Admiralty – Jurisdiction – ‘Drive-By’ Ruling – Jones Act – Dockside Conveyor Belt

Listen to this article

Holloway v. Pagan River Dockside Seafood Inc. (Lawyers Weekly No. 001-055-12, 8 pp.) (Niemeyer, J.) No. 11-1046, Feb. 27, 2012; USDC at Newport News, Va. (Miller, J.) 4th Cir. Full-text opinion.

Holding: Invoking the Supreme Court’s warning against “drive-by jurisdictional rulings,” the 4th Circuit sorts out the differences between motions under 12(b)(1) and 12(b)(6) and reverses the district court’s dismissal of a Jones Act claim, saying plaintiff’s allegation of injury to his hand from a dockside conveyor belt stated a Jones Act claim.

Plaintiff’s complaint purports to allege a claim under the Jones Act, which provides that a “seaman injured in the course of employment … may elect to bring a civil action at law, with the right of trial by jury, against the employer,” under 46 U.S.C. § 30104.

Defendant argued plaintiff was not a “seaman” but an “independent contractor,” as he “leased” a boat from defendant Pagan River Dockside Seafood and sold Pagan River his catch of crabs and oysters, less a fee for use of the boat, equipment and fuel.

Plaintiff contends the district court erred in dismissing his complaint for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. He argues the evidence presented to the district court – through affidavits and pay records – showed that his employment was substantially connected to his vessel and that he should therefore properly be considered a Jones Act seaman. Defendants argue, on the basis of contradicting affidavits, that plaintiff failed to present sufficient proof that he was a “seaman” under the Jones Act.

The parties and the district court have quite blurred the fundamental difference between a Rule 12(b)(1) motion for lack of subject matter jurisdiction and a Rule 12(b)(6) motion for failure to state a claim. A 12(b)(1) motion addresses whether plaintiff has a right to be in the district court at all and whether the court has the power to hear and dispose of his claim, and a 12(b)(6) motion addresses whether plaintiff has stated a cognizable claim.

In recent years, the Supreme Court has cautioned against “drive-by jurisdictional rulings” that dismiss a claim for lack of jurisdiction when some threshold fact has not been established, without explicitly considering whether the dismissal should be for lack of subject matter jurisdiction or for failure to state a claim. Its admonition is grounded in the principle that the subject matter jurisdiction of a federal court is not generally resolved by concluding the plaintiff has failed to allege an element of a federal cause of action or that the plaintiff might not be able to prove an element of a federal cause of action. A court must look more fundamentally at whether plaintiff’s claim is determined by application of a federal law over which Congress has given the federal courts jurisdiction; if it is, his complaint should not be dismissed for a lack of subject matter jurisdiction.

Here, plaintiff sought to state a claim under the Jones Act. He alleged each of the elements of a Jones Act claim: that he was employed as a seaman connected to a vessel; he was injured in the course of his employment; and this employer’s negligence caused his injury. To be sure, the facts to support these conclusory allegations appear to be thin in some instances and in many instances are disputed. But it can hardly be asserted his claim is not colorable, or is made solely for the purpose of obtaining jurisdiction, or is so wholly insubstantial and frivolous that an invocation of federal jurisdiction should not be recognized. The disputes over whether plaintiff will be able to prove the elements of the cause of action are matters that if resolved one way will entitle him to relief and if decided another way will result in dismissal of his action. In either case, however, such disputed allegations must be resolved either by a Rule 56 motion or by trial.

At bottom, we conclude the allegations contained in plaintiff’s complaint provided an adequate basis to invoke the Jones Act and thus to require the district court to exercise federal jurisdiction over the case.

District court order dismissing the case is reversed and case remanded.