial dismissals enumerated above. For the reasons set forth below, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court.

I. BACKGROUND

A. Factual background

All of the plaintiffs worked for either BWXT or BWXTO between September of 1997 and the date of the events giving rise to this lawsuit. Earlier in 1997, the U.S. Department of Energy had awarded these two companies a general contract for the cleanup of the now-defunct federal superfund site at the Mound Facility in Miamisburg, Ohio. The site, originally constructed during World War II to assist the federal government in implementing the Manhattan Project and nuclear-weapons programs more generally, continued to operate as a manufacturer and worldwide distributor of stable isotopes until the end of the Cold War. When BWXT and BWXTO took over the Mound Facility, they immediately modified several of the contract-based employee-benefits packages, especially those relating to insurance. BWXT and BWXTO also effected several large-scale layoffs of Mound Facility employees, including an Involuntary Separation Plan (ISP) in mid-2001 that directly affected all but one of the plaintiffs.

Both BWXT and BWXTO are subsidiaries of the remaining two defendants, McDermott International, Inc. (MII) and McDermott Incorporated (MI). BWXT and BWXTO are Delaware corporations with their principal places of business and headquarters in Lynchburg, Virginia. MII is a Panamanian corporation with both its principal place of business and corporate headquarters in New Orleans, Louisiana, and is the overall parent corporation of the three other defendants in this case. MI, a Delaware corporation, is the immediate subsidiary of MII and the direct parent corporation of BWXT and BWXTO.

B. Procedural background

The plaintiffs filed their initial complaint on May 22, 2003. A little more than one month later, but before the date on which the defendants' answer was due, the plaintiffs timely filed an amended complaint (hereinafter referred to simply as the "Complaint").

In their Complaint, the plaintiffs alleged three separate "groups" of violations, each having occurred respectively before, during, and after the June 26, 2001 ISP implemented by BWXT and BWXTO as part of a larger reduction in force at the Mound Facility. The alleged violations were all "in the nature of contract/estoppel, discrimination, retaliation, and tort." Many were either "collective to all . . . Plaintiffs" or "specific subgroups" thereof, or, alternatively, "individual in nature." At the end of their Complaint, the plaintiffs listed 24 separate causes of action, each based in part on the violations set forth earlier. In only nine, however, did the Complaint specify which individual plaintiffs were bringing the respective causes of action.

1. Defendants' August 7, 2003 Motion to Dismiss

MII, MI, and BWXT filed a motion to dismiss the plaintiffs' Complaint on August 7, 2003. All three defendants alleged, among other things, (1) that the plaintiffs' pleadings violated Rules 8 and 9(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, and (2) that 21 of the 24 causes of action pleaded by the plaintiffs failed, per Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, to state a claim upon which relief could be granted. MII and MI also alleged (3) that the district court, per Rule 12(b)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, lacked personal jurisdiction over them.

The plaintiffs' response to the motion came in three installments, one for each of the grounds enumerated above, and only after having requested and been granted no fewer than four consecutive three-week extensions by the district court. In granting the last of those extensions on November 12, 2003, with a revised due date of November 16, 2003, the district court cautioned the plaintiffs, in uppercase type, that "NO FURTHER EXTENSIONS WILL BE PERMITTED." The plaintiffs nonetheless filed the first of their responses on November 17, 2003, one day after the final deadline had expired. On the same day, the plaintiffs requested two additional extensions for the remaining installments of their response. The district court, true to its word, did not grant either extension at that time. Undeterred, the plaintiffs filed—now without leave of court—the final two installments of their response on November 18 and November 24, 2003, respectively. After a telephonic hearing held on November 24, 2003, the district court retroactively accepted the plaintiffs' late responses nunc pro tunc.

2. Defendants' February 20, 2004 Motion to Dismiss

BWXTO and individual defendants Peyton Baker, Robert Bergin, and Rich Higgins, all officers and/or supervisors of the defendant companies, filed a motion to dismiss the plaintiffs' case against them on February 20, 2004. As in the August 7, 2003 motion to dismiss, all four defendants alleged, among other things, various Rule 8 pleading violations as well as the plaintiffs' failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted. BWXTO also moved for dismissal, pursuant to Rule 12(b)(5) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, for insufficient service of process. (Only BWXTO, together with MII, MI, and BWXT, remain in the case as defendants-appellees at this stage in the proceedings.)

Yet again, the plaintiffs' response came in multiple installments and in violation of the court-imposed deadlines. The four responsive memoranda ultimately filed on April 1, 2, 5, and 19, 2004, respectively, were each out of time and without leave of court. Although the plaintiffs had requested another extension two days before the initial deadline of March 13, 2004, the district court refused to honor the request.

3. Plaintiffs' April 9, 2004 Motion to Amend Complaint

On April 9, 2004, in the midst of filing the above-enumerated responses to the February 20, 2004 motion to dismiss, the plaintiffs moved to amend their Complaint to add another cause of action to the 24 already listed. The plaintiffs, after receiving an opposing memorandum filed by the defendants, filed a motion to request yet another extension on the very day that the plaintiffs' reply was due. True to its initial warning, the district court struck the motion, explaining that the motion not only lacked an accompanying memorandum of law as required by the court's local rule, but also gave no reason whatsoever for the requested extension. The district court added a brief admonishment to the plaintiffs' counsel:

Plaintiffs' counsel has previously advised the Court that he will mend his ways and discontinue his frequent requests for extensions of time within which to plead. He has not done so.

This Court is entrusted with the responsibility "to secure the just, speedy, and inexpensive determination of every action," Federal Rule of Procedure 1. The granting of Plaintiffs' motion would not accomplish this.

4. District Court's October 5, 2004 Order regarding the defendants' motions to dismiss

After an August 20, 2004 transfer of venue from the Cincinnati Division to the Dayton Division, the district court handed down its order disposing of the defendants' two motions to dismiss on October 5, 2004. The district court first dismissed, with prejudice, MII and MI for lack of personal jurisdiction. In addition, the district court dismissed BWXTO for insufficient service of process, pursuant to Rule 12(b)(5) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Finally, pursuant to Rules 8(a)(2) and 8(e)(1), the district court dismissed BWXT because of the plaintiffs' failure "to identify [in their Complaint] which of the named Plaintiffs is bringing several of the Causes of Action." These last two dismissals were presumably with prejudice as well, because the district court did not specify that they were without prejudice. See FED.R.CIV.P. 41(b) ("Unless the court in its order for dismissal otherwise specifies, a dismissal under this subdivision and any dismissal not provided for in this rule . . . operates as an adjudication upon the merits.").

At the end of its order, however, the district court explicitly granted the plaintiffs 30 days to amend their Complaint to comply with the pleading requirements of Rule 8. The court also provided the following guideposts for...