HARRISBURG – A federal judge recently rejected a motion for reconsideration of the dismissal of a lawsuit brought by a woman who was severely injured at an on-campus social event, after a night of underage drinking and illicit drug use at the York College of Pennsylvania.
Savannah Ruiz-Rivera filed a lawsuit on Sept. 20, alleging negligence, after she became intoxicated, used drugs and fell off a balcony in September 2017, at a series of fraternity and sorority parties at York College’s Spring Garden Apartments.
The case was filed against York College, the local chapters and national organizations of the Phi Kappa Psi, Kappa Delta Phi, Zeta Beta Tau and Sigma Delta Tau fraternities and sororities, plus Bryan Soto and 10 John Doe defendants.
In addition to a dismissal motion from York College, both the local chapters and national organizations of Phi Kappa Psi and Sigma Delta Tau named in the lawsuit respectively filed motions to dismiss the lawsuit, which claimed Ruiz-Rivera falsely asserted agency relationship and that it did not host, participate in the planning or was present at the event Ruiz-Rivera attended.
In her Jan. 13 response to Sigma Delta Tau’s dismissal motion, Ruiz-Rivera argues she “was served alcohol despite being under age 21 and/or while being visibly intoxicated” and was “given illicit drugs at the same event by moving defendant’s agents and/or its members and/or its local chapter.”
It was a rationale that did not meet with favor in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, which threw out Ruiz-Rivera’s lawsuit for failure to state a claim on Feb. 25.
“Plaintiff’s claims amount to no more than a fishing expedition. Plaintiff does not allege, for example, that any of the defendants or their agents coerced her into drinking or using drugs or that they manipulated her into jumping off the balcony, nor does she allege that any of the defendants or their agents pushed her,” U.S. District Court Judge John E. Jones III said.
“Plaintiff has also failed to allege how the balcony from which she presumably fell was in any way deficient or why the national organizations of the named fraternity or sorority defendants would be responsible to maintain said deficient balcony. Instead, plaintiff simply recites the elements of her cause of action and relies upon legal conclusions which this Court need not credit.”
In February, Jones added the Court was “unpersuaded” by Ruiz-Rivera’s argument that further discovery will reveal evidence of the basis of her case, that such a process would constitute a “wild goose chase” and that the defendants were not proven to be the legal or factual cause of Ruiz-Rivera’s damages.
“Although we are sympathetic to plaintiff’s debilitating injuries, other than cursory legal conclusions, she has failed entirely to plead any facts which suggest that said injuries were the result of the negligent acts of the named defendants,” Jones said.
Ruiz-Rivera filed a motion for reconsideration on March 9, but Jones responded on May 14 that he felt the plaintiff did not put forth sufficient facts to support a reconsideration of the previous dismissal of her case.
“Although she has lodged several unsupported and conclusory allegations against the various defendants – allegations that she regurgitates in the instant motion – those remarks amount to no more than legal conclusions that the Court need not credit,” Jones said.
“We concluded in our memorandum of Feb. 25, 2020, that plaintiff had failed entirely to plead any facts which support her view that the named defendants breached any duty they owed to her or that they were the actual or proximate cause of her injury. The instant motion does not change this analysis, nor does it cast a suspicious shadow on our reasoning.”
Jones added Ruiz-Rivera cited a police report where she claimed to corroborate the allegations she raised in her complaint, but did not refer to the report in the complaint itself or amend her complaint to include it.
The simple fact that plaintiff cites materials that were never included in her complaint itself necessarily undermines the complaint’s sufficiency.
“When a party has within its possession supplemental material that it intends to incorporate into an amended complaint, such a change is ordinarily initiated by seeking leave to amend – not by sitting idly by and then filing a motion for relief from judgment. In closing, we note that, even were we to construe plaintiff’s motion as an ordinary motion for reconsideration, plaintiff has not provided any basis for this Court to reconsider its order,” Jones stated.
Jones concluded the plaintiff’s motion “does no more than simply ask this Court to reconsider a reasoned decision with which she disagrees and this we will not do without adequate justification.”
The plaintiff’s appeal of the case to the U.S. Court of Appeals to the Third Circuit had been stayed, pending the disposition of this motion for reconsideration.
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit case 20-1649
U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania case 1:19-cv-01636
From the Pennsylvania Record: Reach Courts Reporter Nicholas Malfitano at nick.malfitano@therecordinc.com