The Week in Federal Appellate Jurisdiction: October 2–8, 2022
There were only two decisions of note from last week, both from the Eleventh Circuit. One involved a purported injunction appeal before the district court set the terms of the injunction. The other involved the purported stipulated dismissal of all unresolved claims.
- An Injunction Without Terms Is Not an Appealable Injunction
- The Eleventh Circuit on Stipulated Dismissals of Unresolved Claims
An Injunction Without Terms Is Not an Appealable Injunction
In Curling v. Raffensperger, the Eleventh Circuit dismissed an injunction appeal because the district court had not yet set the terms of the injunction.
Simplifying a bit, the case involved a challenge to certain settings on Georgia’s ballot scanners. The plaintiffs sought an order requiring the the scanners to be programmed to recognize slight marks (such as Xs) in addition to fully filled-in bubbles. The district court sided with the plaintiffs. But it did not not specify the settings that Georgia had to use. The district court instead asked the plaintiffs to propose new settings, which the plaintiffs promptly did. The district court did not follow up on this, however. After some time, the state appealed.
The Eleventh Circuit dismissed the appeal insofar as it challenged the district court’s conclusion about ballot-scanner settings. Orders granting injunctive relief are appealable under 28 U.S.C. § 1292(a)(1). But for there to be an appealable injunction, the court must specify injunctive relief. The district court had not yet done so. So the state’s appeal was premature.
Curling v. Raffensperger, 2022 WL 5056335 (11th Cir. Oct. 5, 2022), available at the Eleventh Circuit and Westlaw
The Eleventh Circuit on Stipulated Dismissals of Unresolved Claims
In Ellison v. Postmaster General, the Eleventh Circuit held that a Rule 41(a)(2) dismissal of unresolved claims, combined with a Rule 54(b) partial judgment, permitted an appeal from resolved claims.
Simplifying a bit, the complaint in Ellison included three counts. The district court dismissed one of them at the pleading stage. The parties then filed a joint stipulation of dismissal under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 41(a)(1)(A)(ii). This stipulation purported to dismiss the unresolved counts with prejudice while preserving the right to appeal the dismissed one. The district court then dismissed the two unresolved counts with prejudice and entered a partial judgment on the dismissed count under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 54(b).
The Eleventh Circuit said that the parties’ stipulated dismissal was improper. In Perry v. Schumacher Group of Louisiana, the Eleventh Circuit held that Rule 41(a)(1)(A)(ii) permits parties to stipulate to the dismissal of an entire action, not individual claims. But the court of appeals still had jurisdiction. The district court could—and did—order dismissal of the unresolved counts under Rule 41(a)(2). That court-ordered (rather than party-stipulated) dismissal, combined with the entry of a Rule 54(b) partial judgment, preserved the plaintiff’s right to appeal the district court’s resolution of one count.
Ellison v. Postmaster General, 2022 WL 4726121 (11th Cir. Oct. 3, 2022), available at the Eleventh Circuit and Westlaw
Final Decisions PLLC is an appellate boutique and consultancy that focuses on federal appellate jurisdiction. We partner with lawyers facing appellate-jurisdiction issues, working as consultants or co-counsel to achieve positive outcomes on appeal. Contact us to learn how we can work together.
Learn More ContactRelated Posts
It’s the fourth annual winter-break edition of the weekly roundup. As I have in previous years, I took a few weeks off from Final Decisions. But I’m back with a roundup covering the last three weeks of 2022. Those weeks saw a pair of collateral-order decisions, the effect of Nasrallah v. Barr on other kinds […]
Continue reading....
There were three cases of note from last week. The Third Circuit held that notices of appeal do not encompass post-notice decisions. Litigants must file a second notice, or amend the first, to appeal those decisions. The D.C. Circuit held that it could not review a facial challenge to a statute in an injunction appeal […]
Continue reading....
There were a bunch of interesting decisions last week. In the continuing saga of the Rule 3(c) amendments, the Second Circuit acknowledged them and applied them retroactively. In other decisions, the Sixth Circuit explained that it could review class certification in an appeal from a class-wide injunction. The Fourth Circuit clarified the basis for its […]
Continue reading....
I took a break from the roundup last week, but I’m back with a double-sized edition. In the last two weeks, another circuit didn’t recognize that the recent Rule 3(c) amendments abrogated its caselaw. The Eleventh Circuit determined that a stay put an action in “suspended animation,” thereby allowing an appeal from the stay. The […]
Continue reading....
Last week, the Tenth Circuit once again used a pro se plaintiff’s notice of appeal to limit the scope of its review despite recent amendments to Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 3(c). The Second Circuit gave a thorough explanation of its jurisdiction over decisions made in post-judgment proceedings. The Fifth Circuit heard an appeal from […]
Continue reading....Recent Posts
In Diaz v. FCA US LLC, the Third Circuit split over whether a district court had resolved distinct claims for purposes of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 54(b). The majority concluded that the district court had resolved only a distinct theory of recovery, not a distinct claim. Dissenting, Judge Phipps argued that claims are defined […]
Continue reading....
In Grippa v. Rubin, the Eleventh Circuit addressed the immediate appealability of Florida’s absolute and qualified litigation privileges. The court determined that the absolute privilege was immediately appealable via the collateral-order doctrine. But the qualified litigation privilege was not.
Continue reading....
Last month featured a Sixth Circuit debate over jurisdiction to review Brady issues in appeals from the denial of qualified immunity. There was also an especially odd Second Circuit decision in which the court exercised pendent appellate jurisdiction over a normally non-appealable issue even though the court lacked jurisdiction over any other issue. And there […]
Continue reading....
In two appeals—Clark v. Louisville-Jefferson County Metro Government and Salter v. City of Detroit, the Sixth Circuit spoke at length about its jurisdiction to review certain Brady issues as part of qualified-immunity appeals. The cases produced a total of six opinions, several of which dove into this jurisdictional issue.
Continue reading....
In Rossy v. City of Buffalo, the Second Circuit appeared to both dismiss a qualified-immunity appeal for a lack of jurisdiction and exercise pendent appellate jurisdiction over a plaintiff’s cross-appeal. This is odd. Pendent appellate jurisdiction allows normally non-appealable issues to tag along with appealable ones. But if the denial of qualified immunity was not […]
Continue reading....