Ca_Law

case_law | United States Federal

Dupree v. Younger

Summary

A post-trial motion under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 50 is not required to preserve for appellate review a purely legal issue resolved at summary judgment.

Text

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  • #1

    Page Proof Pending Publication PRELIMINARY PRINT Volume 598 U. S. Part 2 Pages 729–738 OFFICIAL REPORTS OF THE SUPREME COURT May 25, 2023 REBECCA A. WOMELDORF reporter of decisions NOTICE: This preliminary print is subject to formal revision before the bound volume is published. Users are requested to notif…

  • #2

    ment on suffciency-of-the-evidence grounds is not appealable after trial. 562 U. S. 180, 184. Because the factual record developed at trial “super- sedes the record existing at the time of the summary-judgment motion,” ibid., it follows that a party must raise a suffciency claim in a post-trial motion in order to …

  • #3

    demonstrates that Younger overstates the need for a bright-line rule. “Courts of appeals have long found it possible to separate factual from legal matters.” Teva Pharmaceuticals USA, Inc. v. Sandoz, Inc., 574 U. S. 318, 328. Here, the Court does not decide whether the issue Dupree raised on appeal is purely legal…

  • #4

    case proceeds to trial. After the presentation of evidence, but before the case is submitted to the jury, Rule 50(a) authorizes either party to move for judgment as a matter of law. 1 This standard largely “mirrors” the summary- judgment standard, the difference being that district courts evaluate Rule 50(a) mot…

  • #5

    his codefendants liable and awarded Younger $700,000 in dam- ages. Dupree did not fle a post-trial motion under Rule 50(b). Page Proof Pending Publication 733 Cite as: 598 U. S. 729 (2023) Opinion of the Court Dupree appealed to the Fourth Circuit. He sought review of a single issue: the District Court's reject…

  • #6

    DUPREE v. YOUNGER Opinion of the Court district courts.” Interlocutory orders—those that do not dispose of the whole case, like denials of summary judg- ment—are typically not immediately appealable under § 1291. 3 Instead, the “general rule is that `a party is entitled to a single appeal, to be deferred until …

  • #7

    of frst instance”). This is especially important for factual challenges based on the trial record, which “cal[l] for the judgment in the frst instance of the judge who saw and heard the witnesses and has the feel of the case which no appellate printed transcript can impart.” Cone v. West Vir- ginia Pulp & Paper C…

  • #8

    a post-trial motion under Rule 50 is not required to preserve for appellate review a purely legal issue resolved at sum- mary judgment. C Younger's counterarguments do not persuade us other- wise. First, he argues that under Ortiz, an order denying summary judgment is not a “fnal decision” under § 1291 and cann…

  • #9

    law books, not trial exhibits.) So what would a repeat- motion requirement for legal questions typically amount to? For litigants, a copy and paste of summary-judgment mo- tions into post-trial format. For district courts, the tedium of saying no twice. There is no reason to force litigants and district courts to…

  • #10

    judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. Page Proof Pending Publication Reporter’s Note The attached opinion has been revised to refect the usual publication and citation style of the United States Reports. The revised pagination…