Logan v. Burgers Ozark Ctry ( 2003 )


Menu:
  •                 UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
    FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT
    No. 02-30325
    JAMES P. LOGAN, JR.,
    Plaintiff,
    versus
    BURGERS OZARK COUNTRY CURED HAMS INC.; ET AL.,
    Defendants.
    JAMES P. LOGAN, JR.,
    Plaintiff-Appellant,
    versus
    ORIGINAL HONEY BAKED HAM COMPANY OF GEORGIA, Etc.; ET AL.,
    Defendants,
    ORIGINAL HONEY BAKED HAM COMPANY OF GEORGIA, doing business as
    Honeybaked Ham Co.; HONEYBAKED FOODS INC., doing business as
    Honeybaked Ham Co.,
    Defendants-Appellees.
    Appeal from the United States District Court
    for the Western District of Louisiana
    (97-CV-1363)
    March 12, 2003
    Before GARWOOD, SMITH, and BARKSDALE, Circuit Judges.
    PER CURIAM:*
    This appeal is from the district court’s 29 January 2002
    reentry of an order post-appellate mandate; it originally entered
    the order in May 2000, shortly after the notice of appeal was
    filed.   At issue is whether a district court may amend an order of
    dismissal, more than one year after it was entered, to state the
    original dismissal was with prejudice, even though the new order
    follows an appellate mandate, issued after, and based upon, the
    appellate    holding   that   the   original   dismissal   was   without
    prejudice.     The 29 January 2002 order at issue is VACATED.
    I.
    James P. Logan holds a method patent for spirally-slicing
    meat.    In July 1997, Logan filed a patent infringement action
    against Original Honey Baked Ham Company of Georgia and Honeybaked
    Foods, Inc. (collectively Honeybaked).         To resolve the dispute,
    Logan and Honeybaked entered into a licensing agreement, with
    Honeybaked to pay royalties on spirally-sliced meat product sales.
    Upon Logan's learning that Honeybaked discontinued these sales,
    Logan reinstituted the patent infringement claim, adding breach-of-
    contract, fraud, and Lanham Act claims.
    *
    Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the court has determined that
    this opinion should not be published and is not precedent except
    under the limited circumstances set forth in 5TH CIR. R. 47.5.4.
    2
    Trial was bifurcated, with the non-patent claims tried first.
    For those claims, a jury awarded damages against Honeybaked for
    approximately $9 million.
    Logan then moved to dismiss, with prejudice, his pending
    patent claims. On 9 August 1999, those claims were dismissed; but,
    the order did not specify whether the dismissal was with prejudice.
    That same day, by separate order, the district court stated the
    action was “dismissed in its entirety”.    Logan v. Burgers Ozark
    Country Cured Hams, Inc., No. 97-CV-1361 (W.D. La. 9 Aug. 1999)
    (order denying as moot motions by Honeybaked for summary judgment
    and by Logan to suppress).   Following consideration of attorney's
    fees, final judgment was entered in February 2000.
    Later that month, Honeybaked requested judgment as a matter of
    law (JMOL).   Approximately two months later (19 April 2000), the
    district court vacated all damages awarded against Honeybaked,
    stating:   “[Logan] has been returned to his original position
    because he is able to file suit on his patent claim”.   Logan, No.
    97-CV-1361 (W.D. La. 19 Apr. 2000) (emphasis added; memorandum
    ruling on Honeybaked’s JMOL motion).      On 10 May 2000, without
    citing a Federal Rule of Civil Procedure granting the district
    court authority to do so, Honeybaked moved the court “to amend” the
    19 April order to state that, the prior August, Logan’s patent
    claims had been dismissed with prejudice and Logan had not been
    “returned to [his] original position”.
    3
    Concerning the 19 April ruling granting JMOL to Honeybaked,
    and while Honeybaked's 10 May motion was pending, and unsure
    whether this circuit or the Federal Circuit had jurisdiction, Logan
    filed an appeal with each on 16 May 2000, shortly before the time
    to appeal lapsed.    One day later, however, the district court
    granted   Honeybaked’s   10   May   motion:   “[T]he   [19   April   1999]
    Memorandum Ruling will be corrected to state that [Logan] had moved
    to dismiss with prejudice his patent infringement action against
    [Honeybaked] and the Court had granted that motion with prejudice”.
    Logan, No. 97-CV-1361 (W.D. La. 17 May 2000) (emphasis added; order
    amending 19 April 1999 memorandum ruling).
