Ruh v. Metal Recycling Servs., LLC

• Decision Date: 30 January 2020
• Docket Number: C/A. No. 0:19-cv-03229-CMC
• Citation: 436 F.Supp.3d 844
• Parties: Lucinda S. RUH, Plaintiff, v. METAL RECYCLING SERVICES, LLC, and Nucor Corporation, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of South Carolina

436 F.Supp.3d 844

Lucinda S. RUH, Plaintiff,

v.METAL RECYCLING SERVICES, LLC, and Nucor Corporation, Defendants.

C/A. No. 0:19-cv-03229-CMC

United States District Court, D. South Carolina, Rock Hill Division.

Signed January 30, 2020

William Hugh McAngus, Jr., Chappell Smith and Arden, Columbia, SC, Peter J. Kestner, Pro Hac Vice, McEwen and Kestner PLLC, Inver Grove Heights, MN, for Plaintiff.

Fred Oliver, Collins and Lacy, Murrells Inlet, SC, R. Scott Wallinger, Jr., Collins and Lacy PC, Columbia, SC, Christopher Ogiba, Clinton T. Magill, Moore and Van Allen PLLC (Chas), Charleston, SC, Scott M. Tyler, Moore and Van Allen, Charlotte, NC, for Defendants.

Opinion and Order on Motions to Dismiss

(ECF Nos. 11, 13)

CAMERON MCGOWAN CURRIE, Senior United States District Judge

Through this action, Plaintiff Lucinda S. Ruh ("Ruh") seeks recovery for injuries she sustained when a truck owned by Norris Trucking1, LLC ("Trucking Company") and operated by Cecil Norris ("Driver") struck the vehicle Ruh was driving. ECF No. 1-1 ¶¶ 19-21. Ruh alleges Driver's negligence was the immediate cause of the accident. Id. ¶ 21. She seeks to impose liability on Defendants Metal Recycling Services, LLC ("MRS") and Nucor Corporation ("Nucor") (collectively "Defendants") based on allegations that, at the time of the accident, Trucking Company was "transporting goods or property in interstate commerce under a contract of carriage, bill of lading, transportation services agreement or other contract, having been hired by Defendants MRS and/or Nucor to transport scrap metal from [MRS's] Gastonia, North Carolina facility to Nucor['s facility] in Darlington, South Carolina." Id. ¶ 19.¹

Ruh alleges Defendants knew or should have known of Trucking Company's "long history of violating [federal regulations] designed to promote safe driving and reduce or prevent wrecks" and that it "was an unfit and unsafe motor carrier." Id. ¶ 23; see also id. ¶¶ 24-27 (describing information regarding Trucking Company's record that was allegedly available to Defendants); id. ¶ 29 (alleging Defendants "knew or should have known that said carrier posed a risk of harm to others and was otherwise incompetent and unfit to perform the duties of an interstate carrier, or intentionally chose not to know."). Thus, Ruh's claims against MRS and Nucor depend on a theory one or both are negligent for failing to exercise care in contracting with Trucking Company to ship goods.

The matter is before the court on Defendants' separate motions to dismiss. ECF Nos. 11, 13; see also ECF No. 17 (Plaintiff's response); ECF Nos. 19, 20 (Defendants' replies). For reasons set forth below, the matter is dismissed with entry of judgment delayed to allow Ruh an opportunity to move to amend her complaint.

STANDARD

A motion under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) should be granted only if, after accepting all well-pleaded allegations in the complaint as true, it appears certain that the plaintiff cannot prove any set of facts in support of her claims that entitles her to relief. See Edwards v. City of Goldsboro , 178 F.3d 231, 244 (4th Cir. 1999). Although the court must take the facts in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, it "need not accept the legal conclusions [the plaintiff would draw] from the facts." Giarratano v. Johnson , 521 F.3d 298, 302 (4th Cir. 2008) (quoting Eastern Shore Mkts., Inc. v. J.D. Assocs. Ltd. P'ship , 213 F.3d 175, 180 (4th Cir. 2000) ). The court may also disregard any "unwarranted inferences, unreasonable conclusions, or arguments." Id.

The Rule 12(b)(6) standard has often been expressed as precluding dismissal unless it is certain that the plaintiff is not entitled to relief under any legal theory that plausibly could be suggested by the facts alleged. See Mylan Labs., Inc. v. Matkari , 7 F.3d 1130, 1134 (4th Cir. 1993). Nonetheless, the plaintiff must allege "enough facts to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face." Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly , 550 U.S. 544, 127 S.Ct. 1955, 167 L.Ed.2d 929 (2007) (quoted in Giarratano , 521 F.3d at 302 ).

