Boakye v. NCL (Bahamas) Ltd.

• Decision Date: 06 March 2018
• Docket Number: CIVIL ACTION FILE NO. 1:17–CV–3201–TWT
• Citation: 295 F.Supp.3d 1342
• Parties: Kwabena BOAKYE, Plaintiff, v. NCL (BAHAMAS) LTD., et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Northern District of Georgia

295 F.Supp.3d 1342

Kwabena BOAKYE, Plaintiff,

v.NCL (BAHAMAS) LTD., et al., Defendants.

CIVIL ACTION FILE NO. 1:17–CV–3201–TWT

United States District Court, N.D. Georgia, Atlanta Division.

March 6, 2018

March 7, 2018

Jonah A. Flynn, Flynn Law Firm, LLC, Atlanta, GA, for Plaintiff.

Cameron Eubanks, Curtis J. Mase, Mase Tinelli Mebane & Briggs, P.A., Miami, FL, Gregory L. Mast, Paul Lindsey Fields, Jr., Rachel Erin Hudgins, Fields Howell LLP, Atlanta, GA, for Defendants.

OPINION AND ORDER

THOMAS W. THRASH, JR., United States District Judge

This is a Jones Act case. It is before the Court on the Plaintiff Kwabena Boakye's Motion to Remand [Doc. 7] and the Defendants NCL (Bahamas) Ltd., NCL America Holdings, LLC, NCL America, LLC, and Pride of America Ship Holdings, LLC's Motion to Dismiss [Doc. 3]. For the following reasons, the Plaintiff's Motion to Remand is GRANTED and the Defendants' Motion to Dismiss is DENIED as moot.

I. Background

The Plaintiff is an American seaman and is a Georgia resident.¹ The Defendant NCL (Bahamas) Ltd. ("NCL Bahamas") is a Bermuda corporation that has its principal place of business in Miami, Florida.² The Defendants NCL America, LLC, NCL America Holdings, LLC, and Pride of America Ship Holdings, LLC are Delaware limited liability companies with their principal places of business in Miami, Florida.³

According to the Complaint, the Plaintiff was employed by the Defendants as a crew member on the "Pride of America," a United States flagged cruise ship.⁴ During the course of his employment, the Plaintiff was responsible for washing dishes in the utility galley.⁵ The Plaintiff claims that he was provided with equipment that was not ergonomically sound, that he was not provided with an adequate back belt, and that he was not provided adequate help or support personnel to carry out his duties.⁶ At some point, the Plaintiff sustained a back injury that required two spinal surgeries and continued physical therapy.⁷ The Plaintiff claims that he still suffers from pain and discomfort in his back and legs.

As a result of his injuries, the Plaintiff filed this action in the State Court of Gwinnett County, Georgia, alleging three counts against each of the Defendants: (1) negligence under the Jones Act, (2) unseaworthiness, and (3) failure to provide maintenance and cure. The Defendants removed the action to this Court, then moved to dismiss the action. The Plaintiff has since filed an Amended Complaint, and now moves to remand this action back to state court.

II. Legal Standard

The authority of federal courts is limited; that is, they may only hear those cases which the Constitution and the Congress of the United States have authorized them to hear.⁸ "Except as otherwise expressly provided by Act of Congress," any action originally filed in state court may be removed by a defendant to federal court if it would otherwise meet the constitutional and statutory requirements for original federal jurisdiction.⁹ "A removing defendant has the burden of proving the existence of federal jurisdiction."¹⁰ Due to the limited nature of federal jurisdiction, "removal statutes are construed narrowly; where plaintiff and defendant clash about jurisdiction, uncertainties are resolved in favor of remand" to the originating state court.¹¹

III. Discussion

The Plaintiff has moved to remand this case back to state court for lack of subject jurisdiction. In their Notice of Removal, the Defendants cited two bases for removal: diversity and the federal admiralty jurisdiction.¹² The Defendants have since abandoned their diversity argument, and now exclusively argue that the Plaintiff's non-Jones Act claims are removable under 28 U.S.C. § 1441(a) because of the Court's original jurisdiction over admiralty claims.¹³ Consequently, the only question before the Court is whether the Plaintiff's maritime claims are removable based solely on the Court's admiralty jurisdiction.

