The Slip-and-Fall Removal Race
Marisol Ortega slipped on a wet floor at a Granville, State A grocery store on January 12, 2023. State A's personal-injury limitations period is two years. Your firm filed suit on January 8, 2025, in State A superior court against Halvorsen Markets, Inc., a State B corporation with its principal place of business in State B, alleging $180,000 in damages. Halvorsen was served on January 20, 2025. Today is February 10, 2025. The supervising attorney wants to add the on-duty store manager - a State A citizen - as a defendant and has heard that Halvorsen's counsel is drafting a removal notice. The calendar clerk asks you where to set the removal deadline.
1. Set the notice-of-removal deadline and assess whether joining the store manager will actually defeat removal. Give the attorney a recommendation.
Read the worked answer
Deadline. 28 U.S.C. § 1446(b)(1) gives a defendant 30 days from service of the initial pleading. Served January 20, 2025, so the notice is due February 19, 2025. The § 1446(c)(1) one-year cap does not apply to a case filed in 2025. Removal exists on the face of the complaint: Ortega is a State A citizen, Halvorsen is a State B corporation, and $180,000 exceeds $75,000.
The manager gambit. The forum-defendant rule, § 1441(b)(2), bars diversity removal only while a properly joined and served in-state defendant remains. So the manager must be both joined and served before February 19 to have any chance.
The problem the attorney may not see. The limitations period expired January 12, 2025. A new claim against the manager must relate back under Rule 15(c)(1)(C), which requires notice within the Rule 4(m) period and a mistake about identity. The firm knew who the manager was before filing, so relation back is doubtful and the joinder is likely futile.
Recommendation: tell the attorney the joinder probably will not defeat removal, warn that a futile joinder invites a § 1447(e) denial instead of a remand, and calendar February 19 for a status check with Halvorsen's counsel.
2. Halvorsen removed on February 14, 2025. On February 24 defense counsel served 45 interrogatories, many with discrete subparts, plus 22 requests for production. What is the procedural posture and what should you do?
Read the worked answer
Interrogatories exceed the limit. Rule 33(a)(1) caps interrogatories at 25 including all discrete subparts. 45 is nearly double. Do not answer the excess; serve timely objections within the 30-day response period (Rule 33(b)(2)) and, if defense counsel insists, seek a protective order under Rule 26(c).
Requests for production are different. Rule 34 has no numerical cap, so the objection is relevance and proportionality under Rule 26(b)(1) - 22 requests on a slip-and-fall is not facially abusive.
Answer deadline. After removal, Rule 81(c)(2) gives the defendant the longest of the listed periods, which here works out to seven days after the notice of removal was filed - February 21, 2025. Confirm that date against the rule text and the local rules before relying on it.
Case-management track. Rule 26(f)(1) requires the parties' conference at least 21 days before a scheduling order issues, and Rule 26(a)(1)(C) makes initial disclosures due 14 days after that conference. Put both on the calendar now and propose dates in the joint discovery plan rather than waiting for the court.