    That December, the Federal Circuit, in ruling on Logan's
    motion to dismiss his appeal, refused to do so, based on its having
    jurisdiction.    Logan v. The Original Honey Baked Ham Co. of
    Georgia, Inc., No. 00-1389 (Fed. Cir. 20 Dec. 2000) (single-judge
    order denying Logan’s motion to dismiss).      Four months later, that
    court stayed the appeal pending resolution of the parallel appeal
    in our court.   Logan, No. 00-1389 (Fed. Cir. 24 Apr. 2001) (order
    granting Logan’s unopposed motion to stay).
    And, approximately four months after that ruling (September
    2001), our court held it had jurisdiction; the JMOL was affirmed.
    Regarding whether the dismissal had been with prejudice, our court
    held:
    [U]nder Federal Circuit precedent, the key
    inquiry in this case is whether the dismissal
    4
    of [Logan's] patent claims was with or without
    prejudice.... Because the district court was
    without jurisdiction to enter the May 17th
    order [(post-notice of appeal)]and because the
    correction made therein was not clerical but
    substantive, we find that the dismissal of the
    patent    claims   was   without    prejudice.
    Accordingly, the Federal Circuit’s precedent
    holding that it lacks jurisdiction over non-
    patent   claims   where  patent   claims   are
    dismissed without prejudice from complaints
    containing multiple claims is applicable in
    this   case.      Thus,   we   conclude   that
    jurisdiction is proper in this Court, not in
    the Federal Circuit.
    Logan v. Burgers Ozark Country Cured Hams, Inc., 
    263 F.3d 447
    , 453-
    54 (5th Cir. 2001) (Logan I; emphasis added).
    Following our court's decision, and while this second appeal
    was pending here, the Federal Circuit, in August 2002, dismissed,
    for lack of jurisdiction, Logan's original May 2000 appeal.            Logan
    v. The Original Baked Ham Co. of Georgia, Inc., No. 00-1389 (Fed.
    Cir. 2 Aug. 2002) (unpublished order dismissing appeal).                The
    Federal Circuit held:        its earlier single-judge order did not
    create the law of the case; Logan I's holding our court had
    jurisdiction in the parallel appeal was the law of the case; and
    the Federal Circuit would follow that Logan I decision, because
    there were no exceptional circumstances.
    After our mandate for Logan I issued on 18 October 2001,
    Honeybaked moved the district court to reenter the 17 May 2000
    order which   had   stated   the   patent   claims   dismissal   was   with
    prejudice. Once again, Honeybaked did not reference a Federal Rule
    5
    of Civil Procedure vesting the district court with authority to do
    so.
    The district court granted the motion, however, relying on
    Standard Oil Co. of California v. United States, 
    429 U.S. 17
    (1976).    The district court concluded:   it had an “inherent power
    and discretion to act on its own after [the] mandate issued”; the
    law-of-the-case doctrine did not apply because Logan I only held
    the 17 May 2000 order ineffective because the district court lacked
    jurisdiction; and, post-appeal, it had jurisdiction to reenter that
    order.    Logan, No. 97-CV-1361 (W.D. La. 29 Jan. 2002) (memorandum
    ruling reentering 17 May 2000 order).
    Logan again appealed to both our circuit and the Federal
    Circuit.     The Federal Circuit heard oral argument on 7 January
    2003; approximately one month later, oral argument was held in our
    court.     As of the rendition of this opinion, the Federal Circuit
    has not ruled.
    II.
    By reentering the 17 May 2000 order, the district court
    violated the law of the case and, in the alternative, the Federal
    Rules of Civil Procedure.
    As noted, the district court, in reentering the May 2000
    order, relied on its “inherent power” and referenced Standard Oil;
    that opinion discusses Rule 60(b) motions.    Although it did not do
    6
    so in district court, Honeybaked now claims Rule 60(b) grants such
    authority.
    Generally, Rule 60(b) rulings are reviewed only for abuse of
    discretion.   E.g., Edward H. Bohlin Co., Inc. v. Banning Co., Inc.,
    
    6 F.3d 350
    , 353 (5th Cir. 1993).        Here, however, we are not
    reviewing the merits of the reentered May 2000 order; instead, we
    are deciding whether the district court had authority, post-Logan
    I, to take such action.   This is a purely legal issue, reviewed de
    novo.   See, e.g., Carter v. Fenner, 
    136 F.3d 1000
    , 1005 (5th Cir.)
    (decisions under Rule 60(b)(4) reviewed de novo because such
    motions “leave no margin for consideration of the district court’s
    discretion as the judgments themselves are by definition either
    legal nullities or not”), cert. denied, 
    525 U.S. 1041
     (1998).
    A.
    Logan contends:   in Logan I, our court held the dismissal was
    without prejudice; under the law of the case, the 17 May 2000
    order, amending the dismissal to be with prejudice, could not be
    reentered post-Logan I.   Honeybaked responds:   our court only held
    the district court was without jurisdiction to enter the 17 May
    2000 order after the first notice of appeal (16 May 2000); because
    the district court reacquired jurisdiction after the Logan I
    mandate issued in October 2001, the district court had authority to
    reenter the order under Rule 60(b), pursuant to Standard Oil.
