Johnson v. Ford Motor Co., CIVIL ACTION NO. 3:13-6529

• Decision Date: 24 November 2015
• Docket Number: CIVIL ACTION NO. 3:13-6529
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of West Virginia
• Parties: CHARLES JOHNSON, et al., Plaintiffs, v. FORD MOTOR COMPANY, Defendant.

CHARLES JOHNSON, et al., Plaintiffs, v. FORD MOTOR COMPANY, Defendant.

CIVIL ACTION NO. 3:13-6529

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF WEST VIRGINIA HUNTINGTON DIVISION

November 24, 2015

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

On September 15, 2015, this Court made its initial ruling on Plaintiffs' Motion for Leave to File First Amended Master Consolidated Class Action Complaint (hereinafter the Consolidated Complaint). In that decision, the Court ruled as follows: (1) the Court granted Plaintiffs' motion to consolidate Civil Actions 3:13-6529, 3:13-14207, and 3:13-20976 into a single action; (2) the Court held Plaintiffs could not name sixteen new Plaintiffs in the consolidated action; (3) the Court denied Plaintiffs' attempt to add any new facts or claims solely related to these sixteen proposed Plaintiffs, but the Court allowed Plaintiffs to include additional factual allegations and make new or revived claims as to existing Plaintiffs;¹ (4) the Court required Plaintiffs to file motions pursuant to Rule 41 before it could remove any existing Plaintiffs; and (5) the Court reserved judgment on a number of specific arguments that certain claims must be dismissed on a variety of grounds. Johnson v. Ford, Burnett v. Ford, and Burd v. Ford, Civ. Act. Nos. 3:13-6529; 3:13-14207; and 3:13-20976, 2015 WL 5443550 (S.D. W. Va. Sept. 15, 2015).Thereafter, Plaintiffs filed a motion for the voluntary dismissal of six named Plaintiffs, and the Court granted the motion by Order entered on September 29, 2015. ECF No. 638. Having now considered Ford's specific challenges to a number of individual claims, the Court GRANTS, in part, and DENIES, in part, the balance of Plaintiffs' Motion for Leave to File First Amended Master Consolidated Class Action Complaint. ECF No. 381.

I.

PRELIMINARY RULINGS,

STRUCTURE, AND

STANDARD OF REVIEW

Initially, the Court recognizes that there are a number of claims for which there is no longer a named Plaintiff because the Court denied Plaintiffs' motion to add sixteen new Plaintiffs and Plaintiffs have voluntarily dismissed several other named Plaintiffs.² Therefore, for those Counts with no named Plaintiff, the Court will not permit Plaintiffs to include those claims in the final version of the Consolidated Complaint. Based upon the Court's review, these claims include: Counts 12, 13, & 14 (Florida); Counts 22, 23, 24, 25, & 26 (Illinois); Counts 41, 42, 43, 44, & 45 (Massachusetts); Counts 52, 53, 54, 55, & 56 (Missouri); Counts 62, 63, 64, & 65 (New Jersey); Counts 76, 77, 78, 79 & 80 (Ohio);³ Count 88 (South Carolina); and Counts 90, 91, & 92 (Texas).⁴ In addition, to the extent Ford objects to any of these Counts on other grounds, the Court finds the objections moot and declines to address them. Plaintiffs also do not oppose Ford'sobjections to Counts 16, 29, 82, and 84. Accordingly, the Court directs Plaintiffs not to include those Counts in the final version of the Consolidated Complaint.

In considering the remainder of Ford's arguments, the Court divides them into four very general categories: (1) arguments that the statute of limitations has run on certain claims; (2) arguments that the law of a particular State prevents a specific claim; (3) arguments with respect to the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act; and (4) arguments that certain claims fail to meet the particularity requirement of Rule 9(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Although there is overlap of these arguments with respect to some claims, the Court finds these categories the most comprehensive manner in which to ferret out those claims Plaintiffs may include in the final draft of their Consolidated Complaint.

In addition, with respect to categories one, two, and three, Ford's arguments are, in essence, that these claims are futile. In assessing futility, this Court uses the same standard of review as it would use in assessing whether a claim should be dismissed under Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. See U.S. ex rel. Wilson v. Kellogg Brown & Root, Inc., 525 F.3d 370, 376 (4th Cir. 2008) (finding the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying a motion to file an amended complaint where the proposed amended complaint did "not properly state a claim under Rule 12(b)(6) and lacks sufficient particularity under Rule 9(b)"); City of Charleston v. Hotels.com, LP, 520 F. Supp. 2d 757, 775 (D.S.C. 2007) ("The standards of review for determining whether a motion to amend should be denied for futility under Fed.R.Civ.P. 15(a) and determining whether a motion to dismiss should be granted under Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6) areidentical." (citations omitted)). Indeed, Ford even frames its arguments in its Response brief as motions to dismiss.⁵ Pursuant to this standard, the Consolidated Complaint only must present enough factual content to render a claim "'plausible on its face'" and to enable the Court to "draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged." Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 622, 678 (2009) (quoting Bell Atl. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 556 & 570 (2007)). In doing so, the Court considers all well-pled factual allegations in the Consolidated Complaint as true and construes them in the light most favorable to Plaintiffs. However, the Court may not rely upon naked assertions, speculation, or legal conclusions. Id. at 678-79.

