Thomas v. United Steelworkers Local 1938, et al., No. 12-3625 (8th Cir. 2014)
Annotate this CasePlaintiff filed suit against defendants, alleging, inter alia, a state-law defamation claim arising out of a fact-finding meeting concerning a workplace dispute. On appeal, plaintiff challenged the district court's grant of summary judgment in favor of defendants. The court held that because plaintiff failed to follow Rule 15's procedures and nothing in the district court's order or the record suggested that leave to amend the complaint was granted, the federal claims were not withdrawn from the second amended complaint and remained before the district court until those claims were dismissed by the court in its order. The court construed plaintiff's purported dismissal as a declaration that he was abandoning all claims except the defamation and breach of union constitution claims and would present no further evidence or argument supporting those abandoned claims. Therefore, the claims were merely abandoned for purposes of argument, not removed from the second amended complaint. The court also concluded that the district court properly exercised supplemental jurisdiction over plaintiff's state-law defamation claim. On the merits, the district court's grant of summary judgment was improper because plaintiff satisfied all elements of his defamation claim for summary judgment purposes and the vice president of the union's statements were not privileged. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded.
Court Description: Civil Case - labor. Decision to abandon all but defamation and breach of union constitution claims in response to motion for summary judgment did not divest the district court of federal jurisdiction. District court did not abuse its discretion in exercising supplemental jurisdiction over state law claims. Because genuine disputes of material fact exist, the grant of summary judgment on Thomas's defamation claim under Minnesota law is reversed. Although some of Malek's statements involve subjective view or opinion, other statements were capable of being proven false and were sufficiently inaccurate to create a dispute as to their truth. Statements were also not subject to a qualified privilege, as the investigation of one incident was not the proper occasion to make statements about prior behavior. The failure to investigate prior complaints before making disparaging statements prevented the statements from being based on reasonable or probable cause.
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