Boogaard v. Nat'l Hockey League

• Decision Date: 29 September 2016
• Docket Number: 13 C 4846
• Parties: Len BOOGAARD and Joanne Boogaard, Personal Representatives of the Estate of Derek Boogaard, Deceased, Plaintiffs, v. NATIONAL HOCKEY LEAGUE, National Hockey League Board of Governors, and Gary B. Bettman, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Northern District of Illinois

211 F.Supp.3d 1107

Len BOOGAARD and Joanne Boogaard, Personal Representatives of the Estate of Derek Boogaard, Deceased, Plaintiffs,

v.NATIONAL HOCKEY LEAGUE, National Hockey League Board of Governors, and Gary B. Bettman, Defendants.

13 C 4846

United States District Court, N.D. Illinois, Eastern Division.

Signed September 29, 2016

Joshua D. Branson, David C. Frederick, Kellogg, Huber, Hansen, Todd, Evans & Figel, PLLC, Washington, DC, Thomas A. Demetrio, William T. Gibbs, Corboy & Demetrio, Chicago, IL, for Plaintiffs.

Adam M. Lupion, Joseph Baumgarten, Howard Z. Robbins, Proskauer Rose LLP, New York, NY, Steven Ross Gilford, Michael Frederik Derksen, Proskauer Rose LLP, Chicago, IL, for Defendants.

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

Gary Feinerman, United States District Judge

The personal representatives of Derek Boogaard's estate (for ease of exposition, the court will treat Boogaard himself as the plaintiff) brought this suit against the National Hockey League and its Board of Governors and Commissioner (collectively, "NHL"), alleging tort claims connected with Boogaard's death. Docs. 1-1, 62. Earlier in the case, the court denied Boogaard's motion to remand the suit to state court. Docs. 37-38 (reported at 20 F.Supp.3d 650 (N.D. Ill. 2014) ). After discovery, the court granted summary judgment against Boogaard on all claims set forth in the first amended complaint. Docs. 140-41 (reported at 126 F.Supp.3d 1010 (N.D. Ill. 2015) ). Now before the court is Boogaard's motion for leave to file a second amended complaint. Doc. 143. The motion is granted.

According to the proposed second amended complaint, Boogaard played for two NHL teams as an "Enforcer/Fighter," which means that his principal job was to fight opposing players during games. Doc. 145-1 at ¶¶ 2-3. During the fights he suffered brain injuries

, which eventually developed into chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or "CTE," a brain disorder characterized by deteriorating judgment, inhibition, mood, reasoning, behavior, and impulse control. Id. at ¶¶ 4-7. Boogaard routinely suffered other painful injuries as well, and team doctors treated his symptoms with opioids, a class of highly addictive pain medications. Id. at ¶¶ 4, 119-122, 127-137. Boogaard became addicted to opioids, went to rehab, relapsed, and went to rehab again. Id. at ¶¶ 138, 140, 156-160. When he was on weekend release from his second stay in rehab, he took Percocet, accidentally overdosed, and died. Id. at ¶¶ 164-165, 206. He was 28 years old. Id. at ¶ 1.

The first amended complaint set forth eight claims. Counts I and II alleged that the NHL breached a duty to keep Boogaard safe when it allowed team doctors to get him addicted to opioids. Doc. 62 at ¶¶ 43-101. Counts III and IV alleged that the NHL injured Boogaard by failing to manage his addiction according to the terms of the NHL's collectively bargained Substance Abuse and Behavioral Health Program. Id. at ¶¶ 102-200; see 20 F.Supp.3d at 658 (holding that the Program was part of a 2005 collective bargaining agreement). Counts V and VI alleged that the NHL breached a voluntarily assumed duty to protect Boogaard from brain trauma

. Doc. 62 at ¶¶ 201-226. And Counts VII and VIII alleged that the NHL breached a voluntarily assumed duty to keep Boogaard safe when it allowed team doctors to inject him with Toradol, an intramuscular analgesic that makes concussions more likely and more dangerous. Id. at ¶¶ 227-267.

The NHL moved under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) to dismiss the first amended complaint on the ground that its claims were completely preempted by § 301 of the Labor Management Relations Act ("LMRA"), 29 U.S.C. § 185, in light of the fact that a collective bargaining agreement ("CBA") governed the relationship between Boogaard and the NHL at all relevant times. Doc. 43. The court applied Rule 12(d) to convert the NHL's Rule 12(b)(6) motion into a Rule 56 summary judgment motion. Doc. 58. Boogaard moved for leave to file a second amended complaint while the summary judgment motion remained pending. Doc. 130. The court granted summary judgment on the ground that the first amended complaint's claims were completely preempted by § 301 of the LMRA and that Boogaard § 301 claims—which is how his claims, having been completely preempted, had to be characterized— were barred by the applicable statute of limitations. 126 F.Supp.3d at 1016–27. Boogaard then renewed his motion for leave to file a second amended complaint. Doc. 143.

