Opinion
Case No. 3:15-cv-01678-SC
09-30-2015
ROBERT BLAIR, Plaintiff, v. MEDTRONIC, INC., and DOES 1 through 50, inclusive, Defendants.
ORDER GRANTING MOTION TO DISMISS
I. INTRODUCTION
Now before the Court is Defendants' motion to dismiss the above captioned case. The matter is fully briefed and appropriate for resolution without oral argument under Civil Local Rule 7-1(b). For the reasons set forth below, the motion to dismiss is GRANTED. Plaintiff, however, is given LEAVE TO AMEND.
See ECF Nos. 14 ("Mot."); 15 ("MJN"); 16 ("Opp'n"); 17 ("Reply").
II. FACTS
This case was originally filed in the Superior Court of California, County of San Francisco ("state court") on April 2, 2015. See ECF 1, Ex A ("Compl.") Plaintiff Robert Blair ("Plaintiff") used a form complaint for personal injury, property damage, and wrongful death, with only a single paragraph of non- formulaic text. Accordingly, the Court has very few facts alleged before it within the Complaint, set forth below in their entirety.
Plaintiff identifies the Defendants as Medtronic, Inc. ("Medtronic") and Does 1-50 (collectively, "Defendants"). Id. at ¶¶ 5, 6, 8. Plaintiff alleges that Medtronic has a place of business in San Francisco, California. Id. (Per the Notice of Removal, Defendants disagree.) Plaintiff also alleges that Does 1-50 are agents or employees acting within the scope of their duties or whose capacities are otherwise unknown. Id. at ¶ 6.
The Court hears this case via diversity jurisdiction. Relevant thereto, Medtronic is a Minnesota corporation whose principal place of business is Minneapolis. See ECF Nos. 1 at ¶ 6; 1-1 at ¶ 2. --------
By the boxes checked, the Court deduces Plaintiff brings suit for products liability and general negligence, having suffered wage loss, loss of use of property, hospital and medical expenses, general damage, property damage, loss of earning capacity, and other damage consisting of pre-judgment interest. Compl. at ¶¶ 10-11. Plaintiff accordingly seeks compensatory damages, punitive damages, and damages in an amount according to the proof.
Again, through boxes checked, the Court deduces that Plaintiff brings its suit for products liability because on or about April 7, 2013, Plaintiff was injured by Medtronic M110901AAB, which the Court presumes is a device. Id. at ¶ Prod. L-1. Per the form language and boxes checked, "[e]ach of the defendants knew the product would be purchased and used without inspection for defects. The product was defective when it left the control of each defendant. The product at the time of injury was being" used in both of two ways offered by the form. Id. at ¶ Prod. L-2. First, it was "used in the manner intended by the defendants." Id. Second, it was "used in a manner that was reasonably foreseeable by defendants as involving a substantial danger not readily apparent. Adequate warnings of the danger were not given." Id. Plaintiff was a purchaser and user of the product. Id. at ¶ Prod. L-3.
Plaintiff's injury was the proximate result of three checked-box counts: Strict liability, negligence, and breach of warranty. Id. at ¶¶ Prod. L-4; Prod. L-5; Prod. L-6. Strict liability resulted because Defendants "manufactured or assembled the product," "designed and manufactured component parts supplied to the manufacturer," and "sold the product to the public." Id. at ¶¶ Prod. L-4(a)-(c). Negligence resulted because Defendants "owed a duty to [P]laintiff." Id. at ¶ Prod. L-5. Breach of warranty is alleged to exist because Defendants "breached an implied warranty" and "breached an express warranty which was" "written" (vice oral). Id. at ¶ Prod. L-6.
