Joinder & Intervention — Civil Procedure

Three cars tangle on a Franklin highway. One collision, and inside it a knot of disputes. Each driver blames the others. An injured passenger wants to sue everyone. An insurer may owe a defense. The mechanic who serviced the brakes last week might be on the hook too. How many lawsuits does the law want here?

One, if it can manage it. That is what joinder is for. Now make it your problem. Your client is one of two drivers being sued, and she has a broken wrist and a wrecked car of her own. If she stays quiet about that today, is the claim still hers tomorrow? No. It is gone forever. This episode is about which claims are use it or lose it, and which ones wait.

Here is the route. First, stacking claims against one opponent. Then adding people, when you may and when you must. Then the defense side, counterclaims, crossclaims, and impleader. Then the judge's power to take a case apart. Then the jurisdiction check that decides half of these questions. And finally intervention, the outsider who wants in.

Start with the easiest rule in the topic. Once you have one claim against an opposing party, Rule 18 lets you pile on every other claim you have against that same party. Related or not. Sue your former business partner for breaking the partnership agreement, and you may add your claim that she rear-ended your car two years ago. The claims need not share a single fact.

Why so loose? Because you are already fighting this person. Adding claims brings in nobody new and creates no unfairness. If the mix would confuse a jury, the judge can split it later. But hear the catch. Rule 18 says you may. Claim preclusion can still punish you for splitting one dispute into pieces, so theories from a single transaction usually belong together.

Rule 18 stacks claims against one opponent. Rule 20 adds people. When may several plaintiffs sue together, or one plaintiff sue several defendants? Two gates, and both must open. First, the right to relief must arise out of the same transaction, occurrence, or series of transactions or occurrences. Courts read that through a logical relationship lens. Second, one question of law or fact must be common to everyone being joined.

Three passengers hurt in one bus crash sue the company together. One occurrence, and common questions. Was the driver texting? Was the company's no-phone policy enforced? They join. Now two strangers sue the same bank over different branches, different employees, months apart. A shared defendant is not a shared occurrence, so that joinder fails. But do not read occurrence too narrowly. Three employees fired in different months under one challenged company-wide rule are a related series.

Rule 20 asks whether extra parties may come in. Rule 19 asks the harder question. Is there someone who must be here? The restyled rule calls that person required. Your examiner may still say necessary and indispensable. Three steps. Step one, is the absentee required? Yes if the court cannot grant complete relief without them. Yes also if they claim an interest in the subject of the suit, and deciding without them would impair their ability to protect it.

That branch has a second limb. An absentee is also required if deciding without them would leave an existing party facing a substantial risk of double or inconsistent obligations. Step two, can they be joined? Only if joinder is feasible. Personal jurisdiction must reach them, and adding them must not destroy subject-matter jurisdiction or ruin venue. Step three, if joinder is not feasible, the court decides in equity and good conscience whether to proceed or dismiss.

Four factors carry that last call. Prejudice to the absentee or to the existing parties. Whether shaping the relief could soften it. Whether a judgment without the absentee would be adequate. And whether the plaintiff has another remedy if this case is dismissed. Picture two people each holding a recorded deed to the same parcel. A bank sues one of them to foreclose and ignores the other. She claims an interest in the very land at stake.

She is required. And if she can be joined without wrecking jurisdiction, the court orders her in. Now the trap. A pedestrian is hurt when two cars collide, and she sues one driver only. Is the other driver a required party? Answer before I do. No. The plaintiff can collect her whole loss from any one wrongdoer and sue the rest later, so complete relief is available without him. Joint tortfeasors are joinable, never required.

Back to your client in the pile-up. A counterclaim is a claim a defending party swings back at the party who sued them, and Rule 13 splits them in two. Her claim for the broken wrist and the wrecked car arises from the very collision the plaintiff sued on. Same transaction. So under Rule 13(a) it is compulsory. Plead it in this answer, or lose it forever. That is the silent, deadly half of this topic.

Now suppose she also holds an unrelated promissory note the plaintiff never paid. No shared facts. That is a permissive counterclaim under Rule 13(b). She may fold it in, or sue on it another day, and nothing is waived either way. One word decides which box you are in. Related.

She also blames her co-defendant, the driver who was speeding and struck her first. A claim against a co-party, someone on your own side of the case, is a crossclaim under Rule 13(g). It must arise from the same transaction or occurrence as the original action, or relate to property that is its subject matter. The crash qualifies, so she may crossclaim. Must she? No. There is no such thing as a compulsory crossclaim.

