Meador v. United States

1

KENNETH MEADOR and THOMAS MEADOR, Plaintiffs v. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Defendant.

No. 22-cv-40024-DJC

United States District Court, D. Massachusetts

February 13, 2024

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

DENISE J. CASPER, UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

I. Introduction

Plaintiffs Kenneth Meador and Thomas Meador (the “Meadors”) have filed this lawsuit against Defendant the United States of America (the “U.S.”) alleging wrongful death and loss of consortium. D. 1. The Meadors now have moved for injunctive relief against interested party United Health Group, LLC (“United”), seeking an order from the Court that United's lien on any proceeds from this action is invalid. D. 55. The Meadors have also moved to amend their complaint to add two new defendants, United and Jennifer Favazza (“Favazza”). D. 54. For the reasons stated below, the Court ALLOWS the motion to amend and the motion for injunctive relief.

II. Standard of Review

A. Motion to Amend

“[W]hen justice so requires,” leave to amend pleadings should be “freely give[n].” Fed.R.Civ.P. 15(a)(2). Courts, however, retain considerable discretion in deciding whether to allow or deny leave to amend. U.S. ex rel. Gagne v. City of Worcester, 565 F.3d 40, 48 (1st Cir. 2009) (citation omitted). That discretion, however, allows courts to deny leave for reasons such as “undue delay in filing the motion, bad faith or dilatory motive, repeated failure to cure deficiencies, undue prejudice to the opposing party, and futility of amendment.” Id. (citations omitted).

B. Motion for Injunctive Relief

Injunctive relief “is an ‘extraordinary and drastic remedy.'” Voice of the Arab World, Inc. v. MDTV Med. News Now, Inc., 645 F.3d 26, 32 (1st Cir. 2011) (quoting Munaf v. Geren, 553 U.S. 674, 689-90 (2008)). To obtain such relief, the Court must consider: (1) the movant's likelihood of success on the merits; (2) the likelihood of the movant suffering irreparable harm; (3) the balance of equities between the parties; and (4) whether granting the injunction is in the public interest. Corp. Techs., Inc. v. Harnett, 731 F.3d 6, 9 (1st Cir. 2013). A plaintiff “bears the burden of establishing that these four factors weigh in its favor.” Esso Standard Oil Co. v. Monroig-Zayas, 445 F.3d 13, 18 (1st Cir. 2006) (citation omitted).

III. Background

A. Factual Background

As alleged, Paula Meador (“Ms. Meador”) received treatment from Dr. Kim Houde (“Dr. Houde”), an employee of the United States, for her bipolar disorder. D. 1 ¶ 1. Dr. Houde prescribed lithium carbonate to treat Ms. Meador. Id. After falling unconscious, Ms. Meador was diagnosed with acute lithium toxicity due to the elevated levels of lithium in her blood. Id. ¶ 2. Ms. Meador never recovered and died on June 15, 2019. Id.

1. Factual Allegations Related to the Motion to Amend

The Meadors claim that prior to filing this action, counsel requested Ms. Meador's medical records from healthcare entities, including the clinic employing Dr. Houde and also United. D. 56 (Attorney Reich Aff.) ¶ 1. The Meadors received medical records from Dr. Houde's office, which included an affidavit certifying to its completeness, id. ¶ 2, but the records they received from United did not include medical records from home health nurse visits. Id. ¶ 3.

On July 27, 2022, in its initial disclosure, the U.S. identified a “Jennifer Famzza, NP” (later revealed to be a misspelling of “Jennifer Favazza, NP”) as a potentially relevant witness, but did not identify her employer, address, or relevant information in her possession. Id. ¶ 4. On September 7, 2022, the Meadors served the U.S. with a request for production, seeking documents concerning Favazza, including documents identifying her employer. Id. ¶ 5. The U.S. declined to produce the documents at that time, citing the Court's stay on merits discovery. Id. ¶ 7. On February 8, 2023, the U.S. sent the Meadors a document relating to Favazza, id. ¶ 8, noting that the U.S. had inadvertently misspelled Favazza's name in its initial disclosure. Id. ¶ 9.

The document revealed that Favazza was part of a program called HouseCalls through United. Id. After comparing Favazza's report following her home visit with Ms. Meador on February 26, 2019, D. 56-1, with Dr. Houde's notes from Ms. Meador's office visit a day later, on February 27, 2019, D. 56-2, the Meadors suggests that Dr. Houde had been in possession of Favazza's report and had relied upon its content during her treatment of Ms. Meador during the office visit. D. 56 ¶ 10. The Meadors note that they were aware that United nurses had on occasion visited Ms. Meador's house, but were not previously aware of a causal link between those visits and recommendations and Dr. Houde's treatment. Id. ¶ 11. The proposed amended complaint asserts wrongful death and loss of consortium claims against United (Counts V-VI) and Favazza (Counts III-IV) as it does still against the U.S. (Counts I-II). D. 54-1.

