Michael Green's CivPro Blog

Essay Question 3 from this Year's CivPro Exam

 Essay Question 3 (30 points)

Assume Insurer Corp. and Jane Jones make motions to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, personal jurisdiction and venue. Will the motions be successful?

Again, this question concerns following complaint [sorry if the formatting is off here]

Answer to Another Essay Question from this Year's CivPro Exam

Essay Question 2 (14 points)

Assume for the purposes of this question that the federal court in Florida entertaining Smith v. Insurer Corp. & Jones should use the plausibility pleading standard in Twombly and Iqbal. Has the standard been satisfied?

Like the question I posted a few days ago, this question concerns following complaint [sorry if the formatting is off here]

Essay Question from this Year's CivPro Exam

Essay Question 1 (14 points).

Assume that in Florida state court, the standard for pleading is not the plausibility pleading standard expressed in Twombly and Iqbal, but the notice pleading standard that was used in federal courts prior to Twombly. What are the best arguments you can think of that would convince the federal court in Florida entertaining Smith v. Insurer Corp. & Jones that it should use a notice pleading standard? Do you think these arguments will succeed?

This question concern the complaint below [sorry if the formatting is off here]

 

Answer to Essay Question 8 in this Year's CivPro Exam

I'll post answers to the essay questions as I grade them. I started with the last:

Essay Question 8. (10 points)

P1 (a domiciliary of New York) and P2 (a domiciliary of California), joining as co-plaintiffs under Fed. R. Civ. P. 20, sue D (a domiciliary of New Jersey) under state battery law in federal court in California, asking for $100,000 each for damages from D due to a brawl between P1, P2, and D in California. P1 also joins an action against P2 for state law battery concerning P1’s damages from P2 in the brawl, asking for $20,000 (assume this is the actual amount in controversy). Does P1’s action against P2 have supplemental jurisdiction? If it does have supplemental jurisdiction, should it not (given the purposes for which the supplemental jurisdiction statute was drafted)? If it does not have supplemental jurisdiction, should it (given the purposes for which the supplemental jurisdiction statute was drafted)?

 

Congratulations!

Congratulations to my 2012 CivPro students on finishing their final! It's over! 

Posting will continue, albeit a bit more sporatically from now on. 

Essay Question from the 2007 CivPro Exam

Essay Question 2. 

P1 (a citizen of New York) and P2 (a citizen of New Jersey) joined as co-plaintiffs to sue D (a citizen of Connecticut) for state-law negligence in the Federal District Court for the District of Connecticut. P1 and P2 are each asking for $100,000 in personal injury damages as a result of a car accident in Connecticut involving four cars driven by P1, P2, D, and X (a citizen of New York). After filing and serving their complaint, P1 joined a state-law negligence action against P2 and X, asking for $50,000 in damage to his car that P1 claims was due either to P2’s or X’s negligence in the same accident. Is there federal subject matter jurisdiction for P1’s action against X? If there is, is it right that there is? If there isn’t, is it right that there isn’t?  

Multiple Choice Question from the 2007 CivPro Exam

 8.    Assume P sues D in federal court for negligence. Which of the following is least accurate?

a.    D first brings a pre-answer motion to dismiss for inadequate service. The motion is denied. D may not submit a second pre-answer motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim.

b.    D, having introduced the affirmative defense of contributory negligence in his answer, brings a motion for summary judgment, on the ground that no reasonable jury could find that P was not contributorily negligent. If neither P nor D offers the court any evidence in support of or in opposition to D’s motion, the motion should be denied.

Long Essay Question from the 2010 CivPro Exam

Updated:

Essay Question 8. 

D has lived her whole life in New York. She is employed by the X Corp., which is incorporated in Delaware, but has its headquarters and 5% of its employees in New York. All of its factories (and about 95% of its employees) are in Vermont. On the morning of Nov. 11, 2008, a manager at the X Corp. told D to deliver some documents to Vermont in a truck owned by the X Corp. D had never been to Vermont before. D agreed to make the deliveries and set off that same morning. While D was driving in Massachusetts, she hit P, who was hitchhiking, seriously injuring him. P was able to make out “X Corp.” on the side of the truck that hit him. Instead of stopping, D kept on driving, made her delivery in Vermont, and returned home to New York on the evening of Nov. 11.

P lived in New York, but he decided to move to Vermont immediately after the accident because he thought the disability care was better there. On Nov. 9, 2010, P filed a complaint in the Federal District Court for the District of Vermont, listing “the X Corp. and an unknown driver for the X Corp.” as defendants. P had the X Corp. served on Nov. 10, 2010 by having an 18 year-old process server deliver a copy of the summons and complaint in hand to the X Corp.’s chief legal officer (CLO). After investigating the matter, the CLO uncovered on Nov. 20 that D was the driver. That same day, the CLO told D about the suit and called P to let him know that D was the driver. On Nov. 22, P served D with an amended complaint, by having the same 18-year old process server give D a copy of the summons and complaint while D was staying at a vacation rental on Long Island (in New York).

Under Vermont's choice-of-law rules, Massachusetts tort law would apply to an accident that occurred in Massachusetts. Because Vermont has a generous 3-year statute of limitations for tort actions, Vermont state courts do not apply Vermont's statutes of limitations to tort actions brought under other states' law. They instead borrow the statute of limitations of the state whose tort law applies. Massachusetts's statute of limitations for tort is 2 years. Under Vermont and Massachusetts law a statute of limitations is tolled upon service.

Are D and/or the X Corp. likely to get the actions against them dismissed under Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)? Are the actions against D and/or the X Corp. barred by the applicable statute of limitations? [NOTE: My students this year will not be able to answer the question of the statute of limitations concerning D.]

Insurers as necessary parties

David Noll asked the following great (if compressed) question: "Why isn't an insurance company a necessary party? Then, is the insurance company subject to issue preclusion in the second suit because they would have been in privity with P in the first suit?" 

Erie Essay Question from the 2000 CivPro Exam

Essay Question 2. In response to a flood of malpractice litigation, the state of Colorado passed the Certificate of Review Statute, requiring anyone suing a licenced professional for malpractice to provide, with the complaint filed, a certificate stating that an expert in the licensed professional’s area of practice has examined the claim and has determined that it has substantial justification.  P (a citizen of New York) sues D (a citizen of Colorado) in the Federal District Court for the District of Colorado for medical malpractice under New York law.  P’s suit concerns an operation that D performed upon P in New York City.  P is asking for $80,000.  P does not filed a Certificate of Review with her complaint.  In his answer, D asks that the action be dismissed for failure to file a Certificate of Review.  What result and why?