PITTSBURGH – A federal judge has pointed to a lack of jurisdiction for his dismissal of several defendants from litigation surrounding a municipal feud, over property a nonprofit group purchased to help provide military veterans with service dogs.
In a Feb. 24 memorandum opinion, U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania Judge Mark R. Hornak ordered the removal of defendants All But Forgotten, Inc., Andrea Palmer and Nick Lnu, from a lawsuit brought by plaintiffs Wendi Kraemer and Angels Journey Home Rescue versus Rostraver Township and other officials.
“Plaintiff Kraemer is the CEO of plaintiff Angels Journey Home Rescue, a non-profit corporation that works with veterans and provides them with service and therapy dogs. Plaintiff Rescue is located at Kraemer’s property in Belle Vernon, PA. Kraemer purchased that property in 2015, and ‘various members of the community have informed’ Kraemer that defendant Gary Beck – who was, at all times relevant to the complaint, a Commissioner of defendant Rostraver Township – wanted to purchase that property before Kraemer’s offer was accepted. In sum and substance, a feud with Beck appears to have ensued and Kraemer alleges that, as a result, members of the community alongside Beck and Frank Monack, a zoning officer for the defendant Township – have intentionally made it more difficult to run her rescue,” Hornak said.
“For instance, she alleges that ‘on several occasions throughout the years,’ including from approximately April through November 2021, ‘defendant Township’s garbage collection service refused to collect’ trash from her property. Plaintiff also alleges that a band of community members – many of whom are defendants in this action but are otherwise not relevant here – posted defamatory statements about her online, alleging that she is a hoarder and calling the legitimacy of plaintiff Rescue into question. As a result of these statements, plaintiff’s fundraising page on Cuddly.com was disabled, thereby impairing her ability to fundraise. Moreover, in the wake of a fire that damaged Kraemer’s property, plaintiff was allegedly given inaccurate information about permitting by defendant Township officials, was treated differently than other similarly-situated individuals in that she was required to obtain a structural engineer’s report and later had difficulty getting the necessary permits for construction – all allegedly in retaliation for her running feud with Beck.”
After the aforementioned fire, the Rescue’s animals were in need of temporary homes, and several individuals volunteered to house the displaced animals. Defendant Palmer, an employee of defendant ABF, allegedly contacted several of those volunteers via text message and told them, in her capacity as a humane officer for ABF, not to return the animals to Kraemer and plaintiff Rescue.
In addition, Palmer allegedly told several individuals that she wanted to “build a case” against plaintiffs for not properly vetting their animals and described Kraemer as a “hoarder.” Meanwhile, Kraemer further alleged that defendant Pesante trespassed in her residence and dumped trash inside her house.
Kraemer filed her complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania on Aug. 25, 2022, while defendants Palmer and ABF filed a motion to dismiss the caser’s defamation claim on Nov. 17 and defendant Pesante filed a separate dismissal motion towards the case for lack of jurisdiction on Feb. 2.
Hornak explained that “at issue here is the propriety of this Court’s exercise of supplemental jurisdiction over purely state law claims – the only claims alleged against Palmer, ABF and Pesante under 28 U.S.C. Section 1367, which confers ‘supplemental jurisdiction over all other claims that are so related to claims in the action within’ a District Court’s ‘original jurisdiction that they form part of the same case or controversy under Article III of the United States Constitution.”
According to Hornak, “no party to this case has disputed that the first requirement the propriety of this Court’s jurisdiction over the purportedly federal claims is met in this case [and] nor can the Court see any reason to do so.”
Hornak added that “the federal claims are brought under 42 U.S.C. Section 1983 for alleged violations of federal Constitutional rights on the part of representatives of Rostraver Township [and] whether or not those claims prove to be meritorious, they ‘arise under’ the laws of the United States and therefore this Court has subject matter jurisdiction over them.”
