Opinion
No. 07 C 5166.
September 14, 2007
MEMORANDUM ORDER
NRD Investments LLC ("NRD") has just filed this breach of contract action against Neumann Homes, Inc. and Kenneth P. Neumann, invoking federal jurisdiction on diversity-of-citizenship grounds. Although Complaint ¶¶ 3 and 4 properly identify both defendants' Illinois citizenship (dual citizenship as to the corporate defendant under 28 U.S.C. § 1332(c)(1)), all that is said regarding NRD is this (Complaint ¶ 2):
Plaintiff NRD is a Michigan limited liability company, all of the members of which are citizens of the State of Michigan.
Although on its face that allegation reflects the required diversity, it fails to identify NRD's members. And that missing information is necessary to enable this Court to exercise its independent obligation to confirm the existence of subject matter jurisdiction — it is entirely possible, for example, for an NRD member itself to be an unincorporated entity (such as another limited company, as is quite often the case), in which event more layers of the citizenship onion have to be peeled away to confirm complete diversity.
Accordingly, NRD's counsel are ordered to file an appropriate amendment to Complaint ¶ 2 (not a fully self-contained Amended Complaint) on or before September 24, 2007. And while counsel are returning to the drawing board for that purpose, it would be well for them also to provide as exhibits to the Complaint copies of all of the agreements referred to in the Complaint, so that this Court will be enabled to play with a full deck.