Samuel Tucker Collins, Jr. v. West Palmetto Holdings, LLC, and Clarendon County Magistrate Court

Summary

This Report and Recommendation addresses Samuel Tucker Collins, Jr.'s attempted removal of a South Carolina state-court ejectment appeal to federal court. The magistrate judge recommends remand for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction, citing procedural defects, failure to establish federal-question or diversity jurisdiction, and the Rooker-Feldman doctrine. The recommendation also advises dismissing Collins's motions for declaratory, injunctive, and emergency relief as moot or barred by the Anti-Injunction Act.

Holdings

1. A state-court litigant may not use the removal statutes to remove his own pending state appellate proceedings, particularly where he does not provide the state-court plaintiff's initial pleading as required by the removal statutes.
2. New federal claims, defenses, counterclaims, or allegations asserted by a removing party cannot create federal-question jurisdiction over an original state-law ejectment action.
3. The removing party failed to establish diversity jurisdiction because he did not allege the citizenship of all members of West Palmetto Holdings, LLC.
4. Even if original federal jurisdiction otherwise existed, the district court could not review or reject the state-court ejectment judgment or grant relief that would require invalidating that judgment.
5. Collins was not entitled to emergency, preliminary, or permanent injunctive relief because he could not show a likelihood of success on the merits, and the requested injunctions were barred by the Rooker-Feldman doctrine and the Anti-Injunction Act.

Questions Presented

1. Whether Collins could remove his own pending state-court appeal and related eviction proceedings under the federal removal statutes.
2. Whether the federal district court had federal-question jurisdiction over a state-law ejectment action based on new federal claims, defenses, or counterclaims asserted by the removing party.
3. Whether diversity jurisdiction was established when Collins did not allege the citizenship of the members of the defendant limited liability company.
4. Whether the Rooker-Feldman doctrine and the Anti-Injunction Act barred the requested federal review and injunction of the state-court ejectment proceedings.
5. Whether Collins was entitled to declaratory, preliminary, or emergency injunctive relief.

Disposition

remanded