Komstadius v. UnitedHealth Group, Incorporated et al

Filing 20

ORDER directing Plaintiff to file an amended complaint within 14 days of this order. ( Compliance due by 10/19/2015.) Signed by Judge William T. Moore, Jr on 10/5/15. (wwp)

V

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR
THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF GEORGIA
SAVANNAH DIVISION

PEHR J. KOMSTADIUS,

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OCT -'5 7I1

Plaintiff,
v.

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CASE NO. CV415-241

UNITEDHEALTH GROUP,
INCORPORATED; FIDELITY STOCK
PLAN SERVICES, LLC; and
FIDELITY BROKERAGE SERVICES,
LLC;
Defendants.

ORDER
Plaintiff Pehr J. Komstadius has filed an amended
complaint in this Court seeking a declaratory judgment,
injunctive relief, and damages based on Defendants' alleged
failure to inform him of the acceleration of the expiration
date for certain stock options to which he was entitled
under a qualified domestic relations order.' (Doc. 1; Doc.
12.) However, the jurisdictional allegations contained in
the amended complaint are insufficient to establish
complete diversity between the parties. The party invoking

1

Rather than take a modicum of effort to file a complete
amended complaint, Plaintiff instead chose to file an
amended complaint that amends only two paragraphs of the
original complaint, leaving this Court and Defendants to
piece together the now fragmented complaint. All involved
would be better served if Plaintiff filed a complete
amended complaint, a rather simple task that does not

this Court's diversity jurisdiction bears the burden of
adequately pleading complete diversity. See 28 U.S.C.
§ 1332 Ray v. Bird & Son & Asset Realization Co., 519 F.2d
1081, 1082 (5th Cir. 1975

)2

("The burden of pleading

diversity of citizenship is upon the party invoking federal
jurisdiction, and if jurisdiction is properly challenged,
that party also bears the burden of proof."). For the
purposes of diversity jurisdiction, a limited liability
company ("LLC") is a citizen of every state in which any of
its members are citizens. Rolling Greens I1HP, L.P. v.
Comcast SCH Holdings L.L.C., 374 F.3d 1020, 1021-22 (11th
Cir. 2004) . The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals has been
explicit in addressing the proper method to allege
sufficiently the citizenship of a LLC: "a party must list
the citizenships of all the members of the limited
liability company." Id. at 1022.
In this case, the amended complaint does not include a
list of the individual members, along with their
citizenship, of Defendants Fidelity Stock Plan, LLC and

impose an odious burden given the ease of amending
documents in today's electronic age.
2
In Bonner v. City of Prichard, 661 F.2d 1206, 1209 (11th
Cir. 1981) (en banc), the Eleventh Circuit adopted as
binding precedent all decisions of the former Fifth Circuit
handed down prior to October 1, 1981.
2

Fidelity Brokerage Services, LLC. 3 (Doc. 1 ¶ 3.) Rather, the
complaint simply states that no member of either Fidelity
Stock Plan or Fidelity Brokerage is a citizen of Georgia.
(Id.) The complaint relies on this allegation to advance
the general conclusion that

'[c]omp1ete diversity exists as

between the Plaintiff and each Defendant." (Doc. 12 91 6.)
However, the general allegation that no member of
Defendant LLCs is a Georgia citizen is insufficient for
Plaintiff to carry his burden of establishing complete
diversity between the parties. See Ray, 519 F.2d at 1082.
Accordingly, Plaintiff is DIRECTED to file a second amended
complaint within fourteen days from the date of this order.
As noted above, the amended complaint must properly allege
diversity in this case by including the names and
citizenships of each member of Defendant LLCs, thus
allowing the Court to confirm that it possesses
jurisdiction to entertain this case. 4 Additionally, the

The court will refer to these two defendants collectively
as Defendant LLCs.
The court also notes that the complaint states various
purported 'claims" against Defendants, such as a
declaration (Doc. 1 91 38), entitlement to stock (id. 91 39),
mandatory injunction (Id. ¶ 40), and money damages (id.
¶ 42) . However, these are not claims or causes of action,
but rather the type of relief Plaintiff requests. The
complaint would certainly benefit from the inclusion under
3

Court will not accept any amended complaint that
incorporates by reference any factual allegation or cause
of action contained in an earlier filing, or offers only a
piecemeal amendment. Plaintiff's second amended complaint
should be a stand-alone filing that independently contains
all his claims and factual allegations in this case.
SO ORDERED this

f

day of October 2015.

WILLIAM T. OOR
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF GEORGIA

its 'claims" section of specific causes of action that
Plaintiff believes entitles him to relief.
4