Osborne v. Pride Offshore, Inc.

Full title: FRANK P. OSBORNE, III v. PRIDE OFFSHORE, INC., ET AL

Court: United States District Court, E.D. Louisiana

Date published: Apr 15, 2002

CIVIL ACTION NO. 01-3242 SECTION "C" (2) (E.D. La. Apr. 15, 2002)

Opinion

CIVIL ACTION NO. 01-3242 SECTION "C" (2)

April 15, 2002

MINUTE ENTRY

BERRIGAN, Chief Judge.

This matter comes before the Court on motion to strike jury filed by the plaintiff. Having considered the record, the memoranda of counsel and the law, the Court denies the motion without prejudice.

The Court disagrees with the defendants that it can not review the issue of jury entitlement because of the defendants unilateral action in removing this matter to federal court before the time for filing an appeal in state court had passed. This Court finds that the state court judgment is not a final judgment for purposes of claim/issue preclusion. A contrary ruling would effectively eliminate the plaintiff's right to an appeal. The Court notes that a case remains pending at the trial level after removal, and in federal district court one judgment at the end of a trial is the rule.

The Court joins in what appears to be the consensus of the parties as to what is the remaining issue: that the defendants right to a jury trial depends on whether or not maritime law applies of its own force in this OCSLA case as set forth in Demette v. Falcon Drilling Co., Inc., 280 F.3d 492, 502 (5th Cir. 2002). See Debellefeuille v. Vastar Offshore, Inc., 139 F. Supp. 2 d.821, 824 (S.D. Tx. 2001); Solet v. CNG Producing Co., 908 F. Supp. 375, 377 (E.D.La. 1995). Equally clear to this Court is the fact that the Fifth Circuit in Demette, supra, made it clear that casing contracts are a species of contracts that do not require a fact-specific inquiry:

This court has held that indemnity provisions in contracts to provide offshore casing services are maritime. Even a contract for offshore drilling services that does not mention any vessel is maritime if its execution requires the use of vessels. This is true for contracts that may also involve obligations performed on land. Thus, circuit precedent virtually compels the conclusion that this is a maritime contract.

Demette, 280 F.3d at 500-501.

A study of the limited record on this issue suggests that "casing cementing" is part and parcel of the casing services. However, the record as it is does not provide the Court with the facts it needs to make such a finding. In fact, there is no copy of any contract at all in the record, nor a description of what Osborne's tasks were and how they did or did not relate to casing work.

Accordingly,

IT IS ORDERED that motion to strike jury filed by the plaintiff is DENIED without prejudice.