ADDITIONAL CASES Donna Hodge, Annette Hall, Karen Grant Williams, and Alexi Arias, Class Defendants-in-Intervention; Bent Philipson, Avi Philipson, and Deborah Philipson, Lead Action Defendants-in-Intervention; Aaron Becher, et al., Owner Operator Defendants-in-Intervention; The Philipson Family Trust, et al., Prohibited Transaction Defendants-in-Intervention; Andrew Cuomo, et al., State Officer Defendants-in-Intervention; Oriska Insurance Company, Carrier Defendant-in-Intervention; Rashbi Management, Inc., Trust Defendants-in-Intervention 20-cv-6291; 21-cv-1366; 21-cv-1421; 21-cv-1999; 21-cv-2006; 21-cv-2009; 21-cv-2010; 21-cv-2021; 21-cv-2022; 21-cv-2024; 21-cv-2025; 21-cv-2029; 21-cv-2030; 21-cv-2031; 21-cv-2034; 21-cv-2035; 21-cv-2039; 21-cv-2040; 21-cv-2045; 21-cv-2050; 21-cv-2175; 21-cv-2182; 21-cv-2194; 21-cv-2198; 21-cv-2283; 21-cv-2311; 21-cv-2313; 21-cv-2314 MEMORANDUM & ORDER Pending before the court are 29 related lawsuits, which collectively name more than 8,773 defendants. Eighteen of these lawsuits (the “Removed Actions”) were originally filed in various New York State Supreme Courts and then coordinated and transferred to New York Supreme Court, Oneida County for pre-trial purposes. They were removed to this court by purported class representative defendants (the “Class Representatives”) in each action. Eleven of these lawsuits (the “Federal Actions”) were originally filed in federal court. For the reasons stated below, each of the Removed Actions is REMANDED to New York Supreme Court, Oneida County and each of the Federal Actions is DISMISSED with prejudice. Requests made by counsel in the Removed Actions for attorneys’ fees and costs are GRANTED. Attorney James M. Kernan, counsel for the Class Representatives, is ORDERED to show cause within two weeks of the date of this Order, in writing, as to why he should not be referred to the Disciplinary Committee for this District in connection with his conduct in these lawsuits. I. PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND A. The Removed Actions The eighteen Removed Actions pending before this court1 were initially filed in various New York State Supreme Courts. Oriska Corporation (“Oriska”), an insurance company located in Oneida County in the Northern District of New York, is the plaintiff in seventeen of the eighteen Removed Actions. Oriska originally brought those and other related actions in Bronx, Kings, Nassau, Rensselaer, Richmond, Schenectady, Suffolk, and Westchester Counties against, inter alia, various healthcare and rehabilitation employer defendants (the “Healthcare Employers”). (See Oriska Corp. v. West Lawrence Care Ctr., 21-cv-2039, Coordination Order (Dkt. 8-6) at 2-3; App’x A.) These Removed Actions are shareholder derivative suits seeking reimbursement of unpaid insurance premiums allegedly owed to Oriska’s former subsidiary, Oriska Insurance Corporation. Id. at 2. In the state court proceedings, the Employer Defendants disputed Oriska’s claims and argued that “most, if not all, of the plaintiff’s causes of action have already been adjudicated when similar claims were litigated by Oriska Insurance Company in the Supreme Court of Oneida County by Justice Patrick F. MacRae.” Id. at 3. Oriska moved to consolidate the cases in either Nassau or Kings County. Id. The Healthcare Employers agreed that consolidation was necessary but argued that they should be moved to Oneida County, where Oriska was located and where Oriska Insurance Company’s prior claims had been adjudicated. Id. The New York State Litigation Coordination panel agreed with the Healthcare Employers and, on April 30, 2020, the panel entered an order coordinating the actions and transferring them to Oneida County for pre-trial purposes pursuant to the Uniform Rules for New York State Trial Courts §202.69. Id. at 4. The Coordination Order advised the parties that, after pre-trial discovery and decisions on any summary judgment motions, the plaintiff could choose to have a trial for each action in the county where it was originally filed. Id. Around that time, Oriska purports to have amended its state court complaints in these seventeen Removed Actions to add federal causes of action and to include putative class representatives Annette Hall, Karen Grant Williams, Donna Hodge, Alexi Arias, and Albert E. Percy (the “Class Representatives”) as additional defendants. (See, e.g., Oriska v. North Sea Assocs., 21-cv-454, Am. State Court Compl. (Dkt. 1-2) (E.D.N.Y. Jan. 27, 2021).) The Class Representatives, who are represented by attorney James M. Kernan, then attempted to collectively remove the seventeen actions to this court under one docket number, Oriska v. North Sea Assocs., 21-cv-454 (“North Sea”). On April 9, 2021, this court dismissed North Sea as improperly filed. (North Sea, Apr. 9, 2021 Order.) The Class Representatives then filed notices to individually remove each of those seventeen state court actions to the Eastern District of New York. The eighteenth Removed Action was filed in New York Supreme Court, Nassau County (the “Nassau County Action”). The Healthcare Employers were the original plaintiffs in the Nassau County Action, and they brought various state law claims against individual defendants Bent Philipson, Avi Philipson, and Deborah Philipson. (Bay Park Ctr. for Nursing & Rehab., et al. v. Philipson, et al., 20-cv-6291 (“Bay Park Ctr.”), Compl. (Dkt. 9-3)
57-102.) Specifically, in their initial complaint, the Healthcare Employers alleged that the Philipsons abused their fiduciary positions by engaging in a scheme to trick the Healthcare Employers into paying premiums into a scam third-party insurance policy over the course of several years, promising them third-party insurance coverage that did not exist. (Id.
