United States District Court, N.D. Alabama, Northeastern Division
MEMORANDUM OPINION
LILES
C. BURKE UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE
This is
an employment discrimination case filed pursuant to Title VII
and 42 U.S.C. § 1981. (Doc. 17). This cause is before
the Court on Defendant's Partial Motion to Dismiss or, in
the alternative, Motion to Strike (Doc. 19), and Motion for
More Definite Statement (Doc. 20) pursuant to Rules 12(b)(6),
12(e), and 12(f) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.
Plaintiff filed responses to defendant's motions on March
6, 2019. (Docs. 28 & 29). Defendant replied on March 15,
2019. (Docs. 30 & 31). The motions are now ripe for
review. Upon review and for the reasons stated herein, the
court concludes that Defendant's Motion to Dismiss or, in
the alternative, Motion to Strike (Doc. 19) is hereby granted
as to the motion to strike and Defendant's Motion for
More Definite Statement (Doc. 20) is granted.
I.
STANDARDS OF REVIEW
A.
Rule 12(b)(6) - Dismissal for Failure To
State A Claim Upon Which Relief Can Be Granted
Federal
Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) permits a party to move to
dismiss a complaint for “failure to state a claim upon
which relief can be granted.” Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6).
This rule must be read together with Rule 8(a), which
requires that a pleading contain only a “short and
plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is
entitled to relief.” Fed.R.Civ.P. 8(a)(2). While that
pleading standard does not require “detailed factual
allegations, ” Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly,
550 U.S. 544, 550 (2007), it does demand “more than an
unadorned, the-defendant-unlawfully-harmed-me
accusation.” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662,
678 (2009) (citations omitted). Essentially, a Rule 12(b)(6)
motion to dismiss tests the sufficiency of a complaint
against the “liberal pleading standards set forth by
Rule 8(a)(2).” Erickson v. Pardus, 551 U.S.
89, 94 (2007). When evaluating a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to
dismiss, a district court accepts as true the allegations in
the complaint and construes the allegations in the light most
favorable to the plaintiff. See Brophy v. Jiangbo Pharms.
Inc., 781 F.3d 1296, 1301 (11th Cir. 2015).
B.
Rule 12(e) - More Definite Statement
Federal
Rule of Civil Procedure 12(e) permits a party to move for a
more definite statement if the pleading “is so vague or
ambiguous that the party cannot reasonably prepare a
response.” Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(e). “[A] party may not
use a Rule 12(e) motion to circumvent the short and plain
statement requirement or to obtain information that can
otherwise be obtained in discovery.” Harris v.
Fisher-Price Inc., 2013 WL 9861461, at *1 (N.D. Ala.
Oct. 24, 2013). See also MAO-MSO Recovery II LLC v.
Infinity Prop. & Cas. Grp., No. 2:17-CV-00513-KOB,
2018 WL 1244498, at *5 (N.D. Ala. Mar. 9, 2018). This rule
must be read together with Rule 8(a), which requires that a
pleading contain only a “short and plain statement of
the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to
relief.” Fed.R.Civ.P. 8(a)(2). While that pleading
standard does not require “detailed factual
allegations, ” Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly,
550 U.S. 544, 550 (2007), it does demand “more than an
unadorned, the-defendant-unlawfully-harmed-me
accusation.” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662,
678 (2009) (citations omitted).
C.
Rule 12(f) - Motion to Strike
A
motion to strike is appropriate under 12(f) of the Federal
Rules of Civil Procedure for “any insufficient defense
or any redundant, immaterial, impertinent, or scandalous
matter.” Id. However motions to strike factual
allegations are disfavored and “will usually be denied
unless the allegations have no possible relation to the
controversy and may cause prejudice to one of the
parties.” Poague v. Huntsville Wholesale
Furniture, No. 7:18-CV-00005-LSC, 2019 WL 718716 *6
(N.D. Ala. Feb. 20, 2019) (quoting Augustus v. Bd. of
Pub. Instruction of Escambia Cty., Fla., 306 F.2d 862,
868 (5th Cir. 1962).
D.
Shotgun Pleading
Our
Circuit addressed the evolution and types of shotgun
pleadings in Weiland v. Palm Beach Cty Sherriff's
Office, 792 F.3d 1313 (11th Cir. 2015)
stating:
The most common type-by a long shot-is a complaint containing
multiple counts where each count adopts the allegations of
all preceding counts, causing each successive count to carry
all that came before and the last count to be a combination
of the entire complaint. The next most common type, at least
as far as our published opinions on the subject reflect, is a
complaint that does not commit the mortal sin of re-alleging
all preceding counts but is guilty of the venial sin of being
replete with conclusory, vague, and immaterial facts not
obviously connected to any particular cause of action. The
third type of shotgun pleading is one that commits the sin of
not separating into a different count each cause of action or
claim for relief. Fourth, and finally, there is the
relatively rare sin of asserting multiple claims against
multiple defendants without specifying which of the
defendants are responsible for which acts or omissions, or
which of the defendants the claim is brought against. The
unifying characteristic of all types of shotgun pleadings is
that they fail to one degree or another, and in one way or
another, to give the defendants adequate notice of the claims
against them and the grounds upon which each claim rests.
Id. at 1321-23. An assertion that a complaint is a
shotgun pleading is based upon violations of Rule 8(a)(2), as
mentioned above, and/or Rule 10(b) which provides:
(b) Paragraphs; Separate Statements. A party must state its
claims or defenses in numbered paragraphs, each limited as
far as practicable to a single set of circumstances. A later
pleading may refer by number to a paragraph in an earlier
pleading. If doing so would promote clarity, each claim
founded on a separate transaction or occurrence-and ...