Under Rule 15(a)(2), leave to amend "shall be freely given when justice so requires," but "leave is inappropriate where there is undue delay, bad faith, dilatory motive on the part of the movant, repeated failure to cure deficiencies by amendments previously allowed, undue prejudice to the opposing party by virtue of allowance of the amendment, or futility of the amendment." Villa v. City of Chicago , 924 F.2d 629, 632 (7th Cir. 1991) ; see also Gen. Elec. Capital Corp. v. Lease Resolution Corp. , 128 F.3d 1074, 1085 (7th Cir. 1997) ("Even though Rule 15(a) provides that ‘leave shall be freely given when justice so requires,’ a district court may deny leave to amend for ... futility. The opportunity to amend a complaint is futile if the complaint, as amended, would fail to state a claim upon which relief could be granted.") (citation and some internal quotation marks omitted). The NHL argues that the proposed second amended complaint would be futile because its claims, like the first amended complaint's claims, are all completely preempted by the LMRA and, as LMRA claims, are barred on limitations grounds; the NHL makes no other futility argument. Doc. 152.

Under the complete preemption doctrine, "the pre-emptive force of [a federal] statute ... converts an ordinary state common-law complaint into one stating a federal claim." Caterpillar Inc. v. Williams , 482 U.S. 386, 393, 107 S.Ct. 2425, 96 L.Ed.2d 318 (1987) (internal quotation marks omitted). "Once an area of state law has been completely pre-empted, any claim purportedly based on that pre-empted state law is considered, from its inception, a federal claim." Crosby v. Cooper B – Line, Inc. , 725 F.3d 795, 800 (7th Cir. 2013) (internal quotation marks omitted); see also Ne. Rural Elec. Membership Corp. v. Wabash Valley Power Ass'n , 707 F.3d 883, 894 (7th Cir. 2013). Section 301 of the LMRA completely preempts state law claims "founded directly on rights created by collective-bargaining agreements, and also claims substantially dependent on analysis of a collective-bargaining agreement." Caterpillar , 482 U.S. at 394, 107 S.Ct. 2425 (internal quotation marks omitted); see also Nelson v. Stewart , 422 F.3d 463, 467–69 (7th Cir. 2005) ; In re Bentz Metal Prods. Co. , 253 F.3d 283, 285–86 (7th Cir. 2001) (en banc). Preemption under § 301 "covers not only obvious disputes over labor contracts, but also any claim masquerading as a state-law claim that nevertheless is deemed ‘really’ to be a claim under a labor contract." Crosby , 725 F.3d at 797.

As the court explained in earlier opinions, 20 F.Supp.3d at 653–58 ; 126 F.Supp.3d at 1016–25, the first amended complaint's claims were completely preempted because resolving them would have required the court to interpret the CBA. Counts III through VIII alleged that the NHL voluntarily assumed a duty to protect Boogaard and that it had breached that duty. The scope of one person's voluntarily assumed duty to protect another depends on the totality of the circumstances, which in this case would have included contested interpretations of the CBA. See LM ex rel. KM v. United States , 344 F.3d 695, 700 (7th Cir. 2003) ("[W]hether a voluntary undertaking has been assumed is necessarily a fact-specific inquiry."); Bourgonje v. Machev , 362 Ill.App.3d 984, 298 Ill.Dec. 953, 841 N.E.2d 96, 114 (2005) ("[T]he existence and extent of voluntary undertakings are to be analyzed on a case-by-case basis."). In particular, the scope of the NHL's voluntarily assumed duty to Boogaard depends on reasonable disputes concerning whether the CBA allowed the NHL to unilaterally prohibit fighting, to prohibit team doctors from administering Toradol

, or to require team doctors to follow certain procedures for diagnosing concussions—rendering Counts III through VIII completely preempted. 20 F.Supp.3d at 653–58 ; 126 F.Supp.3d at 1018–22. Counts I and II, meanwhile, alleged that the NHL had breached a freestanding duty to protect Boogaard from addiction. Ordinarily, people are under no obligation to protect others from harm unless they have a "special relationship." Domagala v. Rolland , 805 N.W.2d 14, 23 (Minn. 2011) ; accord

Iseberg v. Gross , 227 Ill.2d 78, 316 Ill.Dec. 211, 879 N.E.2d 278, 284 (2007). But whether the NHL had a special relationship with Boogaard depends on the extent to which the NHL exercised control over Boogaard's behavior and safety, which in turn depends on contested interpretations of the CBA—rendering Counts I and II completely preempted as well. 126 F.Supp.3d at 1022–24.

The proposed second amended complaint has twelve counts. Counts V through XII are essentially identical to the first amended complaint's eight counts, compare Doc. 145-1 at ¶¶ 119-256, with Doc. 62 at ¶¶ 43-267, and are therefore completely preempted and time-barred for the reasons set forth in the court's earlier opinions. But Counts I through IV of the proposed second amended complaint are new, and unlike the other eight counts, they allege that the NHL actively harmed Boogaard. Doc. 145-1 at ¶¶ 33-118. Every person has a duty not to act unreasonably in a way that injures others; the court need not interpret the CBA to determine the existence or scope of that duty, and so claims based on the breach of that duty are not preempted. 126 F.Supp.3d at 1024–25 (distinguishing three other decisions that "involve[d] the [uncontroversial] duty not to unreasonably harm other people" and that therefore did not find LMRA preemption); see McPherson v. Tenn....