Also known as: frivolous or without foundation · frivolous · groundless
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
A standard applied by courts and disciplinary bodies to evaluate whether a claim, defense, or discovery request lacks any reasonable basis in law or fact. The standard permits sanctions, fee shifting to a prevailing defendant, or withdrawal when the position rests on speculation, controlling precedent that squarely bars relief, or no plausible argument for extension of existing doctrine.
Francisco Frost retained counsel to sue a major-label artist for infringement after noting that both songs used the same four-chord progression and romantic-loss theme. Counsel filed the complaint without any evidence that the defendant had heard the earlier track and without any shared protectable expression. The filing violated the requirement of a nonfrivolous basis in law and fact.
Highland Aviation asserted industrial-espionage counts against Sigma Jet based solely on conjecture. At the pretrial conference the court struck those counts because they rested on no factual grounding and therefore qualified as frivolous claims subject to elimination.
Isabella served requests for every lab notebook and email from all research divisions over five years without first investigating narrower alternatives. The certification that the requests were supported by existing law or a nonfrivolous extension failed because the demands lacked any plausible proportionality analysis.
Felicia Fuentes sued her employer under Title VII alleging discrimination but presented no evidence that any adverse action occurred because of a protected characteristic. After summary judgment the court awarded fees to the prevailing defendant upon finding that the action was frivolous, unreasonable, or without foundation.
Buckhannon Board and Care Home, Inc., which operates care homes that provide assisted living to their residents, failed an inspection by the West Virginia Office of the State Fire Marshal because some of the residents were incapable of "self-preservation" as defined under state law. On October 28, 1997, after receiving cease-and-desist orders requiring the closure of its residential care facilities within 30 days, Buckhannon Board and Care Home, Inc., on behalf of itself and other similarly situated homes and residents, brought suit in the United States District Court for the Northern District of West Virginia against the State of West Virginia, two of its agencies, and 18 individuals, seeking declaratory and injunctive relief that the self-preservation requirement violated the Fair Housing Amendments Act of 1988 and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. Respondents agreed to stay enforcement of the cease-and-desist orders pending resolution of the case and the parties began discovery. In 1998, the West Virginia Legislature enacted two bills eliminating the self-preservation requirement, and respondents moved to dismiss the case as moot. The District Court granted the motion, finding that the 1998 legislation had eliminated the allegedly offensive provisions and that there was no indication that the West Virginia Legislature would repeal the amendments. Petitioners requested attorney's fees as the prevailing party under the FHAA and ADA. They argued that they were entitled to attorney's fees under the catalyst theory. This theory posits that a plaintiff is a prevailing party if it achieves the desired result because the lawsuit brought about a voluntary change in the defendant's conduct. The District Court accordingly denied the motion and, for the same reason, the Court of Appeals affirmed in an unpublished, per curiam opinion. To resolve the disagreement amongst the Courts of Appeals, the Supreme Court granted certiorari and now affirms the judgment of the Court of Appeals.
Fernando Farrell alleged that telecommunications carriers conspired to restrain trade but pleaded only parallel conduct and a bare assertion of agreement. The complaint failed to state a claim because it lacked any factual context suggesting an actual agreement, rendering the theory frivolous under the governing pleading standard.
In 1984 the divestiture of AT&T's local telephone business created seven regional service monopolies known as Regional Bell Operating Companies or Incumbent Local Exchange Carriers. More than a decade later Congress enacted the Telecommunications Act of 1996 which restructured local telephone markets and imposed duties on the ILECs to facilitate entry by competitive local exchange carriers through resale of services at wholesale rates, leasing of unbundled network elements, or interconnection of facilities. William Twombly and Lawrence Marcus filed suit in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York on behalf of a putative class of all subscribers of local telephone and high-speed internet services from February 8, 1996 to the present. They named as defendants four consolidated ILECs: BellSouth Corporation, Qwest Communications International Inc., SBC Communications Inc., and Verizon Communications Inc. The complaint alleged that these ILECs conspired to restrain trade by engaging in parallel conduct to inhibit CLECs, including unfair agreements for network access, inferior connections, overcharging, and billing practices designed to sabotage CLEC customer relations. The complaint further alleged that the ILECs agreed not to compete against one another in their respective territories. This agreement was inferred from their common failure to pursue business opportunities in contiguous markets and from a statement by Qwest CEO Richard Notebaert that competing in another ILEC's territory might be a good way to turn a quick dollar but that does not make it right. The complaint asserted that in light of the absence of meaningful competition among the ILECs and their parallel course of conduct the defendants had entered into a contract combination or conspiracy to prevent competitive entry and to allocate customers and markets. The district court dismissed the complaint for failure to state a claim. It concluded that the alleged parallel behavior was fully explained by each ILEC's independent interest in defending its own territory and that the complaint did not allege facts suggesting the decision to refrain from competing elsewhere was contrary to the ILECs' apparent economic interests. The Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit reversed, holding that plus factors need not be pleaded and that allegations of parallel conduct suffice if they leave open the possibility of collusion. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to address the proper standard for pleading an antitrust conspiracy through allegations of parallel conduct.
