Collins v. Greene County Memorial Hospital

DEL SOLE, Judge.

We are asked to consider the right of a litigant, under 42 Pa.C.S. § 5103, to transfer state claims from a federal district court to a court of common pleas following a judgment by the federal court on a federal claim and dismissal of the remaining state claims for lack of jurisdiction. The trial court determined that, because of a seven month delay between the federal court’s dismissal of the state claims and the litigant’s praecipe to transfer the case, the praecipe was untimely filed. The trial court issued an order which struck the praecipe. We affirm.

Jean and Terry Collins, husband and wife, (the Collinses) brought an action against Greene County Memorial Hospital and Dr. Arunava Das (hereinafter collectively referred to as “Hospital”) in the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania. This suit was comprised of a federal claim based upon the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and several state claims which were before the court on the basis of pendent jurisdiction. On August 17, 1990, following a settlement between the parties on the federal civil rights claim, the district court entered a judgment and final decree on that claim. Six days later, the court dismissed the remaining state claims for lack of jurisdiction.

Nearly seven months later, on March 19, 1991, the Collinses filed a certified copy of the complaint, pleadings, and final judgment from the district court, as well as a Praecipe to Transfer, with the Greene County Court of Common Pleas in order to litigate their state claims.

The Hospital filed preliminary objections to the transfer, contending that the documents were not promptly filed. The trial court agreed, noting that “[t]he effort and time needed to file in state court pursuant to the statute is less than would be expected in filing an amended pleading or filing a responsive pleading after disposition of preliminary objections”, Opinion of June 7, 1991, at 3, and that, in either of those cases, the Pennsylvania Rules of Civil Procedure allot twenty days. The trial court concluded that this case could not be deemed to have been promptly transferred where the Collinses had taken more than two hundred days to act. Said the court, “as a matter of statutory construction, the filing was not ‘prompt,’ as mandated by the transfer statute, the sole vehicle for the plaintiffs to transfer their case from federal court to this court.” Opinion at 44.

In Pennsylvania, 42 Pa.C.S. § 5103 governs the transfer of cases from federal court to state court. That statute states, in pertinent part:

§ 5103. Transfer of erroneously filed matters

(a) General rule. — If an appeal or other matter is taken to or brought in a court or magisterial district of this Commonwealth which does not have jurisdiction of the appeal or other matter, the court or district justice shall not quash such appeal or dismiss the matter, but shall transfer the record thereof to the proper tribunal of this Commonwealth, where the appeal or other matter shall be treated as if originally filed in the transferee tribunal on the date when the appeal or other matter was first filed in a court or magisterial district of this Commonwealth. A matter which is within the exclusive jurisdiction of a court or district justice of this Commonwealth but which is commenced in any other tribunal of this Commonwealth shall be transferred by the other tribunal to the proper court or magisterial district of this Commonwealth where it shall be treated as if originally filed in the transferee court or magisterial district of this Commonwealth on the date when first filed in the other tribunal.

(b) Federal cases.—

(1) Subsection (a) shall also apply to any matter transferred or remanded by any United States court for a district embracing any part of this Commonwealth. In order to preserve a claim under Chapter 55 (relating to limitation of time), a litigant who timely commences an action or proceeding in any United States court for a district embracing any part of this Commonwealth is not required to commence a protective action in a court or before a district justice of this Commonwealth. Where a matter is filed in any United States court for a district embracing any part of this Commonwealth and the matter is dismissed by the United States court for lack of jurisdiction, any litigant in the matter filed may transfer the matter to a court or magisterial district of this Commonwealth by complying with the transfer provisions set forth in paragraph (2).

(2) Except as otherwise prescribed by general rules, or by order of the United States court, such transfer may be effected by filing a certified transcript of the final judgment of the United States court and the related pleadings in a court or magisterial district of this Commonwealth. The pleadings shall have the same effect as under the practice in the United States court, but the transferee court or district justice may require that they be amended to conform to the practice in this Commonwealth. Section 5535(a)(2)(i) (relating to termination of prior matter) shall not be applicable to a matter transferred under this subsection.

42 Pa.C.S. § 5103(a) and (b).

The trial court construed § 5103 to impose a promptness requirement, and determined the seven month delay to have been excessive. Thus, the court issued an order granting Hospital’s preliminary objection and striking the transfer of the case from federal court. The Collinses appealed.