    7
    Standard Oil, which concerned a Rule 60(b) motion based on
    alleged misconduct by the Government's counsel and a material
    witness, 
    429 U.S. at 17
    , only decided whether, post-appellate
    mandate, a district court must request leave from the appeal court
    before ruling on a Rule 60(b) motion.     The Supreme Court held it
    did not.
    Like the original district court judgment, the
    appellate mandate relates to the record and
    issues then before the court, and does not
    purport to deal with possible later events.
    Hence, the district judge is not flouting the
    mandate by acting on the motion.
    
    Id. at 18
     (emphasis added).
    This holding follows the contours of the law-of-the-case
    doctrine.
    While the “law of the case” doctrine is not an
    inexorable command, a decision of a legal
    issue or issues by an appellate court
    establishes the “law of the case” and must be
    followed in all subsequent proceedings in the
    same case in the trial court or on later
    appeal in the appellate court, unless the
    evidence   on    a   subsequent    trial   was
    substantially different, controlling authority
    has since made a contrary decision of the law
    applicable to such issues, or the decision was
    clearly erroneous and would work manifest
    injustice.
    White v. Murtha, 
    377 F.2d 428
    , 431-32 (5th Cir. 1967) (footnotes
    omitted).    See Arizona v. California, 
    460 U.S. 605
    , 618-19 (1983)
    (under law-of-case doctrine, when court decides rule of law, that
    decision continues to govern same issue, but jurisdiction retained
    “to accommodate changed circumstances”, citing White v. Murtha).
    8
    In other words, the district court cannot disturb the mandate,
    which “relates to ... issues then before the [appellate] court”; on
    the other hand, the district court may, of course, “deal with ...
    later events”.    Along this line, the district court is bound by
    “things decided by necessary implication as well as those decided
    explicitly”. Terrell v. Household Goods Carriers’ Bureau, 
    494 F.2d 16
    , 19 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 
    419 U.S. 987
     (1974).
    Reentry of the 17 May 2000 order concerned an issue decided in
    Logan I.   That opinion held the district court’s dismissal was
    without prejudice.      
    263 F.3d at 454
    .     This became the law of the
    case; the district court could not subsequently reenter an order
    contradicting    that    mandate.        Further,   there   was   no   new,
    substantially     different     evidence;      intervening,       contrary,
    controlling law; or a clearly erroneous decision in Logan I.
    B.
    In the alternative, the district court did not have authority
    under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure to reenter the order.
    Post-mandate, neither Honeybaked’s motions nor the district court’s
    order addressed which Rule provided authority to reenter the 17 May
    2000 order.     As noted, the district court did refer to Standard
    Oil, which discussed Rule 60(b).         On appeal, Honeybaked contends
    the district court had authority to reenter the order based on
    Rules 60(b)(1) and 60(b)(6). In this instance, however, Rule 60(b)
    proscribes the district court's reentering the order.
    9
    1.
    Under Rule 60(b)(1), and upon motion, the district court may
    relieve a party from a final order as a means of correcting
    “mistake, inadvertence, surprise, or excusable neglect”.                        The
    motion, however, must be made “not more than one year after the ...
    order”.     FED. R. CIV. P. 60(b).      On 30 November 2001, Honeybaked
    moved to reenter the 17 May 2000 order, amending the 9 August 1999
    and 19 April 2000 orders.        The motion was more than a year after
    these orders, and the appeal did not toll the one-year period.
    E.g., Newball v. Offshore Logistics Int'l, 
    803 F.2d 821
    , 827, n.4
    (5th Cir. 1986).
    2.
    Rule    60(b)(6)   allows    amendment         for   “any    other     reason
    justifying relief from the operation of the judgment”.                    The rule
    only requires the motion be made in a reasonable time.                     Subpart
    (b)(6), however,     may   not   be   used     to   circumvent    the     one-year
    limitation    period,   where,   as    here,    the   reason     for   relief    is
    embraced in subpart (b)(1).       Newball, 
    803 F.2d at 827
    ; Gulf Coast
    Building and Supply Co. v. Int'l Brotherhood of Electrical Workers,
    Local No. 480, AFL-CIO, 
    460 F.2d 105
    , 108 (5th Cir. 1972).
    III.
    For the foregoing reasons, and pursuant to Logan I, the
    dismissal of Logan’s patent claims remains without prejudice.
    10
    Accordingly, the district court’s reentry of the 17 May 2000 order
    is
    VACATED.
    11