II.

DISCUSSION

A.

Statute of Limitations

for Warranty, Consumer Protection Act,

and Unjust Enrichment Claims

1.

Breach of Express Warranty

(Counts 10, 18, 28, 38, 67, & 97)

(California—Timothy Matthews; Idaho—Rhoda Jeffers;

Kentucky—William S. Troutman; Maryland—Charles Johnson;

New York—Michael Antramgarza; Washington—Shelley Riley)

Ford argues there are six breach of express warranty claims and six breach of implied warranty of merchantability claims—in which Plaintiffs experienced a sudden unintentional acceleration—that should be dismissed because they were filed outside theapplicable statute of limitations. The Court first will consider the claims for breach of express warranty.

For each of these breach of express warranty claims, Ford argues that the applicable state statutes of limitations apply, effectively barring all claims. The following language is taken verbatim from the Uniform Commercial Code ("UCC") § 2-725 and is identical in each of the States in which Ford has raised this defense. The UCC and these statutes provide:

(1) An action for breach of any contract for sale must be commenced within four years after the cause of action has accrued. . . .

(2) A cause of action accrues when the breach occurs, regardless of the aggrieved party's lack of knowledge of the breach. A breach of warranty occurs when tender of delivery is made, except that where a warranty explicitly extends to future performance of the goods and discovery of the breach must await the time of such performance the cause of action accrues when the breach is or should have been discovered.

U.C.C. § 2-275 (emphasis added).

The discovery exception to the statute of limitations, identified in UCC § 2-725(2), has been interpreted in each of the States in which Ford has raised this defense: California, Idaho, Kentucky, Maryland, New York, and Washington. These states have reached similar findings, all agreeing that the exception language—"where a warranty explicitly extends to future performance of the goods and discovery of the breach must await the time of such performance, the cause of action accrues when the breach is or should have been discovered"—must be read and construed narrowly. Kittitas Reclamation Dist. v. Spider Staging Corp., 27 P.3d 645, 649 (Wash. Ct. App. 2001). This exception applies only when "the seller has expressly agreed to warrant itsproduct for a specific and defined period of time." Cardinal Health 301, Inc. v. Tyco Elecs. Corp., 87 Cal. Rptr. 3d 5, 16 (Cal. Ct. App. 2008); accord In re Lone Star Indus., Inc., Concrete R.R. Cross Ties Litig., 776 F. Supp. 206, 219 (D. Md. 1991) ("For a warranty of future performance to exist under § 2-275, the terms of the warranty must unambiguously and explicitly indicate that the manufacturer is warranting the future performance of the goods for a specified period of time."); Wyandanch Volunteer Fire Co., Inc. v. Radon Constr. Corp., 798 N.Y.S.2d 484, 591 (N.Y. App. Div. 2005) ("A warranty of future performance is one that guarantees that the product will work for a specified period of time."); Kittitas, 27 P.3d at 649 ("In order for a warranty to be explicit, the warranty of future performance must be unambiguous, clearly stated, or distinctly set forth."). In other words, this exception "does not occur in the usual case, even though all warranties in a sense apply to the future performance of goods. Instead, the majority view is that the exception . . . applies only when the seller has expressly agreed to warrant its product for a specific and definite period of time." MacDonald v. Ford Motor Co., 37 F. Supp. 3d 1087, 1100 (N.D. Cal. 2014) (citing Carrau v. Marvin Lumber and Cedar Co., 112 Cal. Rptr. 2d 869, 876 (Cal. Ct. App. 2001)).

As vehicle warranties typically comprise years and/or miles, such warranties may be specific and definite enough to extend to future performance under UCC § 2-725. However, the precise terms of the warranties are not part of the record at this stage of the litigation. As such, the Court cannot properly evaluate Ford's statute of limitations arguments with regard to the express warranty claims because the Court does not have the relevant language of the express warranties. In addition, except with respect to Plaintiff William S. Troutman from Kentucky, the parties did not provide the Court some of the following necessary information for each individualPlaintiff: the date the unintended acceleration first occurred, the date Plaintiff took the vehicle to a Ford dealership (regarding the unintended acceleration), and what specifically the Ford dealership told Plaintiff. In the absence...