HURRICANE IKE PLAINTIFF’S FORM PLEADING FAILS TO OVERCOME REMOVAL TO FEDERAL COURT

Last week, Federal District Court Judge Melinda Harmon from Houston quickly dispatched a motion brought by the Mostyn Law Firm seeking a remand to state court based on the allegations against adjusters contained in the Mostyn firm’s form Hurricane Ike pleadings.  In Gonzales v. Homeland Ins. Co. of N.Y., 2011 WL 3104104 (S.D. Tex. July 25, 2011), the court held that the Plaintiff’s pleadings did not contain facts sufficient to sustain a claim against the defendant-adjusters, and therefore could not defeat federal diversity jurisdiction.  Specifically, while the Plaintiff argued that the adjuster “created a wholly deficient report as a result of his substandard inspection of the claim, which was in part the cause of much of the Plaintiff’s damages complained about in this suit,” the pleadings did not contain any specific facts to “explain the what, where, when, and how, to support these allegations.”  As such, remand was denied.