John Morris Anderson v. Jp Morgan Chase Bank

NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
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No. 24-1718
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JOHN MORRIS ANDERSON,
Appellant
v.
JP MORGAN CHASE BANK
____________________________________
On Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania
(E.D. Pa. Civ. No. 2:22-cv-05084)
District Judge: Honorable Mia R. Perez
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Submitted Pursuant to Third Circuit L.A.R. 34.1(a)
September 11, 2024
Before: JORDAN, PHIPPS, and NYGAARD, Circuit Judges
(Opinion filed: September 13, 2024)
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OPINION*
___________
PER CURIAM
John Morris Anderson accompanied his friend and neighbor Charles James to a
JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A. branch location in South Philadelphia. Anderson had agreed
* This disposition is not an opinion of the full Court and pursuant to I.O.P. 5.7 does not
constitute binding precedent.

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to help James open an account to deposit a $62,000 check, and James agreed to give
Anderson $7,000 of that deposit in order to repay a debt. At the branch, the pair were told
by a Chase associate that funds could not be transferred directly from James’s new
account to Anderson’s Chase account and, further, that a check written against the new
account could not be cashed for five business days. James then wrote a $7,000 check to
Anderson, who did not wait five business days before depositing it into an account he
held with PNC Bank. Two days later, Chase returned the $7,000 check as “unpaid,” and
PNC charged Anderson a $12 returned-check fee. Apparently, Chase, with knowledge of
the debt-repayment agreement between Anderson and James, had frozen James’s account
out of concern that Anderson was a “scammer” trying to take advantage of James. Chase
conveyed as much during a phone call with James, who disputed Chase’s assessment.
Proceeding pro se, Anderson filed this federal action against Chase, raising four
claims he described as “racial discrimination” (Anderson and James are both Black),
“defamation,” “disparagement,” and “interference with an advantageous business
relationship,” respectively.1 Anderson tied Chase’s freezing of James’s account to the
following injuries: Anderson had to loan James an additional sum of money; Anderson’s
and James’s friendship deteriorated; and James backed out of a contractual agreement to
1 Before filing this action, Anderson sued Chase in state court; his thrice-amended
complaint was dismissed with prejudice. See Anderson v. Chase Bank, Case No.
220500692 (C.C.P. Phila.). After filing this action, Anderson filed two more against
Chase. See Anderson v. J.P. Morgan Chase Bank, DC ECF No. 2:24-cv-04193 (E.D.
Pa.); Anderson v. J.P. Morgan Chase Bank, DC Civ. No. 2:24-cv-01425 (E.D. Pa.). All of
this litigation is rooted in Anderson’s and James’s experience at the Chase branch.

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assist with Anderson’s business venture. For relief, Anderson demanded damages
exceeding half of a billion dollars.
Chase moved to dismiss Anderson’s complaint under Federal Rule of Civil
Procedure 12(b)(6). The District Court granted Chase’s motion, after carefully
scrutinizing (and accepting as true) the allegations in Anderson’s complaint in order to
determine whether any of his claims had been adequately pleaded. Cf. Ashcroft v. Iqbal,
556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009).2
The District Court considered whether Anderson had stated a claim under the
Pennsylvania Human Relations Act or under Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and
ultimately determined that the complaint lacked allegations demonstrating (1) the
required exhaustion of administrative remedies (for the state law claim), or (2) the denial
of services by Chase to Anderson (rather than to James), or (3) a cognizable agency
relationship between Anderson and James. In addition, the District Court considered and
rejected the possibility that Chase’s private communication to James about its suspicion
he was being scammed was the cause of injury to Anderson and could otherwise support
a plausible Pennsylvania law claim for defamation, commercial disparagement, or
tortious interference with contractual relations. The District Court also considered
whether Anderson was trying to raise a claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1981; it concluded that
Anderson had failed to state such a claim because he failed to plausibly plead either an
2 Implicit in the District Court’s decision to grant Chase’s Rule 12(b)(6) motion is a
decision to deny, as moot, Anderson’s motion for summary judgment and Chase’s motion
to strike Anderson’s motion. The better practice would have been for the District Court to
explicitly adjudicate those motions in the final order.

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intent by Chase to racially discriminate against Anderson, or a causal connection between
Chase’s actions and James’s alleged breach of his business contract with Anderson.
Anderson now appeals. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. Our review
is de novo. See Lorenz v. CSX Corp., 1 F.3d 1406, 1411 (3d Cir. 1993).
For substantially the reasons given in the District Court’s opinion, we discern no
error in its analysis of Anderson’s complaint. We add only this: The District Court,
insofar as it perceived in Anderson’s complaint a potential civil rights claim, should have
sua sponte granted Anderson leave to fix his claim with an amended pleading, or instead
determined that amendment would be inequitable or futile. See Fletcher-Harlee Corp. v.
Pote Concrete Contractors, Inc., 482 F.3d 247, 251-52 (3d Cir. 2007). Because
amendment would have indeed been futile, the District Court’s omission was harmless.3
The judgment of the District Court will be affirmed. Chase’s motion for leave to
file a supplemental appendix, inclusive of its request for judicial notice, is denied.
3 Anderson’s opening brief cites a ruling in James’s separately filed (but factually
similar) action against Chase. See James v. J.P. Morgan Chase Bank, DC Civ. No. 2:23-
cv-1918, ECF No. 25 (E.D. Pa. Feb. 29, 2024). There, the District Court allowed James’s
claim for tortious interference to proceed to discovery. The ruling in James was available
to Anderson before the underlying action was dismissed, yet Anderson did not bring it to
the District Court’s attention. We generally do not consider arguments made for the first
time on appeal. Regardless, and insofar as our futility assessment is concerned, we are
not persuaded that the James ruling provides a path for Anderson to plead a viable claim.

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