Devore v. City of Philadelphia

Full title: JOHN DEVORE v. CITY OF PHILADELPHIA, et al

Court: United States District Court, E.D. Pennsylvania

Date published: Jun 24, 2003

CIVIL ACTION NO. 00-3598 (E.D. Pa. Jun. 24, 2003)

Opinion

CIVIL ACTION NO. 00-3598.

June 24, 2003.

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

JACOB HART, Magistrate Judge

After an eight day trial in this Title VII / § 1983 case, the jury returned a verdict for the Plaintiff against the city of Philadelphia, John Timoney, John Norris, Thomas Healey, and Joseph Sweeney. Although the jury did not find the Defendants liable for racial discrimination, they did find that the Plaintiff's civil rights had been violated. The jury awarded the Plaintiff a total of $430,000, including minimal punitive damages against each of the individual Defendants. The court entered judgment on the verdict. Thereafter, both sides briefed the court on the feasibility of reinstatement in lieu of the front pay award of $105,000. The Defendants filed a Motion for Judgment as a Matter of Law or in the alternative, a New Trial, and the Plaintiffs filed Motions to Mold the Verdict and for Attorneys' Fees.

While the court was considering the post-verdict motions, we were informed by both sides that the case had been resolved.¹ As part of the agreement, the Plaintiff agreed not to contest a Rule 60 motion by the Defendants seeking relief from the jury's verdict. We now consider the Defendants' motion.²

1 In fact, the Court had notified counsel that we were prepared to file an opinion, but agreed to hold the opinion for a day to allow counsel to resolve any outstanding details of a settlement.

2 All of the Defendants seek relief from the judgment. However, they ask that, pursuant to the settlement agreement, judgment be entered against the City for the agreed upon settlement figure and that the judgments against the individual defendants be vacated, in their entirety.

The Defendants seek relief from the jury's verdict pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b)(6), which provides,

On motion and upon such terms as are just, the court may relieve a party . . . from a final judgment, order, or proceeding for . . . any other reason justifying relief from the operation of the judgment.

Fed.R.Civ.P. 60(b)(6). The Defendants contend that "[p]roviding the individual defendants relief from the judgments . . . would serve the salutary purpose of abating the financial, reputational or other lasting personal effect the judgments would have on the individual defendants, who continue to deny any wrongdoing." (Defendants' Memorandum, at 2). As previously mentioned, as part of the settlement agreement, the Plaintiff does not oppose this motion. Despite the lack of opposition, the court will deny the Motion because we do not believe the law of this circuit permits this court to vacate a judgment in aid of settlement.

The Third Circuit has concluded that Rule 60(b)(6) is a catch-all provision. However, the Circuit Court "has consistently held that the Rule 60(b)(6) ground for relief from judgment provides for extraordinary relief and may only be invoked upon a showing of exceptional circumstances." Coltec Industries, Inc. v. Hobgood, 280 F.3d 262, 273 (2002) (quotingIn re Fine Paper Antitrust Litig., 840 F.2d 188 (3d Cir. 1988)). See also Green v. White 319 F.3d 560, 563 n. 1 (3d Cir. 2003) (citing Page v. Schweiker, 786 F.2d 150, 158 (3d Cir. 1986)).

In determining what constitutes an "exceptional circumstance," the Third Circuit has consistently returned to the Supreme Court's discussion in Ackermann v. United States, 340 U.S. 193 (1950), and concluded that deliberate choices do not constitute "exceptional circumstances." Fine Paper, at 195. Ackermann involved the denaturalization proceedings of two naturalized German citizens during World War II. When one of the two relatives was successful on appeal, the other sought relief from the lower court's order. The Supreme Court concluded that Ackermann, the relative who had failed to appeal, was not entitled to relief because he had made a deliberate choice not to appeal.

For monetary reasons, Ackermann declined to appeal, believing the issue would be resolved after the war. When the appeal of his brother-in-law, Keilbar, was successful, Ackermann filed for Rule 60(b) relief from his denaturalization. The Supreme Court held such relief was appropriately denied, explaining: Petitioner made a considered choice not to appeal, apparently because he did not feel that an appeal would prove to be worth what he thought was a required sacrifice of his home. His choice was a risk, but calculated and deliberate and such as follows a free choice. Petitioner cannot be relieved of such a choice because hindsight seems to indicate to him that his decision not to appeal was probably wrong, considering the outcome of the Keilbar case. There must be an end to litigation someday, and free, calculated, deliberate choices are not to be relieved from.

