PER CURIAM:
Plaintiff-Appellant James E. Pietrangelo, II,
We recite only the limited procedural history relevant to our discussion. Pietrangelo
On March 16, 2009, the City Defendants filed a notice of removal, in which counsel for the City Defendants represented that the other defendants had consented to removal and would formally notify the court of their consent. On March 17, 2009 and March 24, 2009, respectively, the Alvas Defendants and Attorney General Sorrell submitted letters to the district court confirming their consent to the City Defendants' removal motion. The Clerk's Office, however, returned each letter for failing to comply with the format requirements of Local Rule 5.1. The Alvas Defendants and Attorney General Sorrell then reiterated their consent to the City Defendants' removal in submissions that were accepted by the court on April 1, 2009 and April 3, 2009, respectively.
On April 3, 2009, Pietrangelo filed a motion to remand his action to state court; the district court denied the motion on October 7, 2009. We review a district court's denial of a motion to remand de novo. Whitaker v. Am. Telecasting, Inc., 261 F.3d 196, 201 (2d Cir.2001).
The statute in question, 28 U.S.C. § 1446(b), requires a defendant seeking to remove an action from state to federal court to file a notice of removal within thirty days of receiving service of the initial pleading. The City Defendants filed a notice of removal less than thirty days after they were served with the complaint. Pietrangelo contends that the notice was untimely, however, because it was filed nearly seven months after the first defendant waived service of process, an equivalent (for purposes of § 1446(b)) to receiving service. Thus we must decide an issue over which several circuits have disagreed prior to the December 7, 2011 amendment of § 1446: "Does the first-served defendant's thirty-day clock run for all subsequently served defendants (the first-served rule), or does each defendant get his own thirty days to remove after being served (the later-served rule)?" Destfino v. Reiswig, 630 F.3d 952, 955 (9th Cir.2011).
Had this case originated after December 7, 2011, when § 1446 was amended, the City Defendants' notice of removal would indisputably have been timely — the current statute codifies the later-served rule. See 28 U.S.C. § 1446(b).
We agree with the majority of our sister circuits and adopt the later-served rule "for reasons grounded in statutory construction, equity and common sense." Destfino, 630 F.3d at 955. It would appear that Congress addressed the shortcomings of the statute that necessitated judicial stitchery. In addition, we agree with the thorough reasoning of those circuits that share our view.
The plain text of the statute supports the later-served rule because "[g]iven that § 1446(a) explicitly affirms the possibility of multiple notices of removal, the only reasonable reading of § 1446(b) is that the subsection applies individually to each notice of removal that might potentially be filed by each removing `defendant.'"
Finally, we reject the rationale for adopting the first-served rule for substantially the same reasons stated by the Third and Ninth Circuits. See Delalla, 660 F.3d at 187-89; Destfino, 630 F.3d at 956. Most notably, the last-served rule is not inconsistent with the requirement that defendants unanimously join in a removal notice because we do not construe a defendant's failure to file a notice of removal as an affirmative decision not to join another defendant's removal request in the future. See Delalla, 660 F.3d at 188; Destfino, 630 F.3d at 956. Moreover, we agree that the Supreme Court's holding in Murphy Bros., Inc. v. Michetti Pipe Stringing, Inc., 526 U.S. 344, 347-48, 119 S.Ct. 1322, 143 L.Ed.2d 448 (1999) — that the thirty-day removal period begins upon formal service of process — "cuts against binding later-served defendants to decisions made before they were joined."
For the purpose of applying the pre-amended removal statute, we adopt the later-served rule and hold that each defendant has thirty days from when he received service to file a notice of removal. Accordingly, the City Defendants' notice of removal was timely.
We have considered Pietrangelo's remaining arguments pertaining to the denial of his motion to remand and find them to be without merit. For the foregoing reasons, and the reasons set forth in the Summary Order accompanying this Opinion, the judgment of the district court is hereby
Pub.L. No. 112-63, § 103(b)(3)(B), 125 Stat. 760, 762 (2011) (codified as amended at 28 U.S.C. § 1446(b)) (emphasis added).