Valarie Davis v. Fiat Chrysler Automobiles U.S., LLC

The doctrine of judicial estoppel holds that “where a party assumes a certain position in a legal proceeding, and succeeds in maintaining that position, he may not thereafter, simply because his interests have changed, assume a contrary position, especially if it be to the prejudice of the party who has acquiesced in the position formerly taken by him.” New Hampshire v. Maine, 532 U.S. 742, 749 (2001). Over the past 20 years, judicial estoppel has grown from an obscure and seldom-used doctrine to a fearsome judge-made rule invoked in thousands of cases. See 18B Charles Alan Wright, Arthur R. Miller & Edward H. Cooper, Federal Practice and Procedure: Jurisdiction § 4477 (“Wright & Miller”). Nowhere has this sudden change been felt more acutely than in the area of bankruptcy law. There, some circuits have adopted “a basic default rule: If a plaintiff-debtor omits a pending (or soon-to-be-filed) lawsuit from [her] bankruptcy schedules and obtains a discharge (or plan confirmation), judicial estoppel bars [the plaintiff-debtor from pursuing] the action.” See Ah Quin v. Cnty. of Kauai Dept. of Transp., 733 F.3d 267, 271 (9th Cir. 2013). The question presented is: Whether a plaintiff who fails to disclose her civil claim in bankruptcy is barred, under the doctrine of judicial estoppel, from pursuing her claim—even where there is no evidence that the plaintiff made the omission in bad faith.