Coltec, at 275 (citing Ackermann, at 198).

Here, the Defendants made two choices. First, they decided to go to trial rather than settle the case. It was a calculated risk that resulted in verdicts against them, including punitive damages. Second, they have decided, after benefit of the knowledge of a jury verdict, to settle the case before an appeal.³ The Defendants stated reason for seeking relief from the judgment is to abate "the financial, reputational or other lasting personal effect the judgments would have on the individual defendants, who continue to deny any wrongdoing." Defendants' Memorandum, at 2. Yet, they have made the choice to settle the case and forego the opportunity for vindication in the appellate court. Guided by the reasoning of Ackermann, Rule 60(b)(6) does not provide relief for the choices that they have made.

3 We do not mean to imply that settlement after trial was unwise. Indeed, it was a welcome development that was encouraged and, perhaps, even helped by this court's post-trial mediation efforts. However, in the end, it was still the parties' conscious choice to accept settlement rather than risk the uncertainties of an appeal.

We also find support for this conclusion in the reasoning of cases involving vacatur of a District Court judgment by the Circuit Court or Supreme Court. In Clarendon v. Nu-West Industries, Inc., 936 F.2d 127 (3d Cir. 1991), the parties, on appeal, had reached a settlement agreement and, as part of the settlement, agreed that the District Court judgment would be vacated. Relying on the Seventh Circuit's decision in Matter of Memorial Hospital of Iowa County, Inc., 862 F.2d 1299 (7th Cir. 1988), the Third Circuit declined to vacate the lower court's judgment. The Defendants argue that Clarendon is distinguishable because the Defendants are seeking relief in the District Court before an appeal is filed. We conclude that the factors considered by the Circuit Court in considering vacatur are also present at this stage of the proceedings after a jury has returned a verdict and the court has entered judgment.

In Clarendon, the Third Circuit emphasized the public interest in a judgment. A judgment belongs, not only to the litigants, but also to society, as a whole.

When a clash between genuine adversaries produces a precedent, . . . the judicial system ought not allow the social value of that precedent, created at cost to the public and other litigants, to be a bargaining chip in the process of settlement. The precedent, a public act of a public official, is not the parties' property.

Clarendon, at 129 (quoting Memorial Hospital, at 1302). We believe this sentiment has even more force in this case.Clarendon involved an appeal from an Order granting summary judgment in favor of the Plaintiff. Here, not only does society have an interest in the judgments, but so do the eight citizens of the Commonwealth who dedicated eight days of their lives to the consideration of this case.

More recently, the Third Circuit again considered the use of a stipulation to vacate a judgment as a condition of settlement between the parties. Sentinel Trust Company v. Universal Bonding Insurance Co., 316 F.3d 213 (3d Cir. 2003). In considering the preclusive effect to be given the findings of fact underlying a judgment that had been vacated in aid of settlement, the Third Circuit discussed the competing views concerning the practice. Relying on the Supreme Court's decision in U.S. Bancorp Mortg. Co. v. Bonner Mall P'ship, 513 U.S. 18 (1994), in which the Supreme Court held that appellate courts should not vacate civil judgments of subordinate courts in cases that are settled after an appeal is filed, the Third Circuit again concluded that vacatur was appropriate in only the narrowest of circumstances. Like the Third Circuit inClarendon, the Supreme Court in Bonner Mall focused on the public interest of precedents. "[Precedents] are not merely the property of private litigants and should stand unless a court concludes that the public interest would be served by a vacatur." Sentinel Trust, at 220 (quoting Bonner Mall, at 26).

In addition to the public interest in precedent, the Supreme Court also identified another interest undermined by the vacation of a district court judgment — the orderly operation of the federal judicial system.

Congress has prescribed a primary route, by appeal as of right and certiorari, through which parties may seek relief from the legal consequences of judicial judgments. To allow a party who steps off the statutory path to employ the secondary remedy of vacatur as a refined form of collateral attack on the judgment would — quite apart from any considerations of fairness to the parties — disturb the orderly operation of the federal judicial system.

Bonner Mall, at 27.

As we stated in discussing the "exceptional circumstances" necessary for granting Rule 60(b)(6) relief, the Defendants have made the choice to forego an appeal. We do not believe it is appropriate to allow them obtain vindication through a circumvention of the judicial system.

An appropriate Order follows.

ORDER

AND NOW, this 24TH day of June, 2003, upon consideration of the Defendants' unopposed Motion for Relief Pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b)(6), and for the reasons stated in the accompanying Memorandum, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that the Motion is DENIED.