Local Union No. 1992 of Intern. Broth. v. Okonite, 02-4352.

• Citation: 358 F.3d 278
• Decision Date: 26 January 2004
• Docket Number: No. 02-4352.,No. 02-4428.,No. 03-1555.,02-4352.,02-4428.,03-1555.
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (3rd Circuit)
• Parties: LOCAL UNION NO. 1992 OF THE INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF ELECTRICAL WORKERS, Appellant in No. 02-4428, v. THE OKONITE COMPANY, Appellant in Nos. 02-4352 & 03-1555.

358 F.3d 278

LOCAL UNION NO. 1992 OF THE INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF ELECTRICAL WORKERS, Appellant in No. 02-4428, v. THE OKONITE COMPANY, Appellant in Nos. 02-4352 & 03-1555.

No. 02-4352.

No. 02-4428.

No. 03-1555.

United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit.

Argued: October 15, 2003.

Filed: January 26, 2004.

As Amended January 27, 2004.

Richard Delello (Argued), David E. Cassidy, Grotta, Glassman & Hoffman, P.A., Roseland, N.J., for Appellants.

Paul A. Montalbano (Argued), Brian E. Curtis, Cohen, Leder, Montalbano & Grossman, Kenilworth, N.Y., for Appellee.

Before SLOVITER, ROTH, and CHERTOFF, Circuit Judges.

OPINION OF THE COURT

CHERTOFF, Circuit Judge.

Rule 58 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure mandates that district courts set forth a judgment on a separate document, apart from any accompanying opinion. The precise definition of that requirement is important because the docketing of a judgment in correct form triggers the beginning of the time period within which an appeal must be filed. Misapprehension of Rule 58 can be jurisdictionally fatal to an appeal.

The disposition of this appeal turns on precisely that jurisdictional issue. Appellant, The Okonite Company ("Okonite"), argues that Appellate Rule 4(a)'s thirty-day period to file an appeal never began to run because the District Court failed to comply with Rule 58's "separate document requirement." For the reasons set forth below, we disagree with Okonite's interpretation of Rule 58. We find that Okonite has not timely appealed the District Court's original rulings. Accordingly, we have no jurisdiction to entertain an appeal of those rulings. The only ruling properly before us is Okonite's timely appeal from the District Court's more recent judgment awarding plaintiff attorneys' fees. We will vacate that judgment and remand for further proceedings.

I.

In 1997, plaintiff Local 1992 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers ("Local 1992") brought suit against Okonite under the Worker Adjustment Retraining and Notification Act ("WARN Act"), 29 U.S.C. §§ 2101-09, claiming that Okonite failed to provide the sixty-day notice of a plant closing that the statute requires.¹ On June 18, 1998, the District Court granted summary judgment for Local 1992 and awarded it reasonable attorneys' fees. We reversed and remanded the case for further proceedings. Local Union No.1992 v. Okonite Co., 189 F.3d 339 (3d Cir.1999).

Back before the District Court, the parties renewed their cross-motions for summary judgment. The District Court denied them, and the case went to trial. After a jury returned a verdict in its favor, Local 1992 filed post-trial motions for attorneys' fees, costs, and prejudgment interest. Okonite opposed Local 1992's motions and cross-moved for judgment as a matter of law (under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 50(b)) or, alternatively, a new trial (under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59).

The District Court issued an opinion, dated May 7, 2002, in which it (1) denied Okonite's Rule 50 and 59 motions for judgment as a matter of law or a new trial; (2) denied Local 1992's motion for prejudgment interest; (3) granted in part and denied in part Local 1992's motion for attorneys' fees and costs;² and (4) referred Local 1992's application for attorneys' fees and costs to a Magistrate Judge to determine the total amount of fees and costs that was reasonable. The comprehensive opinion was accompanied by a separately-captioned "order," dated May 7, 2002. The Clerk of the Court separately entered the opinion and order on the docket on May 8, 2002.³

After the referral by the District Court, the Magistrate Judge issued a Report and Recommendation on September 24, 2002. She recommended that the District Court (a) award Local 1992 $51,340 in attorneys' fees for the period since July 9, 1998; and (b) deny, without prejudice, Local 1992's request for costs for failing to comply with Local Civil Rule 54.1(a). Local 1992 objected to the Magistrate Judge's Report and Recommendation on the grounds that the Magistrate Judge wrongly excluded the time Local 1992's attorneys spent working on Okonite's appeal from the initial decision granting Local 1992 summary judgment.

