Kent v. Charter Communications LLC et al

Filing 64

ORDER denying 63 defendants' Motion to vacate. Signed on 10/16/14 by District Judge Fernando J. Gaitan, Jr. (Enss, Rhonda)

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF MISSOURI
CENTRAL DIVISION
KENNETH M. KENT,
Plaintiff,
vs.
CHARTER COMMUNICATIONS, LLC, et al.,
Defendants.

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No. 13-4156-CV-C-FJG

ORDER
Pending before the Court is Defendants’ Motion to Vacate the Court’s December
26, 2013 and August 21, 2014 Orders finding Plaintiff’s Claim is Sufficiently Plead and
Subject to a Ten-Year Statute of Limitations (Doc. No. 63). This case was remanded to
state court on August 21, 2014. See Doc. No. 61. After the case had been remanded,
defendants filed the present motion, requesting the Court vacate its previous orders
finding that a 10-year statute of limitations could apply under the facts alleged by plaintiff,
arguing that the Court should have considered its subject matter jurisdiction before
making merits determinations in the underlying suit.
The Court will deny defendants’ request. One reason why the Court considered
which statute of limitations applied is because defendants had alleged fraudulent joinder.
If the statute of limitations precluded a lawsuit against the in-state defendants, those
defendants would have been found to have been fraudulently joined and the case would
therefore have been removable. Thus, it was necessary for the Court to consider the
statute of limitations in making its subject matter jurisdiction determination. Furthermore,

the Court’s denial of a motion to dismiss based on the statute of limitations is not a final
decision on the merits. As the Court made perfectly clear in its Orders, the statute of
limitations issues raised by defendants may be more appropriate for summary judgment.
See Orders, Doc. Nos. 33 at p. 6, 61 at p. 9. Defendants’ motion to vacate (Doc. No. 63)
is DENIED.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
/s/ Fernando J. Gaitan, Jr.
Fernando J. Gaitan, Jr.
United States District Judge

Dated: October 16, 2014
Kansas City, Missouri

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