Anthony Trupia v. Bob Moore Enterprises, L.L.C.

Petitioner, without a lawyer, sued over two automated text messages under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, a statute that gives private plaintiffs a damages remedy. The district court dismissed his federal claims with prejudice and without leave to amend, holding that the complaint did not plausibly allege the capacity of the defendant's texting equipment. In a separate suit before the same district judge, petitioner challenged the plausibility standard itself; that court held the question "resolved by the Supreme Court" and told him that his remedy was "to appeal the disposition in the particular case." He did. The court of appeals held his challenge forfeited because he had not raised it in the district court, added that it was "bound to apply" Twombly and Iqbal in any event, and held every other issue waived for inadequate briefing. The questions presented are:

1. Whether the plausibility pleading standard al Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544 (2007), and Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662 (2009), which changed the operative meaning of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a)(2) by adjudication rather than through the Rules Enabling Act, and which authorizes a judge to dismiss a claim for legal relief before discovery by weighing the plausibility of the plaintiffs inferences, is consistent with 28 U.S.C. § 2072 and the Seventh Amendment.

2. Whether a court of appeals may refuse to consider, as forfeited for want of a district-court objection, a challenge to the validity of a pleading standard that only this Court can revisit, where the challenge was briefed on appeal, the court of appeals passed upon it, and the district court had already ruled in a parallel case that the question was closed and belonged on appeal. 3 . Whether a court of appeals may hold waived-, for inadequate briefing, an unrepresented appellant's challenge to a dismissal with prejudice entered without leave to amend, and as to one claim on a ground the defendant never raised, when the duties to construe a pro se pleading liberally and to permit amendment of a curable claim are duties this Court places on the courts themselves.