Montgomery vs. Caribe Transport II lives on, with both sides asking for the case to be moved back to a federal district court in Illinois.
Beyond all the focus on the long-term implications of the Supreme Court decision that lifted barriers to filing suit against brokers, there remains the litigation that began it all: a lawsuit by a truck driver who lost his leg on the side of an Illinois highway in 2017 after being struck by a truck operated by Caribe Transport II that was booked by C.H. Robinson (NASDAQ:CHRW).
That case is now expected to go back to the federal district court for the Southern District of Illinois, following a joint filing by the two sides made last week with the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals.
Attorneys for both driver Shawn Montgomery and for the group of companies as defendants, including C.H. Robinson, made the formal request June 30 that the case be sent back to the original district court where it was heard. The deadline for making that request was Monday.
The defendants making the request are various divisions of C.H. Robinson and Luis Lopez, representing Caribe Transport II.
However, the name of the case does not now become Montgomery vs. C.H. Robinson, even though the Supreme Court action overturned the lower court’s decision, upheld on appeal by the Seventh Circuit, that the Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act (F4A) preempted legal action against C.H. Robinson for hiring Caribe.
That doctrine is now gone with the Montgomery decision, and C.H. Robinson will be part of the “et. al.” list of defendants.
Normal first step
When the Supreme Court handed down its ruling in early May, it sent the case back to the Seventh Circuit. But the appeals court is just the first stop for the next steps in the case’s future.
“The appellate court’s role here is largely procedural—it acts as an intermediary or conduit to ensure the Supreme Court’s instructions are carried out, but it generally does not revisit the merits of the case unless specifically directed to do so,” Marc Blubaugh, the co-lead of the Transportation & Logistics practice at the Benesch Law Firm, said in an email to FreightWaves.
The argument by the two sides for Montgomery vs. Caribe Transport II to be remanded to the district court is that the summary judgment by that court in favor of C.H. Robinson was based on its interpretation of F4A.
But the joint filing says “the Supreme Court has now held that such claims are not preempted by the act. Accordingly, this case should be remanded for further proceedings” on the negligent-hiring claims against C.H. Robinson, which were tossed out under the earlier F4A interpretation.
Settlement possible?
The case could wind up in a trial. But it could also end up settled out of court.
C.H. Robinson has been in a similar situation previously. In the mixture of cases involving broker liability, for several years the only federal case where F4A was not found to protect brokers was Miller vs. C.H. Robinson in the Ninth Circuit. (A Sixth Circuit decision in the case of Cox vs. TQL a year ago added another decision that was “anti-broker,” which helped pave the way for the Supreme Court to take up the issue given the conflicting circuit court decisions).
In the Miller case, the appeals court found that F4A’s phrase “with respect to motor vehicles” that allows state legal action against a transportation provider over a safety issue could be extended to include a 3PL.
C.H. Robinson sought certiorari from the Supreme Court to review the issue. But in 2022, it was denied.
The Miller case went back to the U.S. District Court for Nevada, where it was ultimately settled just a few months after the Supreme Court punted.
In an email to FreightWaves, Greg Feary, president and managing partner at the trucking-focused Scopelitis law firm, said he thought the chances of a settlement in the case were “fairly likely,” given the fact that Caribe carried a conditional rating from the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA), which meant it had certain safety deficiencies.
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