Hill v. Spirit Halloween Superstores LLC

• Court: District Court, W.D. Washington
• Decided: October 30, 2024
• Docket: 2:24-cv-01644
• Status: Unknown

Opinion

1 2

3 4 5 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT WESTERN DISTRICT OF WASHINGTON 6 AT SEATTLE 7 JEFFREY HILL, individually and on behalf of all others similarly situated, 8 Plaintiff, 9 v. 10 24-01644 TSZ SPIRIT HALLOWEEN 11 SUPERSTORES LLC, a foreign MINUTE ORDER limited liability company; and DOES 1- 12 20, as yet unknown Washington entities, 13 Defendants. 14

15 The following Minute Order is made by direction of the Court, the Honorable Thomas S. Zilly, United States District Judge: 16 (1) Having reviewed the Notice of Removal and the attached exhibits, docket no. 1, the Court is not satisfied that it has subject-matter jurisdiction pursuant to the Class 17 Action Fairness Act (“CAFA”), 28 U.S.C. § 1332(d). CAFA requires that an action removed from state court involve a class with at least 100 putative members, that at least 18 one plaintiff is diverse in citizenship from any defendant, and that the aggregate amount in controversy exceeds $5 million. See Moliga v. Qdoba Restaurant Corp., No. 23-CV- 19 1084, 2023 WL 5013439, at *4 (W.D. Wash. Aug. 7, 2023). The removing party has the burden of overcoming the strong presumption against removal jurisdiction by 20 establishing that the CAFA criteria are met. See Lindley Contours, LLC v. AABB Fitness Holdings, Inc., 414 F. App’x 62, 64 (9th Cir. 2011). With regard to the amount in 21 controversy, Defendant asserts that the maximum in potential statutory damages ($5,000) may be aggregated by class member, as opposed to statutory violation, and contends that 22 1 the approximately more than 1,000 individuals who applied during the period from January 1, 2023, to September 5, 2024, for job openings in Washington would be entitled 2 to at least $5,000,000. See Notice of Removal, pgs. 6-7 (docket no. 1). Defendant provides no authority for interpreting the statute to authorize the calculation of class 3 damages in this manner. Defendant is DIRECTED to file by November 8, 2024, a supplement to the Notice of Removal addressing whether the Court has CAFA 4 jurisdiction. 5 (2) The Clerk is directed to send a copy of this Minute Order to all counsel of record. 6 Dated this 30th day of October, 2024. 7 Ravi Subramanian 8 Clerk 9 s/Laurie Cuaresma Deputy Clerk 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22