R.A. v. Brady Johnson, 24-1009

R.A. sued her son's teacher, Robin Johnson, and several school officials for alleged abuse of her son and the officials' failure to intervene.
The school officials moved to dismiss the state law negligence claims, asserting public official immunity.
The district court denied dismissal; the officials appealed to the Fourth Circuit, which directed dismissal of the state law claims due to immunity.
On remand, the district court allowed R.A. to amend her complaint with additional details and did not dismiss the claims as directed.
The school officials appealed again, arguing the district court violated the appellate mandate requiring dismissal with prejudice.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether district court was bound by appellate mandate to dismiss state law claims with prejudice	The district court could dismiss without prejudice and let plaintiff amend claims based on new evidence	The prior appellate decision required dismissal with prejudice; no discretion to allow amended complaint	The district court violated the mandate; dismissal with prejudice was required
Whether the amended complaint, based on new evidence, justified reconsidering immunity	Newly discovered parent complaints about teacher's abuse was significant new evidence warranting reconsideration	New evidence was cumulative and did not meet threshold to evade mandate rule	New evidence did not justify departure from mandate; claims must be dismissed with prejudice
Whether the prior appellate ruling was on the merits or procedural	The prior decision left room to amend complaint and retry negligence claims	The appellate ruling was on the merits, not procedural; only dismissal with prejudice appropriate	Appellate ruling was on merits; claims cannot be reasserted
Applicability of the mandate rule exceptions (extraordinary circumstances)	Discovery of new reports was an extraordinary exception to mandate rule	No extraordinary circumstances existed; evidence was not new or significant enough	No exception applied; mandate must be followed

Bailey v. Kennedy, 349 F.3d 731 (4th Cir. 2003) (denial of official immunity under NC law is immediately appealable)
Doe v. Chao, 511 F.3d 461 (4th Cir. 2007) (appellate decisions bind district courts)
United States v. Bell, 5 F.3d 64 (4th Cir. 1993) (mandate rule requires compliance with appellate court mandate)
Invention Submission Corp. v. Dudas, 413 F.3d 411 (4th Cir. 2005) (district court must follow appellate order to dismiss)
Ostrzenski v. Seigel, 177 F.3d 245 (4th Cir. 1999) (dismissal for failure to state a claim is with prejudice unless stated otherwise)
Bell v. Hood, 327 U.S. 678 (1946) (dismissal for failure to state a claim is on the merits)
Semtek Int’l Inc. v. Lockheed Martin Corp., 531 U.S. 497 (2001) (dismissal as adjudication on the merits means with prejudice)
Costello v. United States, 365 U.S. 265 (1961) (excepts jurisdictional dismissals from res judicata effect)