28 U.S.C. § 1333 grants district courts original jurisdiction over all cases of "admiralty or maritime jurisdiction, saving to suitors in all cases all other remedies to which they are otherwise entitled." This means that while federal courts have original jurisdiction over admiralty cases, which involve unique procedures and remedies, plaintiffs still have the right to pursue common law remedies in state court. This effectively gives a plaintiff, such as this one, alleging an in personam maritime claim three options: "(1) file suit in federal court under admiralty jurisdiction; (2) file suit in federal court under diversity jurisdiction (or some other applicable jurisdictional basis); or (3) file suit in state court pursuing common law remedies."¹⁴

Historically, when a plaintiff has chosen the third option, federal courts have refused to allow defendants to remove those cases. Some courts, such as the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, reached this conclusion based exclusively on the language of the removal statute, 28 U.S.C. § 1441.¹⁵ Prior to 2011, the removal statute provided that any civil action could be removed to federal court if a federal court would have had original jurisdiction, as long as either (1) none of the defendants were being sued in their home state, or (2) it was based on federal question jurisdiction.¹⁶ Because maritime claims do not on their own raise questions of federal law,¹⁷ "the practical effect of these provisions [was] to prevent the removal of admiralty claims pursuant to [the removal statute] unless there [was] complete diversity of citizenship (predicated upon out-of-state defendants)."¹⁸ Thus, in cases where there was not complete diversity, some courts felt perfectly comfortable relying solely on the language of section 1441 in rejecting removal.

But in 2011, Congress amended the removal statute so that it now reads, in relevant part:

(a) Generally. —Except as otherwise expressly provided by Act of Congress, any civil action brought in a State court of which the district courts of the United States have original jurisdiction, may be removed by the defendant or the defendants, to the district court of the United States for the district and division embracing the place where such action is pending.

(b) Removal based on diversity of citizenship. —

(1) In determining whether a civil action is removable on the basis of the jurisdiction under section 1332(a) of this title, the citizenship of defendants sued under fictitious names shall be disregarded.

(2) A civil action otherwise removable solely on the basis of the jurisdiction under section 1332(a) of this title may not be removed if any of the parties in interest properly joined and served as defendants is a citizen of the State in which such action is brought.¹⁹

Practically speaking, this amendment limited the old "home state rule" to only those cases where removal was based on diversity alone. Whereas before the amendment, no case could be removed if a defendant was in his home state, unless there was a federal question, now, all cases involving a home state defendant in which a federal court could have had original jurisdiction can be removed unless jurisdiction is based solely on diversity.

With this change in the removal statute, however, the reliance by some courts on section 1441 alone led to some unfortunate confusion regarding removal of maritime cases. In particular, a few district courts in the Fifth Circuit, believing the only bar to removal had been the home state defendant rule in the old version of the statute, held that maritime cases were now removable solely on the basis of federal admiralty jurisdiction.²⁰ For example, in the first opinion to take this approach, Ryan v. Hercules Offshore, Inc. , the district court reasoned that:

(1) federal courts have original jurisdiction over admiralty claims;

(2) the saving to suitors clause does not preclude federal courts from exercising jurisdiction over admiralty claims originally brought in state court;

(3) the old version of section 1441(b) was relied upon as the "Act of Congress" that precluded federal courts from exercising removal jurisdiction unless the requirements of section 1441(b) were met; and

(4) admiralty cases do not arise under the Constitution, treaties or laws of the United States, so admiralty cases were considered "any other such actions" under the prior version of section 1441(b)and were thus removable only if none of the parties in interest properly joined and served as defendants was a citizen of the State in which the action was brought.²¹

Because Congress changed section 1441(b), the Ryan court held that there was no longer any "Act of Congress" which barred maritime claims from being removed.²²

But despite some initial acceptance, Ryan has been nearly universally criticized by courts around the country since it was decided, including within the Fifth Circuit, and for good reason.²³ Perhaps the most obvious ways in which the Ryan court erred was its assumption that the removal statute was the only barrier to removal for maritime claims. But while the previous version of section 1441 may have provided an additional reason to deny removal, the foundational barrier to removal of most in personam maritime claims is the saving to suitors clause, which is an integral part of the very statute granting federal courts original jurisdiction over admiralty claims in the first place. In addition to giving federal courts original jurisdiction over admiralty claims, 28 U.S.C. § 1333 specifically "sav[es] to suitors in all cases all other remedies to which they are otherwise entitled."²⁴ This means that the statute protects a plaintiff's choice to pursue more familiar remedies at common law in state court instead of subjecting his claim to the unique procedures of admiralty that would control in federal court. And in contrast with the Fifth Circuit, courts in the Eleventh Circuit have consistently relied on the saving to suitors clause, not the removal statute, as the basis for denying the removal of in personam...