Conte v. Emmons

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
Conte v. Emmons, 647 F. App'x 13 (2d Cir. 2016)

Conte v. Emmons

Opinion

SUMMARY ORDER

Robert Emmons, William Wallace, and Michael Falzarno appeal, from the April 2, 2015 order of the United States District Court for .the Eastern District of New York (Bianco, J.) denying their renewed motion for judgment as a matter of law on Anthony Conte’s claim for tortious interference with contract. We assume the parties’ familiarity with the underlying facts, procedural history, and specification of issues for review.

“Where a mandate limits the issues open for consideration on remand, a district *14 court ordinarily cannot consider additional issues.” Puricelli v. Argentina, 797 F.3d 213, 218 (2d Cir. 2015). “To determine whether an issue remains open for reconsideration on remand, the trial coux-t should look to both the specific dictates of the remand order as well as the broader spirit of the mandate.” United States v. Ben Zvi 242 F.3d 89, 95 (2d Cir. 2001) (quotation marks omitted). Here, our previous summary order stated that:

The defendants argue that we can affirm the district court’s decision because Conte did not prove sufficient facts to allow the jury to find any of the elements of a tortious-interference-of-contract claim and the defendants are immune from suit. However, the defendants did not specifically articulate these grounds for reversal in their Rule 50(a) motion.A movant, therefore, may not raise a ground in its renewed motion for judgment as a matter of law if he failed to raise that specific ground earlier. We decline to address these issues for the first time on appeal and therefore vacate the judgment as a matter of law as to these claims.

Conte v. County of Nassau, 596 Fed.Appx. 1, 6 (2d Cir. Dec. 17, 2014) (citations omitted). In the decretal paragraph, we vacated “the judgment of the district court granting judgment as a matter of law ... on Conte’s claim of tortious interference with contractual relationships,” and remanded “to the district court to resolve that claim in further proceedings consistent with this order.” Id. at 7. We also directed the district court on remand to consider Conte’s motion for a new trial on damages.

On remand, the district court found that the mandate limited it to considering only Conte’s motion for a new trial on damages. This was error, although the distl'ict court’s confusion is understandable given the drafting and arguable resulting ambiguity of our summary order. In directing the district court to “resolve” the tortious interference with contract claim, it was this Court’s intention that the district court consider, in the first instance, all arguments related to that claim other than the statute of limitations claim. We thus remand again to give the district court an opportunity to do so.

Accordingly, the order of the district court hereby is VACATED and REMANDED. Each side to bear its own costs.

Reference

Full Case Name
Anthony CONTE, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Bob EMMONS, Individually and as Assistant District Attorney of Nassau County, New York, William Wallace, Individually and as Assistant District Attorney of Nassau County, New York, Mike Falzarno, Individually and as Special Investigator for the Office of the District Attorney of Nassau County, New York, Defendants-Appellants
Cited By
2 cases
Status
Unpublished