Which means a co-defendant who stays quiet for tactical reasons waives nothing. A general contractor who never crossclaims against the subcontractor can still sue it for indemnity in a later case. And once a crossclaim is filed, Rule 18 wakes up. You may stack any other claim against that co-party, related or not.

Impleader is where candidates lose points. Rule 14 lets a defending party pull in a brand new person, a third-party defendant, on one narrow theory. If I am liable to the plaintiff, this newcomer must reimburse me. The word to hold is derivative. Indemnity, contribution, subrogation, a warranty. A shopper slips in a grocery store, and the store's cleaning contractor had promised in writing to indemnify the store for exactly that accident.

If we owe the shopper, the contractor owes us. That is proper impleader. What Rule 14 is not is the empty chair. He did it, not me, is a defense, not a third-party claim. Blaming a stranger for the plaintiff's injury does not make that stranger liable to you, and the plaintiff decides whether to add him.

Two mechanics worth memorizing. First, timing. A defendant may implead as of right within 14 days after serving its answer. Miss that window and it needs the court's leave. Second, the door swings both ways. Once the newcomer is in, it may raise its own defenses, counterclaims, and crossclaims. And the original plaintiff may claim against it, if that claim arises from the same transaction or occurrence.

The rules so far let the parties build a bigger case. The next two let the judge take it apart. Misjoinder is never, by itself, a reason to dismiss the whole action. Under Rule 21 the court simply adds or drops a party, or severs a claim, on just terms. Rule 42(b) does something else. It keeps everyone in one action and orders separate trials, to avoid prejudice or for convenience.

Try it. A judge has one case with two claims, and the fraud evidence would poison the jury on the defect claim. She wants one lawsuit and one judgment, but two trials. Rule 21, or Rule 42(b)? Rule 42(b). Severance would create two independent actions, each with its own final judgment. That is the line. Rule 21 splits lawsuits. Rule 42(b) splits trials.

One neighboring device deserves a name. A stakeholder holds a single fund that several people all claim. Think of an insurer with one payout and two beneficiaries. It can force those rival claimants into one action to fight it out. That is interpleader, under Rule 22 and, more broadly, § 1335.

Now the overlay that turns easy joinder questions hard. A claim can be perfectly proper under the joinder rules and still have no business in a federal court. Federal power is limited. So for every added claim and every added party, ask a second question. Does it have its own ticket, a federal question, or complete diversity with more than $75,000 at stake? Or can it borrow one through supplemental jurisdiction under § 1367?

Supplemental jurisdiction reaches claims so related to the anchor claim that they form part of the same case or controversy. The same common nucleus of operative fact. Which is why the defense side travels light. A compulsory counterclaim, a crossclaim, an impleader claim, each shares the transaction, so none of them needs an independent jurisdictional basis.

The plaintiff side is where the trap is set. In a case resting on diversity alone, § 1367(b) withholds supplemental jurisdiction over claims by plaintiffs against people joined under Rules 14, 19, 20, or 24. It bites whenever allowing the claim would break complete diversity. Watch it work. Alvarez, a Franklin citizen, sues a Columbia corporation for $200,000. The corporation impleads its supplier, Crux, for indemnity.

Crux is a Franklin citizen too, and that impleader is still fine, because § 1367(b) restricts claims by plaintiffs, not a defendant's third-party claim. Then Alvarez turns and sues Crux directly. Franklin against Franklin. Blocked. Allowing it would destroy the complete diversity that got Alvarez into federal court in the first place.

Keep one carve-out. Extra plaintiffs joined under Rule 20 whose claims fall short of $75,000 can still ride along, so long as one plaintiff clears the amount and complete diversity survives. Small money can be smuggled in. Bad citizenship never can.

Last piece, and it flips the camera. Everything so far has been insiders adding claims and people. Intervention is an outsider knocking. Let me in, this case affects me. Rule 24 has two doors. Intervention of right, where the court must allow it. Permissive intervention, where the court may. Both need a timely motion, and timeliness is a real gate.

Four things get you in as of right. A timely motion. A direct, legally protectable interest in the property or transaction at the heart of the suit, not an ideological one. Practical impairment, meaning a decision without you would impede your ability to protect that interest. And representation that is not adequate. That last burden is light. You need only show that representation may be inadequate.