The information provided in the Complaint that was not described above and strictly the result of filling in a generalized form was Plaintiff's description of its cause of action for general negligence. There, Plaintiff alleged that Defendants were "the legal proximate cause of damages to plaintiff" "on (date): or about April 7, 2013" and "at (place): or around [sic]" by the following:
Plaintiff was recipient of a neurostimulator device that was surgically placed in his back. This subject device was the product of Medtronic, Inc. As such, Defendant Medtronic, Inc. owed a duty to Plaintiff to inspect, maintain and insure that the device was functioning properly and safely. Defendant Medtronic, Inc. breached this duty of care to Plaintiff. As a direct and legal result of this breach of the duty of care owed to Plaintiff. [sic] Plaintiff has suffered damages, including special damages and general damages. Plaintiff has sustained damage in an amount in excess of the jurisdictional minimum of the Superior Court.Id. at ¶ GN-1. Plaintiff's Opposition brief contains no section on the factual background of this case, no additional information related to this case, and no motion (or response to Defendants' motion) for judicial notice. See generally Opp'n. Therefore, the Court is bound to these highly limited facts.
III. LEGAL STANDARD
A motion to dismiss under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) "tests the legal sufficiency of a claim." Navarro v. Block, 250 F.3d 729, 732 (9th Cir. 2001). "Dismissal can be based on the lack of a cognizable legal theory or the absence of sufficient facts alleged under a cognizable legal theory." Balistreri v. Pacifica Police Dep't, 901 F.2d 696, 699 (9th Cir. 1988). "When there are well-pleaded factual allegations, a court should assume their veracity and then determine whether they plausibly give rise to an entitlement to relief." Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 664 (2009). However, "the tenet that a court must accept as true all of the allegations contained in a complaint is inapplicable to legal conclusions. Threadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere conclusory statements, do not suffice." Id. at 678 (citing Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555 (2007)). The allegations made in a complaint must be "sufficient allegations of underlying facts to give fair notice and to enable the opposing party to defend itself effectively" and "must plausibly suggest an entitlement to relief" such that "it is not unfair to require the opposing party to be subjected to the expense of discovery and continued litigation." Starr v. Baca, 652 F.3d 1202, 1216 (9th Cir. 2011).
While normally a Court would be limited to the complaint, certain additional documents may be considered. Documents referenced in a complaint may be attached to a Rule 12(b)(6) motion or incorporated by reference into the complaint by the Court for purposes of deciding a 12(b)(6) motion. See Rubio v. Capital One Bank, 613 F.3d 1195, 1199 (9th Cir. 2010) (permitting a court to consider a document submitted "'whose contents are alleged in [the] complaint and whose authenticity no party questions[.]' Branch v. Tunnell, 14 F.3d 449, 454 (9th Cir. 1994), overruled on other grounds by Galbraith v. County of Santa Clara, 307 F.3d 1119 (9th Cir. 2002)."); Davis v. HSBC Bank Nevada, N.A., 691 F.3d 1152, 1159-60 (9th Cir. 2012) ("the district court may, but is not required to incorporate documents by reference," and doing so will be reviewed for abuse of discretion). Stated more succinctly, if the complaint "necessarily relies" on a document, the Court may consider that document if: "(1) the complaint refers to the document; (2) the document is central to the plaintiff's claim; and (3) no party questions the authenticity of the copy attached to the 12(b)(6) motion." Marder v. Lopez, 450 F.3d 445, 448 (9th Cir. 2006) (citations omitted).
In some instances, per Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(d), a court may sua sponte convert a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss to a Rule 56 motion for summary judgment if "matters outside the pleadings are presented to and not excluded by the court." In re Mortgage Elec. Registration Sys., Inc., 754 F.3d 772, 781 (9th Cir. 2014) (refusing to make the conversion where a district court based its dismissal of a case entirely on deficiencies in the pleadings).
IV. DISCUSSION
Defendants ask this Court to find the Complaint deficient on four main grounds, including failure to adequately plead this type of case (given treatment by other federal courts in California and elsewhere), federal preemption of the claims at issue, bars by California law to bringing certain causes of action, and failure to plead with specificity sufficient to satisfy Fed. R. Civ. P. Rules 8 and 12(b)(6). Defendants argue that given the law on preemption and the state of the law in California, the case should be dismissed with prejudice. Plaintiffs oppose on all counts.
