United States v. Mottolo

107 F.R.D. 267, 23 ERC 1292, 23 ERC (BNA) 1292, 1985 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 17744
District Court, D. New Hampshire·Decided July 18, 1985·No. Civ. Nos. 83-547-D, 84-90-D·Published·Cited by 3 cases

Opinion

ORDER

DEVINE, Chief Judge.

This is a civil action brought under section 107(a) of the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liabil[268]*268ity Act of 1980 (“CERCLA”), 42 U.S.C. § 9607(a), for reimbursement of costs incurred by plaintiffs United States of America and State of New Hampshire in the cleanup of a hazardous waste site in Raymond, New Hampshire. By Order of April 24, 1985, this Court granted a motion for continuance, all parties concurring, of the then-scheduled June 17, 1985, trial date. The matter now comes before the Court on motions by plaintiffs United States and New Hampshire to amend their complaints to include a request for a declaratory judgment holding that defendants are liable for any future response costs which may be incurred by plaintiffs at the Raymond, New Hampshire, site. Defendants strongly oppose the motion, claiming plaintiffs have been dilatory in amending their complaint and that the proposed amendment would unduly prejudice defendants at this late stage of the proceeding. Plaintiffs argue that the proposed amendment is limited to the liability issue already before the Court and that recovery of any future costs would be the subject of a separate proceeding sometime in the future.

The Court finds that plaintiffs’ motion to amend their complaints should be granted with the condition that discovery be reopened and trial postponed until such time as plaintiffs present a final and specific ad damnum covering all CERCLA damages which plaintiffs seek to recover from defendants in connection with the Raymond site. In so ruling, the Court finds that the piecemeal litigation strategy proposed by plaintiffs would violate the doctrine against claim-splitting and would defeat the interests of fairness and the economic use of scant judicial resources.

Rule 15(a), Fed.R.Civ.P., provides that leave to amend the pleadings “shall be freely given when justice so requires”. Foman v. Davis, 371 U.S. 178, 182, 83 S.Ct. 227, 230, 9 L.Ed.2d 222 (1962). In exercising its discretion to grant leave to amend, the Court must consider such factors as undue delay, bad faith, dilatory motive, repeated failure to cure deficiencies by previous amendments, undue prejudice to the party, or futility of the amendment. Id. Defendants claim that plaintiffs have been dilatory in amending their complaint to include a claim for future cleanup cost recovery in that plaintiffs knew as early as January 1985 that future cleanup activities were under consideration by the Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”) but waited until June 1985 to seek amendment of the complaint. However, the Court finds that as soon as the speculative possibility of further cleanup activity crystallized into a first-stage EPA proposal to add the Raymond site to the National Priorities List, established under section 105(8) of CERCLA, 42 U.S.C. § 9605(8), 50 Fed.Reg. 14115 (April 10,1985), plaintiffs seasonably moved to amend the complaint to accommodate the proposed action, filing the proposed amendment on May 14, 1985. Therefore, the Court finds no dilatory behavior warranting denial of-the requested amendment. Defendants further object that the proposed amendment would require costly additional discovery, just when case preparation appeared to be complete and the case ready for trial. However, the Court notes that the trial date already has been extended to accommodate defense counsel, and that defendants will have ample additional discovery opportunity prior to the rescheduling of the trial date. Therefore, the Court rules that plaintiffs may amend their complaint to seek reimbursement of future cleanup costs.

However, the Court grants this amendment on the condition that trial of this action will not proceed until such time as plaintiffs have presented a comprehensive and quantified ad damnum and until such time as the parties have thoroughly explored the possibility of settlement. Thus, the Court rejects the plaintiffs’ proposal to try this action in multiple stages: a first-stage proceeding to recover the costs of cleanup efforts already completed and to secure an open-ended judgment for all future cleanup activities; and a second stage, or possibly several successive stages, to present an accounting of additional cleanup activities which might be performed sometime in the future. Although plaintiffs ar[269]*269gue that the remedial purposes of CERCLA require this approach to reimbursement of the Hazardous Substance Response Fund, 42 U.S.C. §§ 9611-9612, the Court finds no mandate in CERCLA for a “rolling-accounting” procedure whereby the Government may seek judgment for unlimited damages and return at its convenience to seek additional payments from defendants. While CERCLA was intended to provide the federal government with the tools necessary for prompt and effective response to the hazardous waste disposal threat and to impose the costs and responsibilities for remedial action upon persons responsible for the creation of the hazardous waste disposal threat, see United States v. Reilly Tar and Chemical Corp., 546 F.Supp. 1100, 1110, 1112 (D.Minn.1982), the Act contains no indication that it was intended to suspend the doctrine against splitting claims, which is one application of the general doctrine of res judicata. As the First Circuit Court of Appeals noted in Sutcliffe Storage and Warehouse Co. v. United States, 162 F.2d 849, 851 (1st Cir.1947):

There is no reason why a court should be bothered or a litigant harassed with duplicating lawsuits on the same docket; it is enough if one complete adjudication of the controversy be had. As a matter of fact, it is often an advantage to the plaintiff to have the issue of double suits settled before he finds himself barred from full recovery by a partial but final judgment in one action.

See also Mendez v. Bowie, 118 F.2d 435, 440-41 (1st Cir.), cert. denied, 314 U.S. 639, 62 S.Ct. 76, 86 L.Ed. 513 (1941). Plaintiffs will not be permitted to bring successive actions for additional damages, but instead must finally resolve all CERCLA issues and damage claims in one consolidated trial. See Mashpee Tribe v. Watt, 707 F.2d 23, 24 (1st Cir.1983) (res judicata barred second action where claims were the same, or logically dependent upon, basic claim presented in first case); 21 Fed.Proc., L.Ed. § 51:202 (1984). Fairness and judicial economy require that plaintiffs be permitted to proceed to trial only after they have presented a finalized ad damnum, thereby enabling one dispositive hearing consolidating all CERCLA claims.1 Once plaintiffs have quantified their damages claims against defendants, the parties will be given sufficient time to thoroughly explore the possibilities of settlement.2

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

United States v. Mottolo, 107 F.R.D. 267, 23 ERC 1292, 23 ERC (BNA) 1292, 1985 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 17744 (D.N.H. 1985).

107 F.R.D. 267 (United States v. Mottolo) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

Related

Pinal Creek Group v. Newmont Mining Corp.
218 F.R.D. 652 (D. Arizona, 2003)
Rockwell International Corp. v. IU International Corp.
702 F. Supp. 1384 (N.D. Illinois, 1988)
United States v. Mottolo
695 F. Supp. 615 (D. New Hampshire, 1988)