“Under the test articulated in Gibbs and restated by the Third Circuit in MCI Telecommunications, this Court lacks subject matter jurisdiction to hear the state law defamation claims against Palmer and ABF. There is no common nucleus of operative fact with the claims alleged against the Section 1983 defendants, and the two sets of clams would not ordinarily be tried in a single judicial proceeding. The allegations against defendants Palmer and ABF are essentially that – in Palmer’s role as a humane officer for ABF Palmer defamed Kraemer by instructing volunteers who had taken in the Rescue’s animals after a fire on Kraemer’s property not to return those animals to Kraemer and the Rescue; stating that she wanted to ‘build a case’ against Kraemer and the rescue for not properly ‘vetting’ their animals; and describing Kraemer as a ‘hoarder,” Hornak stated.
“Though there is a loose connection between the federal claims and the defamation claim against Palmer and ABF in that they involve, to some degree, the fire that occurred on Kraemer’s property, animals generally, and plaintiff Kraemer’s work with plaintiff Rescue, the connection falls short of a ‘common nucleus of operative fact.’ The fact that plaintiffs have not alleged that defendants Palmer and ABF acted in concert or conspiracy with the Section1983 defendants also detracts from their argument that supplemental jurisdiction is appropriate here. Moreover, here…plaintiffs have not cited to a single similar case in which a court found that state law tort claims had a common nucleus of operative fact with a federal civil rights claim alleged against separate individuals for different acts or omissions.”
Since the Court concluded it had no jurisdiction to consider the state law defamation claim against Palmer and ABF (and that is the only claim in the complaint that pertains to either of them) Count VIII was dismissed as to Palmer and ABF, and both were removed as defendants in this case.
Likewise, Hornak found the Court also had no jurisdiction to consider the state law trespass claim against Pesante, which was the only claim in the complaint that pertains to him. As a result, he dismissed Count VI as to Pesante and he was terminated as a party in the case.
“The connection between the facts that concern Pesante and those that undergird the Section 1983 claims is tenuous at best. The factual allegations pertaining to Pesante are simply that, after a fire on Kraemer’s property, Pesante trespassed on that property and deposited trash there. Plaintiffs allege that the common nucleus of operative fact between the Section 1983 claims and the trespassing claim against Pesante is the fire,” Hornak stated.
“However, the fire has almost nothing to do with the Section 1983 claims except that plaintiffs also allege that the two Township officials implicated in the Section 1983 claim also trespassed on her property after that fire and that, in the wake of that fire, the Section 1983 defendants committed constitutional violations in the discharge of their official duties. Again, plaintiff does not assert that Pesante acted in concert with the Township officials to inflict the alleged harm on her. This is merely a ‘tangential overlap’ in facts ‘insufficient’ to confer supplemental jurisdiction under Section 1367.”
On July 24, defendants Erin Cassidy, Patricia Cole, Renee Barnes and Libby Williams filed a joint motion to dismiss without prejudice all claims against them, along with requesting the dismissal without prejudice of all cross-claims filed on behalf of defendants Cassidy, Cole and Williams.
Hornak signed an order which granted their motion on July 25.
“For the reasons previously set forth in the Court’s Opinion and Order entered Feb. 24, 2023, the Court concludes that it lacks subject matter jurisdiction over all claims against defendants Erin Cassidy, Patricia Cole and Renee Barnes. The Court therefore dismisses without prejudice Counts VII, VIII, IX and X of the complaint as they pertain to defendants Cassidy, Cole and Barnes. As to defendant Libby Williams, although the Court has jurisdiction based on diversity of citizenship, the parties have jointly requested that the Court also dismiss without prejudice Count X of the complaint as to defendant Williams. The Court therefore grants the joint motion to dismiss without prejudice Count X of the complaint as to defendant Williams,” Hornak said.
“In light of the dismissal of all claims set forth in the complaint against defendants Cassidy, Cole, Barnes and Williams, the parties also have jointly requested that the Court also dismiss without prejudice all cross-claims filed by defendant Williams and by defendants Cassidy and Cole. The Court hereby grants the joint motion to dismiss as to said cross-claims, and said cross-claims are hereby dismissed without prejudice.”
U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania case 2:23-cv-01232
From the Pennsylvania Record: Reach Courts Reporter Nicholas Malfitano at nick.malfitano@therecordinc.com