The Court is surprised that Plaintiff would file such a threadbare Complaint, but also recognizes that Plaintiff originally filed under the laws and standards applicable in state court rather than those for Federal Court per the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. The Court does not make any attempt to compare the standards or deduce if the Complaint might be adequate in its original jurisdiction -- what is clear and matters now is that the Complaint is clearly insufficient for maintaining a federal case.
Plaintiff argues the Complaint is sufficient, claiming that a complaint simply "must contain factual matter, accepted as true, to 'state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.'" See Opp'n at 5 (quoting Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678 (quoting Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570)). Yet even making all assumptions that would be favorable to the Complaint, see Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 664, the Complaint is the epitome of "[t]hreadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere conclusory statements," which simply "do not suffice." Twombly, 550 U.S. at 578. For the sake of clarity to Plaintiff, the Court reiterates that the allegations must be more than threadbare recitals and must be "sufficient allegations of underlying facts to give fair notice and to enable the opposing party to defend itself effectively" and "must plausibly suggest an entitlement to relief" such that "it is not unfair to require the opposing party to be subjected to the expense of discovery and continued litigation." Starr v. Baca, 652 F.3d 1202, 1216 (9th Cir. 2011). The Complaint here utterly fails to meet these standards, as none of the claims have pleaded sufficient facts to state a claim. Therefore, the claims must be DISMISSED. Defendants' motion is accordingly GRANTED.
However, the Court is not inclined to dismiss with prejudice. Certainly, it is not an improper request to ask the Court to take judicial notice of such matters as are referenced and relied upon in the Complaint. See Rubio, 613 F.3d at 1199; Marder, 450 F.3d at 448. It is also not unreasonable to ask the Court to consider preemption law or other legal bars to a claim. See Mot. at 8-18. However, even a preliminary review of cases likely relevant to the Court's analysis of preemption suggest that a close factual analysis will be required to determine if this is a case where claims run parallel to or are preempted by relevant federal law. See, e.g., Medtronic, Inc. v. Lohr, 518 U.S. 470 (1996), Stengel v. Medtronic, Inc., 704 F.3d 1224 (9th Cir. 2013) (en banc); see also Perez v. Nidek Co., 711 F.3d 1109, 1117-20 (9th Cir. 2013); Gilstrap v. United Air Lines, Inc., 709 F.3d 995, 1006 (9th Cir. 2013); McClellan v. I-Flow Corp., 776 F.3d 1035, 1040-41 (9th Cir. January 23, 2015). Other district courts within this Circuit have engaged in a careful, claim-by-claim analysis in deciding whether and how these cases should apply. See, e.g., Seedman v. Cochlear Americas, No. SACV 15-00366 JVS (JCGx), 2015 WL 4768239, at *8 (C.D. Cal. Aug. 10, 2015); Eidson v. Medtronic, Inc., 40 F. Supp. 3d 1202, 1231-33 (N.D. Cal. 2014); Ramirez v. Medtronic Inc., 961 F. Supp. 2d 977, 996 (D. Ariz. 2013), clarified on denial of reconsideration (Oct. 24, 2013). The Court is therefore loathe to embark on a legal analysis with such a sparsely developed Complaint where Plaintiff has yet to amend or be given any chance to fairly present its case. The Court thus declines the invitation to dismiss with prejudice.
V. CONCLUSION
Defendants' motion to dismiss is GRANTED. The Complaint is DISMISSED WITHOUT PREJUDICE. Plaintiff may file a First Amended Complaint within 30 days of the date of this Order. If still applicable, Defendants are permitted to again raise the same arguments brought forth in its current motion to dismiss. Plaintiff is advised that the Court will not forgo analysis of preemption or legal bars to this suit a second time if the Complaint remains similarly threadbare or fails to consider the information submitted in the motion for judicial notice. The motion for judicial notice is DENIED WITHOUT PREJUDICE.
Parties have been referred to private mediation. ECF No. 24. The deadline for mediation is hereby extended 30 days to permit Plaintiff an opportunity to file a First Amended Complaint.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
Dated: September 30, 2015
/s/_________
UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE