ELR Citation: ELR 20003
No(s). 08-6321 (6th Cir. Dec 29, 2008)

The Sixth Circuit held that a group of 300 landowners may not divide their class action nuisance suit against a paper mill into five separate water pollution claims to avoid federal jurisdiction under the Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA). The landowners divided their suit into five separate suits covering distinct six-month time periods, with plaintiffs’ limiting the total damages for each suit to less than CAFA’s $5 million threshold. The suits were filed in state court with identical parties and claims, except that the suits were for a series of different, sequential six-month periods. Each suit limited the total class damages to less than $4.9 million. The cases were removed to federal court by the defendant paper mill, but remanded to state court by the district court. But because no colorable basis for dividing the claims has been identified by the plaintiffs other than to avoid the clear purpose of CAFA, remand was not proper.

[A related case can be found at 37 ELR 20027.]