Fazenbaker v. Community Health Care

CompleteCare is a provider of health care services in Southern New Jersey operated by Community Health Care. After a data breach exposed their protected personal information, several current and former patients of CompleteCare sued in New Jersey state court, arguing that CompleteCare’s failure to protect their data and to respond once it learned of the data breach violated New Jersey  law. CompleteCare removed the case to federal court, invoking two separate statutes as the basis for federal-court jurisdiction. First, it asserted that the Federally Supported Health Centers Assistance Act (FSHCCA) gave it both a right to remove and immunity from the claims. Second, it argued that, by virtue of its participation in a federal grant program, it was both a “federal officer” and acting under federal officers and, therefore, entitled to remove under the federal-officer removal statute. The district court rejected both arguments and ordered the case remanded to state court. CompleteCare appealed.

Public Citizen represents the plaintiffs in the court of appeals. Our brief explains that the district court correctly remanded the case, both because the FSHCAA does not allow private parties to remove a case to federal court when the Attorney General has filed a timely appearance in state court, and because the plaintiffs’  data-breach claims do not result from the performance of a “medical, surgical, dental, or related function”—as is necessary for the FSHCAA’s removal and immunity provisions to apply. In addition, the brief explains that CompleteCare forfeited its arguments on federal-officer removal, and that removal under that statute was both untimely and lacked merit regardless.