McDonald v. Gurson, 2:17-cv-00724

McDonald and Gurson met in Hawaii about RoxyCar AI software; McDonald alleges an agreement to run operations for 10% of the company and signed a confidentiality agreement.
Relations soured; Gurson sued McDonald in King County Superior Court for breach of the confidentiality agreement and tortious interference.
McDonald filed a federal suit alleging breach of contract, unjust enrichment, and promissory estoppel; he also removed Gurson’s state action but the removal was later remanded.
Gurson moved to dismiss the federal case under Rule 12(b)(1) arguing the Colorado River abstention doctrine requires dismissal or stay in deference to the parallel state case.
The district court analyzed Colorado River and Moses H. Cone factors (including parallelism, piecemeal litigation, forum shopping, and whether federal law governs) and found the factors either neutral or irrelevant.
Court denied Gurson’s motion to dismiss, concluding exceptional circumstances for Colorado River abstention were not present.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether federal court should decline jurisdiction under Colorado River abstention	McDonald contends suits are not parallel; removal and other procedural moves affect ripeness	Gurson argues the state case is parallel and McDonald’s federal claims are compulsory counterclaims that should be resolved in state court	Court held suits are sufficiently parallel but Colorado River abstention is not justified; denied motion
Whether danger of piecemeal litigation justifies abstention	McDonald downplays piecemeal risk and emphasizes right to federal forum	Gurson emphasizes overlapping facts and potential duplicate litigation	Court found no special federal policy or comprehensive state action; factor neutral
Which forum’s prior jurisdiction and progress favors abstention	McDonald notes his federal filings and settlement negotiations	Gurson notes he filed state suit first and sought preliminary relief there	Neither action had substantial progress; factor neutral
Whether federal law controls or state forum is inadequate	McDonald argues some contract interpretation may implicate Delaware law; does not claim federal-law issues	Gurson says state law governs and state court can provide relief	No federal issues or unusual state-law complexity; factor neutral; state court adequacy not shown lacking

Colorado River Water Conservation Dist. v. United States, 424 U.S. 800 (abstention limited to exceptional circumstances for wise judicial administration)
Moses H. Cone Mem’l Hosp. v. Mercury Constr. Corp., 460 U.S. 1 (list of factors and heavy presumption in favor of exercising federal jurisdiction)
Nakash v. Marciano, 882 F.2d 1411 (9th Cir.) (parallelism does not require exact identity of claims)
Intel Corp. v. Advanced Micro Devices, Inc., 12 F.3d 908 (9th Cir.) (state proceedings must be able to resolve federal action for parallelism)
Travelers Indem. Co. v. Madonna, 914 F.2d 1364 (9th Cir.) (doubt resolved against stay; mere possibility of piecemeal litigation insufficient)
R.R. Street & Co. Inc. v. Transport Ins. Co., 656 F.3d 966 (9th Cir.) (state-of-affairs at time of analysis includes removed actions; forum-shopping considerations)
Pullman Co. v. ... (Pullman abstention), 312 U.S. 496 (abstention doctrines based on comity and avoidance of constitutional decisionmaking)
Burford v. Sun Oil Co., 319 U.S. 315 (abstention where state law issues of special importance require state administration)
Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37 (abstention to avoid interference with state criminal proceedings)