USCA1 Opinion
September 15, 1995 [NOT FOR PUBLICATION]
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FIRST CIRCUIT
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No. 94-2208
ROGER DIONNE and WILLIAM HAYDEN,
Plaintiffs, Appellees,
v.
GROUND ROUND, INC.,
Defendant, Appellee.
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ALAN BASCH, ROBERT EISENBERG, JEFFREY EYMER,
SHANO EZELL, JOSEPH McKENDRY, JAMES RILEY and DIANA KURTZ,
Intervenors, Appellants.
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APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS
[Hon. Richard G. Stearns, U.S. District Judge]
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Before
Boudin, Circuit Judge,
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Bownes, Senior Circuit Judge,
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and Stahl, Circuit Judge.
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Jonathan J. Margolis with whom Sara Fleschner and Kushner &
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Sanders were on briefs for intervenors-appellants.
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Edward P. Leibensperger with whom Ronald M. Jacobs and Nutter,
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McClennen & Fish were on brief for defendant-appellee.
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Per Curiam. Appellants are seven former employees of
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The Ground Round, Inc. Appellants, and four other former
employees, sought to intervene as plaintiffs in an age
discrimination suit brought against Ground Round by yet two
more former employees, Roger Dionne and William Hayden. The
district court denied intervention. On appeal the seven
reassert their claim that they were entitled to intervention
as of right or permissively. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 24(a)(2),
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24(b)(2). We affirm summarily, substantially for the reasons
stated by the district court in its order of August 31, 1994.
This is a typical instance of plaintiffs with generally
similar or parallel claims against a single defendant. There
is a common legal framework, potentially one important common
issue of fact (here, concerning company-wide discrimination),
and a host of individual issues peculiar to each plaintiff
involving his or her job performance and damages. This is
simply not the kind of case in which Rule 24(a)(2) provides
for intervention as of right. See 7C C. Wright, A. Miller &
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M. Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure 1908, at 305-12 (2d
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ed. 1986), and cases there cited.
Instead the case is a classic example of one in which
intervention "may be permitted," in the district court's
sound discretion, because plaintiff and intervenor
potentially have questions of law and/or fact "in common."
Fed. R. Civ. P. 24(b). Here, the district court
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preliminarily found that the supposed common issue of fact
rested on little evidence; the court also found that
individual issues substantially predominated. This judgment
was assuredly not an abuse of discretion.
Affirmed.
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