On appeal, the Collinses contend that no timeliness requirement is imposed by the statute, and that, therefore, notwithstanding the seven month delay, the trial court erred by concluding that the filing of the praecipe was not sufficiently prompt. In response, Hospital contends that a promptness requirement is imposed by this court’s decision in Williams v. F.L. Smithe Machine Company, Inc., 395 Pa.Super. 511, 577 A.2d 907 (1990), appeal denied 527 Pa. 650, 593 A.2d 422 (1991).

In Williams, this court held that if a matter is originally filed within the statute of limitations in federal court but is dismissed for lack of jurisdiction, a litigant may effect transfer of the action to a state court by complying with the provisions of 42 Pa.C.S. § 5103(b), and the state court will treat the matter as if it were originally filed in the state court, despite the fact that the federal court took no action to transfer the case or take any other action.¹

We also held that dismissal of the action by the trial court was not appropriate even though the plaintiffs had failed to file a certified transcript of the final judgment of the United States court and related pleadings until seven months after the federal court granted the motion to dismiss. Given the dearth of case law interpreting this statute and the fact that Appellants partially complied with the statute just 14 days after the case was dismissed by filing a certified copy of the order dismissing the action along with a new complaint, identical to the complaint filed in federal court, we held that dismissal of the complaint for lack of promptness would be unduly harsh. We also stated that to protect the timeliness of an action a litigant must promptly file a certified copy of the transcript of the final judgment of the federal court along with a certified copy of the pleadings in state court.

In the instant case the Appellants gave no indication of their intention to pursue their state claims for nearly seven months after the federal court’s Order of Dismissal. Furthermore, after Williams, the Appellants cannot claim that because of a lack of interpretive case law under § 5103, they did not know what was required of them. Therefore, we hold that Appellant’s actions were not prompt, and the order striking the transfer was proper.

We find Appellees’ analogy with the case law that has developed regarding the writ of summons or complaint and then failing to effect service on the defendant persuasive. Lamp v. Heyman, 469 Pa. 465, 366 A.2d 882 (1976); Robinson v. Trenton Dressed Poultry Co., 344 Pa.Super. 545, 496 A.2d 1240 (1985). Beginning with Lamp, our courts have held that if a plaintiff commences an action by writ of summons and then does not attempt service within 30 days by complying with the local rules concerning delivery of the summons to the sheriff within that time, then that failure to make a good faith effort to notify the defendant will serve to nullify both the commencement of the action and the tolling of statute of limitations. This rule of promptness established by the courts was held to be consistent with the policy of avoiding stale claims, making the processes of justice as speedy and efficient as possible, and preventing the possibility of the plaintiff retaining exclusive control over the action for a period in excess of the statute of limitations.

When a litigant transfers an action under § 5103(b), this section, like the filing of a writ of summons, provides protection from the bar of the statute of limitations. This protection comes into play in the situation where the litigant has timely filed an action, such that notice to the defendant is sufficient for statute of limitations purposes, but as the federal court subsequently determines, has filed in the wrong court. If, however, a litigant fails to promptly transfer the action to the appropriate court, then the litigant abuses that protection, (as was done prior to Lamp by parties commencing actions by writ of summons,) subverts the policies underlying the statute of limitations, and undermines the speedy and efficient processes of justice.

Therefore, we hold that litigants must act promptly in transferring their actions which have been dismissed for lack of jurisdiction by the Federal courts. We again ask, as we did in Williams, supra, 395 Pa.Super. at 511, n. 1, 577 A.2d 907, that our Legislature will see fit in the future to include a specific time requirement of 30 days in the provisions of 42 Pa.C.S.A. § 5103.

Order is affirmed and jurisdiction relinquished.

JOHNSON, J., files a dissenting opinion.

1 . The dissent claims that this case is not included within the scope of § 5103 because we must read this section to allow transfer only when the transferring court lacks jurisdiction over the entire matter, which is defined in 42 Pa.C.S. § 102 as an action, proceeding, or appeal. Because the transferring court had jurisdiction over the matter, at least until the Federal claim was resolved, the dissent argues that § 5103 cannot be used to toll the statute and effect transfer to the state court.

However, the purpose of the Federal-State transfer statute would be frustrated by such a construction. To hold otherwise would require the filing of State protective actions every time a federal claim with pendant state claims is filed in Federal court on the off chance that if the federal claim is resolved, the litigant will be barred from pursuing the state claim. This is the very problem, the elimination of duplication of effort, which this statute was designed to prevent.

Furthermore, it seems equally logical to construe the language of this statute to include cases with facts similar to those present here. After all, once a federal claim is resolved, the entire "matter” or "action” before the federal court is a state action made up of state claims, and therefore when the federal court dismisses the "matter” for lack of jurisdiction, the provisions of § 5103(b) may be used to effect transfer of the action.