Fiona Foster sued high-level officials for constitutional violations arising from detention policies but alleged only that the officials had approved the policies in general terms. The complaint was dismissed because the allegations failed to state a plausible claim that the officials themselves acted with the required discriminatory purpose.
In the wake of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, the FBI dedicated more than 4,000 special agents and 3,000 support personnel to an investigation that by September 18 had received more than 96,000 tips or potential leads from the public. In the ensuing months the FBI questioned more than 1,000 people with suspected links to the attacks or to terrorism in general. Of those individuals, 762 were held on immigration charges, and a 184-member subset of that group was deemed to be of high interest to the investigation and held under restrictive conditions designed to prevent communication with the general prison population or the outside world. Javaid Iqbal, a citizen of Pakistan and a Muslim, was arrested in November 2001 by agents of the FBI and Immigration and Naturalization Service on charges of fraud in relation to identification documents and conspiracy to defraud the United States. Pending trial, he was housed at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, New York. In January 2002 he was designated a person of high interest and placed in the Administrative Maximum Special Housing Unit, where detainees were kept in lock-down 23 hours a day and spent the remaining hour outside their cells in handcuffs and leg irons accompanied by a four-officer escort. Iqbal pleaded guilty to the criminal charges, served a term of imprisonment, and was removed to Pakistan. He then filed a Bivens action in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York against 34 current and former federal officials, including former Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI Director Robert Mueller, as well as 19 John Doe corrections officers. The complaint concentrated on his treatment while confined to the ADMAX SHU and alleged that petitioners designated him a person of high interest on account of his race, religion, or national origin. The complaint alleged that the FBI under Mueller’s direction arrested and detained thousands of Arab Muslim men as part of the September 11 investigation, that the policy of holding post-September-11 detainees in highly restrictive conditions until cleared by the FBI was approved by Ashcroft and Mueller in discussions in the weeks after September 11, and that petitioners each knew of, condoned, and willfully agreed to subject Iqbal to harsh conditions solely on account of his religion, race, and national origin. It named Ashcroft as the principal architect of the policy and identified Mueller as instrumental in its adoption, promulgation, and implementation. Petitioners moved to dismiss the complaint for failure to state sufficient allegations showing their own involvement in clearly established unconstitutional conduct. The District Court denied the motion. Petitioners brought an interlocutory appeal, and while the appeal was pending the Supreme Court decided Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly. The Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed the District Court’s decision. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.
A prevailing defendant must demonstrate that the plaintiff's action was frivolous, unreasonable, or without foundation. The standard is objective and does not require proof of subjective bad faith.
Yes. Rule 3.1 expressly allows a good-faith argument for an extension, modification, or reversal of existing law, provided the argument has a nonfrivolous basis in law or fact.
…false. The salutary social value of this rule is preventive in character since it often permits a defamed person to expose the groundless character of a defamatory rumor before harm to the reputation has resulted therefrom." Id. , § 569, comment b, p. 166. If the defamation was not libel but slander, it was actionable per…
…when we explained that something beyond the mere possibility of loss causation must be alleged, lest a plaintiff with "a largely groundless claim" be allowed to "take up the time of a number of other people, with the right to do so representing an in terrorem increment of the settlement value." So, when the allegations in a…
…or the courts. Finally, the appellant argues that the Act violates the Thirteenth Amendment. This contention is patently frivolous. The Thirteenth Amendment abolishes slavery and involuntary servitude. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 does not subject anyone to slavery or involuntary servitude. It merely prohibits racial…
…discrimination except race. See ibid . In addition lessening the causation standard could also contribute to the filing of frivolous
…for fee award absent "special circumstances," but prevailing defendant may obtain fee award only if plaintiff's suit is "
Yes. Rule 16(c)(2)(A) authorizes the court to formulate and simplify the issues and to eliminate frivolous claims or defenses at any pretrial conference.
Yes. Rule 3.4(d) prohibits a lawyer from making a frivolous discovery request or failing to make a reasonably diligent effort to comply with a proper request from an opposing party.
A claim supports federal-question jurisdiction if it is not wholly insubstantial or frivolous, even if the ultimate merits remain uncertain. Jurisdiction turns on whether the complaint asserts a nonfrivolous right to relief arising under federal law.