Donnahue George v. William Snyder, et al.

[DO NOT PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
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No. 20-11648
Non-Argument Calendar
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D.C. Docket No. 0:19-cv-61827-RAR
DONNAHUE GEORGE,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
versus
WILLIAM SNYDER,
WESTWAY TOWING,
FORT LAUDERDALE CODE ENFORCEMENT,
JOHN DOE,
Defendants-Appellees.
________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of Florida
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(February 12, 2021)
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Before WILSON, GRANT, and ANDERSON, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Federal pleading rules serve a dual purpose. First, they ensure that the
defendants have fair notice of the claims against them so that they can frame an
appropriate defense. And, second, they guarantee that the district court will have
“a clear and definitive response before it,” so it can “recognize the parties’ claims
and defenses, identify the issues of fact to be litigated, and proceed to a just result.”
Davis v. Coca-Cola Bottling Co. Consol., 516 F.3d 955, 979 (11th Cir. 2008). The
district court found that Donnahue George, a pro se plaintiff, violated those
pleading rules when he submitted a threadbare and conclusory complaint, leaving
the court and the defendants unable to discern and analyze his claims. So it
dismissed his complaint.
George believes that this dismissal was in error. He also contends that the
court erred in other ways, including incorrectly setting aside the clerk’s entry of
default against the defendants and striking the defendants’ separate motions to
dismiss and ordering them to file a joint motion. Because we find that the district
court did not abuse its discretion in any of these decisions, we will affirm.
I.
Donnahue George alleges that on March 18, 2019, William Snyder entered
his property and, with the help of West Way Towing Co., stole his vehicle from his
covered driveway. George’s neighbors called to alert him that his vehicle was
being towed. When they put Snyder on the phone, George informed him that the
vehicle was his and that it was parked legally on his own property. But rather than
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return the vehicle, Snyder hung up and “proceeded to tow the vehicle and submit
the false report to his department that stated he did not know who the owner of the
vehicle was and that it was derelict.”
George spent the next several months trying to recover his vehicle. He went
to the Fort Lauderdale Police Department and to “code enforcement,” but was told
only that his vehicle was towed because it was derelict. So he called West Way
Towing. They put him on hold three times and never returned his call. He wrote
to “code enforcement” and to the City of Fort Lauderdale. Again, no reply.
As a last resort, he filed this lawsuit. In his first attempt at drafting his
complaint, he completed a handwritten five-page form, alleging generally that
“William Snyder conspired with [West Way] Towing to deprive Plaintiff of his
constitutional rights by illegally stealing his property from his premises without
legal authority and fabricating information to cover up the theft.” The district
court promptly sua sponte dismissed the case without prejudice because the
“Plaintiff’s Complaint fail[ed] to state a claim upon which relief may be granted.”
Specifically, the court noted that Rule 8(a)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil
Procedure requires a complaint to contain a “short and plain statement of the
claim” showing that the plaintiff is entitled to relief. In that first complaint,
George had not included “sufficient factual matter, that if accepted as true, allows
the Court to reasonably infer that Defendants are liable for any misconduct or
wrongdoing, or what the claim or claims against each of them may be.”
A few months later, George moved to reopen his case and to file an amended
complaint. The district court granted that motion. The case then sat; no
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defendants appeared. George eventually filed affidavits showing that he had
served the defendants and asked the clerk to enter default. After the clerk’s entry
of default was noted on the docket, George moved for a default judgment against
all the defendants.
Within days of that motion being filed, counsel for West Way Towing,
Snyder, and Fort Lauderdale Code Enforcement entered their appearances and
moved to set aside the clerk’s entry of default. George, they explained, had only
served his original complaint on them—not the amended complaint. Once they
discovered that the case had been dismissed sua sponte by the court, they assumed
the matter was closed. But when they were notified of the clerk’s entry of default
against them, they quickly entered their appearances and moved to set aside the
default. The district court found that the defendants had established good cause for
failing to appear, so it set aside the entry of default and allowed the case to
proceed.
The defendants then filed separate motions to dismiss the amended
complaint. But the district court struck those motions because the court’s policies
and procedures prohibited “filing of separate motions, unless there are clear
conflicts of positions.” It instructed the defendants to refile with a joint motion.
After briefing on the motion to dismiss was completed, the court dismissed
George’s amended complaint. Again repeating the Rule 8(a) requirements, the
court noted that George had “failed to remedy the deficiencies noted by this Court
in its prior Order Dismissing Case.”
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II.
The district court dismissed George’s complaint as a shotgun pleading,
violating the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure’s pleading requirements. A district
court possesses “inherent authority to control its docket and ensure the prompt
resolution of lawsuits, which in some circumstances includes the power to dismiss
a complaint for failure to comply with Rule 8(a)(2) and Rule 10(b)” of the Federal
Rules of Civil Procedure. Weiland v. Palm Beach Cnty. Sheriff’s Off., 792 F.3d
1313, 1320 (11th Cir. 2015). We review those dismissals for abuse of discretion.
Id.
Though pro se parties’ pleadings are liberally construed by courts, the
litigants are not relieved from following procedural rules. Albra v. Advan, Inc.,
490 F.3d 826, 829 (11th Cir. 2007). Rule 8(a) sets standards for the content of
pleadings, requiring complaints to provide a “short and plain statement of the
grounds for the court’s jurisdiction,” a “short and plain statement of the claim
showing that the pleader is entitled to relief,” and a “demand for the relief sought.”
Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(1)–(3). Rule 10(b) regulates the form of those pleadings,
stating that a “party must state its claims or defenses in numbered paragraphs” and
must assert “each claim founded on a separate transaction or occurrence” in a
“separate count.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 10(b). Pleadings that violate these rules are
known as “shotgun pleadings.”
Shotgun pleadings take many different forms, but their “unifying
characteristic” is that they fail to give the defendants “adequate notice of the claims
against them and the grounds upon which each claim rests.” Weiland, 792 F.3d at
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1323. The most common type is a complaint that contains “multiple counts where
each count adopts the allegations of all preceding counts, causing each successive
count to carry all that came before and the last count to be a combination of the
entire complaint.” Id. at 1321. But a complaint that commits the “sin of not
separating into a different count each cause of action or claim for relief” or the “sin
of asserting multiple claims against multiple defendants without specifying which
of the defendants are responsible for which acts or omissions, or which of the
defendants the claim is brought against,” is equally prohibited. Id. at 1323.
The district court determined George’s amended complaint fell into this
latter category. The complaint did not “include sufficient factual matter that would
allow the Court to reasonably infer that Defendants are liable for any misconduct
or wrongdoing, or what the claim or claims against each of them may be.” It
recited facts but did “not contain any counts,” nor did it make any attempt to tether
the factual allegations to the various claims. It did not contain enough factual
allegations for the court to determine the “basis of its subject matter jurisdiction.”
And it set forth only “vague and conclusory allegations.” The district court
dismissed the complaint because, in sum, it failed to “comply with the Federal
Rules of Civil Procedure and federal pleading standards, and does not provide a
sufficient basis for this Court to find subject matter jurisdiction.”
We find no abuse of discretion in this decision. Though George’s
amended complaint is an improvement upon his first, it still did not provide the
defendants adequate notice of the claims against them, for the reasons the district
court outlined. George’s brief on appeal now does a better job tethering his factual
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allegations to his particular causes of action, but that information is lacking in his
pleading. He cannot amend his complaint now through his appellate briefing.
We emphasize, though, that the district court dismissed this case on
procedural grounds and, it appears, without prejudice.1 George may have real and
valid claims against West Way Towing, Snyder, or the Fort Lauderdale Code
Enforcement. He remains free to try again with a new complaint that contains
clear factual allegations tethered to specific counts against particular defendants, as
required by Rules 8(a) and 10(b).
III.
George also claims two other errors by the district court. First, he suggests
that the district court incorrectly set aside the clerk’s entry of default, and second,
he argues that the court impermissibly struck the defendants’ separate motions to
dismiss. We review both orders for abuse of discretion. Compania
Interamericana Exp.-Imp., S.A. v. Compania Dominicana de Aviacion, 88 F.3d
948, 951 (11th Cir. 1996); Scantland v. Jeffry Knight, Inc., 721 F.3d 1308, 1320
(11th Cir. 2013). Under this standard, we must “affirm unless we find that the
district court has made a clear error of judgment, or has applied the wrong legal
1 The district court never stated whether the dismissal was with or without prejudice. A district
court may dismiss a case for failure to comply with court rules “under the authority of either
Rule 41(b) or the court’s inherent power to manage its docket.” Weiland, 792 F.3d at 1321 n.10.
To dismiss with prejudice under Rule 41(b), the court must find that “(1) a party engages in a
clear pattern of delay or willful contempt (contumacious conduct); and (2) the district court
specifically finds that lesser sanctions would not suffice.” Betty K Agencies, LTD. v. M/V
Monada, 432 F.3d 1333, 1337–38 (11th Cir. 2005) (quotation omitted). Because the “order does
not cite Rule 41(b)” or “make the findings necessary to justify a dismissal under that provision,”
we will assume it dismissed under its inherent power to manage its docket and that it was done
without prejudice. See Weiland, 792 F.3d at 1319–20.
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standard.” Robinson v. Tyson Foods, Inc., 595 F.3d 1269, 1273 (11th Cir. 2010)
(quotation omitted).
Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 55(c), the district court “may set
aside an entry of default for good cause.” Good cause is not precisely defined and
often depends upon the court’s consideration of whether “the default was culpable
or willful, whether setting it aside would prejudice the adversary, and whether the
defaulting party presents a meritorious defense.” Compania, 88 F.3d at 951.
The district court correctly applied that standard here, finding good cause for
vacating the entry of default. The defendants, it said, were not “properly served
with the Amended Complaint; as such their default was not culpable or willful.”
More, the court noted that the defendants “acted promptly to vacate the Clerk’s
Entry of Default” and that “vacating the Clerk’s Default will not unduly prejudice
Plaintiff.” Because George has not identified any clear error in the district court’s
judgment, we will affirm.
Finally, the district court did not err in striking the defendants’ separate
motions to dismiss and ordering that they file a joint motion. District courts have
“broad discretion” in managing their cases. Chrysler Int’l Corp. v. Chemaly, 280
F.3d 1358, 1360 (11th Cir. 2002). Because of the “caseload of most district courts
and the fact that cases can sometimes stretch out over years,” district courts may
use this discretion to ensure that their cases “move to a reasonably timely and
orderly conclusion.” Id. That is all that the district court’s order did here. By
striking the separate motions and requiring a joint motion to be filed in compliance
with the court’s rules, it tried to streamline the case. Contrary to George’s
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contentions, nothing in this order gave “defense strategies to the defendants,”
evidenced any sort of bias toward the defendants, or suggested in any way that the
court abused its discretion.
* * *
Because we find no abuse of discretion in any of the district court’s orders
challenged by George, we AFFIRM.
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