Plaintiffs Heart Disease Research Foundation, a charitable trust, and Robert R. Peters and Henry Sassone, two of the Foundation’s trustees, appeal from an order of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, Harold R. Tyler, Jr., J., dismissing plaintiffs’ amended complaint against General Motors Corp., Chrysler Corporation, Ford Motor Co. and American Motors Sales Corp. Plaintiffs seek to represent a class consisting of “the population of the United States residing in the metropolitan areas of the United States, amounting to approximately 125,000,000 persons.”
1
The amended complaint contains three counts: Count 1 alleges that defendants have committed antitrust violations by conspiring to suppress the development of motor vehicle pollution control devices; jurisdiction is grounded on the antitrust laws, 15 U.S.C. §§ 1, 2, 15. Count 2 purports to add another cause of action “pursuant
Counts 2 and 3 of the complaint do not allege the essential elements of any cause of action. The purported jurisdictional basis for the former — the “general welfare” clause — is frivolous. As to count 3, plaintiffs now claim that “the sufficiency of this count need not be considered at this time” since count 2 “is also specifically bottomed on the ‘Clean Air Act.’ ” This assertion is typical of the sloppy, scatter-shot manner in which this complaint was thrown together. Count 2 does not mention the “Clean Air Act.” Neither does count 3 for that matter. The latter does refer to the “Environmental Quality Act,” which Judge Tyler understandably took to mean the Environmental Quality Improvement Act of 1970, 42 U. S.C. § 4371 et seq. Plaintiffs now tell us they really were referring to 42 U.S. C. § 1857, which the complaint nowhere mentions and which requires, in any event, allegations as yet unmade. Plaintiffs also now argue that count 2 is actually a nuisance or negligence action based upon diversity, allegations that they never bothered to make in the complaint. Even under the liberal Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, there is a limit to how much a court may be called upon to divine in assessing the sufficiency of the complaint before it, particularly when the plaintiff is represented by counsel.
As to count 1, it was well within the district court’s discretion to dismiss the claim since no facts are alleged supporting an antitrust conspiracy. Although the Federal Rules permit statement of ultimate facts, a bare bones statement of conspiracy or of injury under the antitrust laws without any supporting facts permits dismissal. See generally, 2A Moore, Federal Practice fl 12.08 (2d ed. 1968). This is particularly true when, as here, the original plaintiff has already amended his complaint once with the approval of the court.
We are aware that a number of cases are now pending in the District Court for the Central District of California in which the plaintiffs, mostly political entities suing
parens patriae
on behalf of their citizens, are charging these defendants with antitrust violations in connection with the development of air pollution control devices. At least one of these actions was transferred to that court from the Southern District of New York. See In re Motor Vehicle Air Pollution Control Equipment,
Judgment affirmed.
Notes
. The original complaint -was on behalf of “the entire population of the United States, amounting to approximately 225,000,000 persons.”
. Fed.R.Civ.P. 11 provides, inter alia, that:
The signature of an attorney [on a pleading] constitutes a certificate by him that he has read the pleading; that to the best of his knowledge, information, and belief there is good ground to support it; and that it is not interposed for delay. If a pleading is signed with intent to defeat the purpose of this rule, it may be stricken as sham and false ....