In papers filed on October 11, 2002, Okonite opposed Local 1992's objection. In addition, also on October 11, 2002, Okonite filed a motion requesting that the District Court enter what Okonite termed three separate final judgments, pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 58, for (1) the denial of Okonite's Rule 50 and 59 motions, (2) the denial of Local 1992's motion for prejudgment interest, and (3) the partial denial and partial grant of Local 1992's motion for attorneys' fees and costs. Okonite also urged the District Court to exercise its discretion under Rule 58 and order that Local 1992's motion for attorneys' fees "have the same effect under Rule 4(a)(4) of the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure as a timely motion under Rule 59." Fed.R.Civ.P. 58.⁴

On November 27, 2002—while the parties' motions were pending before the District Court and 203 days after the District Court's May 8 order—Okonite filed a notice of appeal from several of the District Court's orders from before, during, and after the trial. Okonite's principal argument in that appeal is that the District Court erred by denying its Rule 50 motion for judgment as a matter of law.

Local 1992 filed a motion with this Court, arguing that we should dismiss Okonite's appeal as untimely. Local 1992 also protectively cross-appealed the District Court's denial of prejudgment interest, but acknowledged that its appeal is also untimely if we dismiss Okonite's appeal.

Meanwhile, in a January 30, 2003 opinion, the District Court rejected the Magistrate Judge's recommendation to exclude the 186.3 hours Local 1992's attorneys spent working on the appeal from the initial summary judgment decision, and the Court accepted the Magistrate Judge's recommended $200 hourly attorneys' fees rate. The District Court further denied Okonite's motion for separate judgments under Rule 58 and declined to order that Local 1992's motion for attorneys' fees be treated like a Rule 59 motion for purposes of extending when the time to file a notice of appeal would begin to run. Okonite timely filed a notice of appeal from the January 30, 2003 decision on February 24, 2003.

To summarize, we have before us Okonite's November 27, 2002 appeal, Local 1992's motion to dismiss the November 27, 2002 appeal, Local 1992's cross-appeal, and Okonite's February 24, 2003 appeal. Both parties agree that Okonite's appeal from the District Court's final attorneys' fees determination (decided in the January 30, 2003 decision) is properly before us, and we address it below. The primary question we must decide, however, is the timeliness of Okonite's November 27, 2002 appeal, which Okonite filed more than six months after the District Court's May 8 opinion and order. That issue underlies both Local 1992's motion to dismiss Okonite's November 27, 2002 appeal and Okonite's appeal from the District Court's January 30, 2003 order denying Okonite's motions for separate judgments and for an order extending the time for appeal.

II.

Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 4(a) requires that a notice of appeal "be filed with the district clerk within thirty days after the judgment or order appealed from is entered." Fed. R.App. P. 4(a)(1)(A).⁵ With regard to an appeal from a jury verdict, the thirty days does not begin to run—i.e., "entry of judgment" has not occurred—until the judgment is set forth in a separate document pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 58 and the clerk of the court enters the judgment into the civil docket pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 79(a). See Fed. R.App. P. 4(a)(7); cf. United States v. Fiorelli, 337 F.3d 282, 286-87 (3d Cir.2003); Diamond v. McKenzie, 770 F.2d 225, 227-28 (D.C.Cir.1985).

But the matter is not so simple. Certain post-trial motions—Rule 50(a) and Rule 59 motions, for example, as well as Rule 54 attorneys' fees motions "if the district court extends the time to appeal under Rule 58"—postpone the thirty-day time to appeal from a jury verdict. See Fed. R.App. P. 4(a)(4)(A). When such motions are timely filed with the district court, the thirty days begins to run upon "entry of the order disposing of the last such remaining motion." Fed. R.App. P. 4(a)(4)(A).⁶

Here, judgment was entered from the jury's verdict on February 26, 2002, and the parties timely filed post-trial motions. Local 1992's Rule 54 motion for attorneys' fees did not toll the time for appeal, because the District Court never extended the time to appeal pursuant to Rule 58.⁷ Consequently, the thirty-day time to appeal began to run upon "entry of the order disposing of" the parties' remaining post-trial motions.

The parties dispute when that occurred; indeed, they dispute if that occurred. As we explained above, the District Court issued its opinion rejecting the post-trial motions on May 7, 2002. The opinion was accompanied by the order (also described above), and the Clerk of the Court entered them separately in the docket on May 8, 2002. If these series of events constituted "entry of the order disposing of" the post-trial motions, then Appellate Rule 4(a)'s thirty-day period for filing a notice of appeal began on May 9, 2002 and ended June 7, 2002. See Fed. R.App. P. 26. And if the deadline for filing the appeal was June 7, 2002, then Okonite's notice of appeal, filed on November 27, 2002, was woefully untimely and we lack jurisdiction to hear the appeal.⁸

Okonite argues, however, that entry of the order disposing of the post-trial motions never occurred. To maintain this position, Okonite seizes upon Rule 58's "separate document requirement," which provides that a judgment is effective only when "set forth on a separate document." The District Court failed to do so, Okonite contends, and Appellate Rule 4(a)'s thirty-day time...