Thus, in applying Rule 12(b)(6), the court also applies the relevant pleading standard. Despite the liberal pleading standard of Rule 8, a plaintiff in any civil action must include more than mere conclusory statements in support of a claim. See Ashcroft v. Iqbal , 556 U.S. 662, 678, 129 S.Ct. 1937, 173 L.Ed.2d 868 (2009) (court need only accept as true the complaint's factual allegations, not its legal conclusions); see also McCleary-Evans v. Maryland Dept. of Trans. , 780 F.3d 582, 587 (4th Cir. 2015) (noting " Iqbal and Twombly articulated a new requirement that a complaint must allege a plausible claim for relief, thus rejecting a standard that would allow a complaint to survive a motion to dismiss whenever the pleadings left open the possibility that a plaintiff might later establish some set of [undisclosed] facts to support recovery." (emphasis and alteration in original, internal quotation marks omitted)); Walters v. McMahen , 684 F.3d 435, 439 (4th Cir. 2012) (citing Robertson v. Sea Pines Real Estate Companies, Inc. , 679 F.3d 278 (4th Cir. 2012) for proposition plaintiff need not forecast evidence sufficient to prove the elements of a claim, but must allege sufficient facts to establish those elements).

DISCUSSION

I. AVAILABILITY OF LEGAL THEORY ON WHICH CLAIM DEPENDS

A. Arguments

Defendants' opening arguments. Both Defendants argue Ruh's single claim fails because she has not alleged facts supporting an inference of an employer-employee, master-servant, or agency-agent relationship between either Defendant and the Trucking Company or Driver. ECF Nos. 11, 11-1 at 5-7, 13 at 5-8. Defendants assert such a failure is fatal to Ruh's claims because a contracting party cannot be held liable for the actions of an independent contractor. ECF No. 11-1 at 7 (citing Cook v. United States , C.A. No. 0:14-cv-2660-RMG-PJG (D.S.C. Nov. 16, 2015) (dismissing Federal Tort Claims Act claim where allegations did not suggest government controlled "the physical conduct or day-to-day activities of the independent contractor" whose actions were at issue); ECF No. 13 at 8 (concluding "South Carolina courts do not recognize a cause of action for negligent hiring or retention against a shipper utilizing an independent motor carrier.").

MRS also challenges Plaintiff's factual premise that the publicly available information would have placed Defendants on notice Trucking Company was an unsafe carrier. See ECF No. 13 at 7 (explaining Trucking Company maintained a conditional safety rating and federal law provides readers of the data compiled under that law "should not draw conclusions about a carrier's overall safety condition simply based on the data displayed in this system" and "[u]nless a motor carrier has received an UNSATISFACTORY safety rating .... it is authorized to operate on the Nation's roadways."). Nucor advances a separate argument that it cannot be held liable, even if Plaintiff's legal theory is accepted, because it was not the entity that contracted with Trucking Company.

Ruh's response. In response, Ruh maintains she has properly stated her claim in the alternative: either based on an employment relationship between Defendants and Trucking Company (and Driver) or based on Defendants' hiring of "incompetent and unfit contractors." ECF No. 17 at 3, 4. She relies on cases holding an employer may be liable for its own negligence in hiring, supervising, training, or entrusting an employee with tools that create an unreasonable risk of harm as well as South Carolina's recognition of "several exceptions to the general rule that [a contracting party] is not liable for the negligent acts of its independent contractors." Id.

Citing Restatement (Second) of Torts § 411 (1965), which she acknowledges South Carolina has not expressly adopted, Ruh argues an exception to the general rule of nonliability for an independent contractor's work exists where the contracting party (1) "fail[s] to exercise reasonable care to employ a competent and careful contractor" and (2) "the work involves a risk of physical harm unless it is skillfully and carefully done." Id. at 4. Ruh relies on several older cases as suggesting South Carolina would adopt this rule. Id. at 5. For example, she relies on Conlin v. City Council of Charleston , 15 Rich. 201 (S.C. Ct. App. 1868), in which the court stated "under suitable allegations the owner might be made responsible for the misconduct of a contractor known to be unworthy of trust ." Conlin , 15 Rich. at 211-12 (emphasis added). Ruh also relies on Caldwell v. Carroll , 139 S.C. 163, 137 S.E. 444 (1927), in which the court stated a contracting party is not liable for "wrongful or negligent manner [of performing job] by a contractor or his servants" if "due diligence has been exercised in selecting a competent contractor , and the thing contracted to be done is not in itself a nuisance, nor will necessarily result in a nuisance if proper precautionary measures are used" Caldwell , 137 S.E. at 451 (emphasis added). Ruh responds to Nucor's separate argument that it cannot be liable even under this theory because it did not contract with Trucking Company by arguing she is entitled to discovery on Nucor's role prior to any ruling..

Ruh also relies on the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations ("FMCSR") to support imposition of a duty. ECF No. 17 at 7. Most critically, she relies on the FMCSR's definition of "employee" to include persons a motor carrier characterizes as an independent contractor. Id. She explains that " ‘[o]ne purpose of the FMCSRs is to protect members of the public from motor carriers' attempts to escape liability for the negligence of drivers by claiming their drivers were independent contractors.’ " Id. (quoting Perry v. Harco Nat'ls Ins. Co. , 129 F.3d 1072, 1074 (9th Cir. 1997) ).

Even if Trucking Company and Driver are held to be independent contractors, Ruh argues Defendants may...