Martingano v. American International Group, Inc.
Martingano v. American International Group, Inc.
Opinion of the Court
SUMMARY ORDER
The named plaintiffs (“plaintiffs”) appeal from a September 20, 2007 judgment of the District Court, granting defendants’ motion to dismiss with prejudice. We assume the parties’ familiarity with the factual and procedural history of the case, though we revisit key portions of that history here.
In April 2006, plaintiffs brought the consolidated putative class action against American International Group, Inc. (“AIG”) and certain of its broker-dealer subsidiaries (“the AIG Brokers”). Plaintiffs alleged that they all purchased shares or like interests in certain mutual funds, referred to as “Shelf-Space Funds,” from the AIG Brokers. Plaintiffs alleged also that “[djefendants failed to properly disclose that they had been aggressively pushing the AIG financial advisors to sell the Shelf-Space Funds that provided undisclosed payments, financial incentives
Following oral argument, the District Court granted defendants’ motions to dismiss the action in an April 25, 2007 Memorandum and Order. See In re AIG Advisor Group Sec. Litig., No. 06-cv-1625 (JG), 2007 WL 1213395 (E.D.N.Y. Apr. 25, 2007). Specifically, the District Court dismissed plaintiffs’ complaint pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(1) and Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(h)(3) for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, insofar as the complaint related to funds other than the ones in which plaintiffs alleged they owned shares. The District Court also granted defendants’ motion for dismissal pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6) for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted with respect to certain claims that it found were time-barred by the relevant statute of limitations, but denied the motion in all other respects. Finally, the District Court dismissed plaintiffs’ complaint pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 9(b) and the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act, 15 U.S.C. § 78u-4(b)(l), (“PSLRA”), for failure to adequately plead fraud by the AIG Brokers because of a want of sufficient particularity.
On May 31, 2007, plaintiffs filed an amended complaint designed to cure the pleading deficiency identified by the District Court in its ruling of April 25, 2007. Defendants filed a motion to dismiss the amended complaint on June 22, 2007. Following oral argument, the District Court granted defendants’ motion to dismiss in a September 20, 2007 Memorandum and Order. See In re AIG Advisor Group Sec. Litig., No. 06-cv-1625 (JG), 2007 WL 2750676 (E.D.N.Y. Sept. 20, 2007). Specifically, the District Court concluded that most of the complaint’s description of what the AIG Brokers stood to gain from selling the Shelf-Space Funds was still “too generalized.” Id. at *1. To the extent that the plaintiffs had included specific sums that the AIG Brokers would gain by each transaction with the plaintiffs, including $25 for a “standard” $10,000 transaction, the District Court determined that those sums were “too small to state a claim upon which relief can be granted.”
We review de novo the dismissal of a complaint under Rules 12(b)(1) and 12(b)(6). See Jaghory v. N.Y. State Dep’t of Educ., 131 F.3d 326, 329 (2d Cir. 1997). We “must accept all factual allegations in the complaint as true and draw inferences from those allegations in the light most favorable to the plaintiff.” Id. However, “[securities fraud claims are subject to heightened pleading requirements that [a] plaintiff must meet to survive a motion to dismiss.” ATSI Commc’ns, Inc. v. Shaar Fund, Ltd., 493 F.3d 87, 99 (2d Cir. 2007). Specifically, under Rule 9(b) and the PSLRA, a plaintiff “must state with particularity the circumstances constituting fraud.” Fed.R.Civ.P. 9(b).
CONCLUSION
For the reasons stated above, the judgment of the District Court is AFFIRMED.
. Plaintiffs originally brought additional claims pursuant to the Securities Act of 1933, which they omitted in their amended complaint of May 31, 2007 — the operative pleading at issue here.
. The District Court noted that the "standard” $10,000 transaction figure is supplied by the plaintiffs' brief — rather than the complaint. In re AIG Advisor Group Sec. Litig., 2007 WL 2750676, at *4 n. 5.
. Because we affirm on these grounds, we express no view on the District Court’s materiality and standing rulings.
. The single exception is the website of Sun-America Securities, Inc. ("SunAmerica"), which may have posted its disclosure as late as April 13, 2004 — approximately one week shy of two years before plaintiffs filed their complaint. Even assuming that the timing of the disclosure were resolved in plaintiffs' favor, the complaint would still fail to state a claim. That is because, given the unique circumstances of the roughly contemporaneous posting of nearly identical website disclosures by the other AIG Brokers, combined with preexisting disclosures contained in the Shelf-Space Funds' prospectuses and accompanying SAIs, sufficient knowledge existed to place plaintiffs on inquiry notice of SunAmerica’s alleged fraud at least as of April 6, 2004. See Shah v. Meeker, 435 F.3d 244, 249, 252 (2d Cir. 2006).
Reference
- Full Case Name
- In re: AIG ADVISOR GROUP SECURITIES LITIGATION. Joseph Martingano, Frances Martingano, Alan Bogage, Ethel J. Karabin, as beneficiary of the IRA FBO Ethel J. Karabin and trustee of the FBO The Residential Trust of The Karabin Trust U/A/ DTD 05/10/1985 and Survivor Trust of The Karabin Trust U/A DTD 05/10/1985, Sidney Perris, Steven R. Wiskow, and Edsel F. Young v. American International Group, Inc., AIG Financial Advisors, Inc., Royal Alliance Associates, Inc., FSC Securities Corporation, Advantage Capital Corporation, Senta Securities Corp., Spelman & Co., Inc., and SunAmerica Securities, Inc.
- Status
- Published