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Plaintiff’s Motion To Remand Denied When Diversity Claim Is Not Limited To Damages Not In Excess Of $75,000Friel v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co.,
Joseph Friel (“Friel”) filed a claim for uninsured motorist benefits (“UM”) with his insurance company State Farm. The claim could not be resolved and the policy did not allow for arbitration so he filed a complaint in state court seeking damages under the policy in excess of $30,000 and also asserted a claim for bad faith. The case was removed by State Farm to federal court based upon it claim of diversity jurisdiction. Friel sought to remand the case to state court by arguing that the amount in controversy was not met since State Farm could not establish the claim was worth in excess of $75,000 to meet the diversity statute.
The District Court denies the Motion to Remand because Friel did not agree to cap the damages. The District Court relies upon the Third Circuit case of Samuel-Bassett v. Kia Motors, 357 F.3d (3d Cir. 2004) where the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit adopted the “legal certainty” test such that “it must be evident to a legal certainty that the Plaintiff cannot recover an amount greater than $75,000 required for diversity jurisdiction” before a case such as this would be remanded.
In this case Friel did not stipulate to the cap and the Complaint had not been amended to cap the damages. Thus, the District Court finds that it cannot say “to a legal certainty, based upon the face of the Complaint, that Friel will not be able to recover more than $75,000 in this case.” Therefore, the Motion to Remand is denied.
Scott B. Cooper
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