A conservation group sues an agency to block a dam permit. The company already holding the contract to build the dam moves in early. Concrete financial stake. Directly impaired if the permit falls. And an agency that cares about regulatory policy, not the company's profits. That is intervention of right. A neighbor who simply dislikes dams? No protectable interest, and the group already makes her arguments. At most permissive intervention, on a shared common question, in the court's discretion.

So when does the door stay shut? When the motion is untimely, and someone who waits until after summary judgment usually loses on that alone. When an existing party already represents the same interest adequately. When the interest is remote, contingent, or purely ideological. Or when the newcomer would destroy subject-matter jurisdiction.

A word on authorities. This episode named no cases, and that was deliberate. NextGen questions hand you a fact pattern and ask which rule lets a claim or a party into the case. They will not ask you for case names. Everything you just heard sits in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and in § 1367, the supplemental jurisdiction statute.

If you keep only three things, keep these. Same transaction or occurrence, the phrase that flags a compulsory counterclaim, a crossclaim, and Rule 20 joinder. Is or may be liable to me, the phrase that flags impleader. And the second question, does this added piece have subject-matter jurisdiction? Those three triggers answer most of this topic.

Now the traps, straight from the examiners' favorites. One. Impleader is not the empty chair. Rule 14 needs derivative liability, never he did it, not me. Two. The compulsory counterclaim bar is silent and deadly. A same transaction counterclaim you fail to raise now is lost forever, so never assume every counterclaim is optional.

Three. Crossclaims are always permissive, and nothing is waived by not filing one. Four. Joint tortfeasors are not required parties, because the plaintiff can recover fully from any one of them. Five. Passing the joinder test does not create jurisdiction. A proper Rule 20 or Rule 14 joinder still fails without subject-matter jurisdiction.

Six. Do not confuse severance under Rule 21, which creates separate lawsuits, with separate trials under Rule 42(b), which keeps one lawsuit. Seven. For intervention of right, adequate representation by an existing party defeats it, though the movant's own burden is otherwise minimal. And these mechanics are memory-level. Expect them tested with no rulebook in front of you.

Time for the quick check, and this one comes straight from the BARGO question bank. A cyclist sues a driver, Coleman, after a collision. Coleman insists he was not at fault. A delivery van operated by Meridian Logistics swerved into the intersection, he says, and caused the injuries. Coleman wants Meridian in as a third-party defendant. He asserts no claim that Meridian owes him indemnity or contribution.

His position is simply that Meridian did it. May Coleman implead Meridian under Rule 14? Option one. Yes, because Meridian's conduct is central to who caused the injuries. Option two. Yes, because a defendant may always add the person he blames. Option three. No, because he did it, not me, is a defense, not a derivative claim. Pause here if you want a moment.

The answer is option three. Impleader requires a derivative theory. The newcomer is or may be liable to the defendant for the plaintiff's claim, through indemnity, contribution, or warranty. Coleman asserts no such theory. He simply blames Meridian. That is the empty chair defense. Option one is the tempting trap. Relevance to causation is not the test. Derivative liability to Coleman is.

Option two overstates it. Pointing at an absent wrongdoer is a defense the plaintiff, not the defendant, may act on. If you felt the pull of option one, that is the trap examiners build. There are thirty plus more questions on this topic alone, each option explained.

Five things to take away. One. Rule 18 stacks any claims against one opponent, related or not, while Rule 20 needs the same transaction and a common question before you add people. Two. Rule 19 marches in three steps. Required, feasible, then equity and good conscience, and a joint tortfeasor is never required.

Three. A same transaction counterclaim is compulsory under Rule 13(a) and dies if you skip it, while every crossclaim and every unrelated counterclaim is optional. Four. Impleader is derivative or it is nothing, and Rule 21 splits lawsuits while Rule 42(b) only splits trials. Five. Every added claim and party needs its own jurisdiction, § 1367(b) is the plaintiff-side trap, and an outsider gets in on interest, impairment, inadequate representation, and timing.

Which brings us back to the pile-up. Your client's broken wrist has to be claimed today. Her fight with the co-defendant can wait as long as she likes. One collision, two very different clocks. Next time, Discovery.

Practice this topic with more than 2,900 exam-style questions, free to start, at nextgenbargo.com. This episode is for education and exam preparation only, not legal advice, and we are not affiliated with or endorsed by the NCBE or any bar examining authority.