2. Factual Allegations Related to the Motion for Injunctive Relief

Ms. Meador received Medicare benefits through United's AARP Medicare Advantage Plan. D. 68 at 2. As a Medicare Advantage Organization (“MAO”), United paid Ms. Meador's medical expenses from the time of her diagnosis of acute lithium toxicity on March 6, 2019 through the time of her death on June 15, 2019. Id. On February 8, 2023, Optum, a subrogation agent acting on behalf of United, asserted a lien here for the purposes of reimbursing United for the medical expenses for the treatment of the injuries Ms. Meador sustained on March 6, 2019. D. 58 at 2; D. 68 at 2; 68-2. The Meadors now challenge that lien in their motion for injunctive relief. D. 55.

IV. Procedural History

The Meadors initiated this action on March 15, 2022. D. 1. The U.S. filed a motion for partial summary judgment on the limited issue of the applicability of the Massachusetts charitable liability cap, D. 21, which the Court allowed. D. 40. The Meadors have now moved to amend the complaint, D. 54, and to enjoin United from asserting a lien on the proceeds of this action. D. 55. The Court heard the parties on the pending motions and took these matters under advisement. D. 74.

V. Discussion

A. Motion to Amend Complaint

The Meadors seek to amend the complaint to add United and Favazza as defendants. D. 54. In considering this motion to amend, the Court turns to United and Favazza's contention that it should not be allowed on the bases of undue delay, undue prejudice and futility. D. 67 at 4, 7, 9.

1. Undue Delay

United and Favazza argue that the Meadors' delay in bringing their motion to amend is not justified. D. 67 at 4. “[U]ndue delay, on its own, may be enough to justify denying a motion for leave to amend.” Hagerty ex rel. United States v. Cyberonics, Inc., 844 F.3d 26, 34 (1st Cir. 2016). “[W]hen considerable time has elapsed between the filing of the complaint and the motion to amend, the movant has [at the very least] the burden of showing some valid reason for his neglect and delay.” Perez v. Hosp. Damas, Inc., 769 F.3d 800, 802 (1st Cir. 2014) (second alteration in original) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). At the same time, however, “[t]here is no delay that is per se undue” and a “district court mulling a motion to amend in a particular case must consider any alleged delay with that case's specific history in mind.” Sheet Metal Workers Loc. No. 20 Welfare & Ben. Fund v. CVS Pharm., Inc., 305 F.Supp.3d 337, 343 (D.R.I. 2018) (internal citation omitted). “In assessing whether a movant has carried this burden, courts must take into account ‘[w]hat the plaintiff knew or should have known and what he did or should have done.'” Hagerty, 844 F.3d at 34 (alteration in original) (internal citation omitted).

Here, the motion to amend, D. 54, comes seventeen months after the complaint was filed on March 15, 2022, D. 1. This is not an insignificant period of time. See Zullo v. Lombardo (In Re Lombardo), 755 F.3d 1, 3 (1st Cir. 2014) (discussing cases that have found considerable delay “warranting explanation” where the time elapsed between the filing of the complaint and the motion to amend ranged from fourteen, fifteen and seventeen months). When considering the length of this delay, the Court must do so in the context of this case and concludes here that the Meadors' delay is justifiable. As the Meadors note, this Court bifurcated the case into two phases: 1) addressing the limited issue of the applicability of the Massachusetts charitable liability cap and 2) proceeding with the merits of the case. See D. 19; D. 41; D. 47. The Meadors assert that because the Court stayed discovery on the merits until the resolution of the liability cap issue, they could not obtain further information from the U.S. about Favazza or her employer until February 2023. D. 72 at 3; D. 56 ¶¶ 6-7; see O'Leary v. N.H. Boring Inc., 323 F.R.D. 122, 125 (D. Mass. 2018) (concluding that “it would have been impractical if not impossible” for plaintiffs to move to amend by the court's deadline because the “court effectively stayed discovery until after its resolution of the motion to dismiss, which in turn delayed the exchange of discovery potentially informing on the appropriateness or not of seeking leave to amend”). The Meadors assert that because United never responded to their pre-discovery request for release of all of Ms. Meador's medical records, D. 73-1, despite follow ups requesting same, D. 73 (Reply Reich Aff.) ¶¶ 1-3, the Meadors had no means of knowing the details of Favazza's visits or identifying United as her employer. D. 72 at 2.

United and Favazza argue that the Meadors knew that Ms. Meador was enrolled in United's HouseCalls program and that nurses from United visited Ms. Meador at home, so “Plaintiffs should have known that...