The Eleventh Circuit upheld the dismissal of a personal injury complaint, finding a forum selection clause naming the Bahamas as the forum for any litigation between plaintiffs and defendants was valid and enforceable. In Feggestad v. Kerzner International Bahamas Ltd., No. 15-11773, 2016 WL 7210067 (11th Cir. Dec. 13, 2016), plaintiffs brought suit after a…
Category: Civil Procedure
Americans with Disabilities Act Held to Allow “Competitive” Reassignment
The Eleventh Circuit handed the EEOC another recent defeat in U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission v. St. Joseph’s Hospital, Inc., No. 15-14551, 2016 WL 7131479 (11th Cir. Dec. 7, 2016). The case involved cross-appeals after a jury found that the defendant hospital had acted in good faith despite its failure to accommodate a disabled nurse…
Trademark Plaintiff Waited Too Long to Douse the Fire
When an opinion opens with “the plaintiff pursued its preliminary-injunction motion with the urgency of someone out on a meandering evening stroll rather than someone in a race against time,” there isn’t much suspense about who’s going to win and why, and the court did indeed affirm the denial of preliminary injunctive relief in Wreal,…
Civil RICO Class Action Dismissal Affirmed
A civil RICO class action challenging Spirit Airlines’ “Passenger Usage Fee” landed for a second time in the Eleventh Circuit and this time the airline fared better: the court affirmed the dismissal of the amended complaint in a major opinion on RICO pleading standards authored by Judge Stanley Marcus. Ray v. Spirit Airlines, Inc., 2016…
Eleventh Circuit Allows Extraterritorial Discovery for Foreign and International Disputes
28 U.S.C. § 1782 provides federal-court assistance in gathering evidence for use in foreign tribunals, but how far does its reach extend? In an opinion published on August 23, 2016, Sergeeva v. Tripleton International, 2016 WL 4435616, the Eleventh Circuit addressed the use of Section 1782 to achieve discovery of documents outside U.S. territorial limits and possessed by…
Court Applies Final Judgment Review Standard to Grant of Summary Judgment
When no jury is demanded, does a district court have more leeway in granting summary judgment? The Eleventh Circuit explained the question in its July 26 opinion in Florida International University Board of Trustees v. Florida National University, Inc., 2016 WL 4010164 (11th Cir. July 26, 2016), affirming the district court’s judgment in favor of the…
Eleventh Circuit Holds That Bankruptcy Rules Apply to Adversary Proceedings in District Court, Orders Reinstatement of $6-Million Verdict on Procedural Grounds
When a federal district court oversees adversary bankruptcy proceedings, is the post-trial deadline to request judgment as a matter of law governed by Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 50(b), which allows 28 days to file such a motion—or by Bankruptcy Rule 9015(c), which allows only 14 days? The Eleventh Circuit applied the Bankruptcy Rules’ shorter…