The courts of appeals "have jurisdiction of appeals from all final decisions of the district courts of the United States,... except where a direct review may be had in the Supreme Court." 28 U.S.C. § 1291. A "final decision" is one "by which a district court disassociates itself from the case," Mohawk, 558 U.S. at 106, 130 S.Ct. at 604-05 (alteration omitted) (quoting Swint v. Chambers Cnty. Comm'n, 514 U.S. 35, 42, 115 S.Ct. 1203, 1208, 131 L.Ed.2d 60 (1995)), and "ends the litigation on the merits and leaves nothing more for the court to do but execute the judgment[.]" [. . . ] Five notable exceptions to this rule exist: the Perlman doctrine; the collateral-order doctrine; a certification provided by statute, 28 U.S.C. § 1292(b); a petition for a writ of mandamus; or an appeal of a contempt citation. (Citations omitted.) Doe No. 1 v. US, 749 F. 3d 999 (11th Cir. 2014).
The judicially-developed [collateral order] doctrine is a "practical construction" of § 1291's "final decision" rule that "accommodates a small class of rulings, not concluding the litigation, but conclusively resolving claims of right separable from, and collateral to, rights asserted in the action." Will v. Hallock, 546 U.S. 345, 349, 126 S.Ct. 952, 957, 163 L.Ed.2d 836 (2006) (internal quotation marks omitted). For the collateral order doctrine to apply, the collateral issues raised in the interlocutory appeal must be "too important to be denied review and too independent of the cause itself to require that appellate consideration be deferred until the whole case is adjudicated." Cohen, 337 U.S. at 546, 69 S.Ct. at 1225-26; see also Will, 546 U.S. at 349, 126 S.Ct. at 957. Plaintiff A v. Schair, 744 F. 3d 1247 (11th Cir. 2014).
The United States Supreme Court has distilled Cohen's requirements for a collateral order appeal to a three-part test. Will, 546 U.S. at 349, 126 S.Ct. at 957. To satisfy the Cohen test, the district court's order must "[1] conclusively determine the disputed question, [2] resolve an important issue completely separate from the merits of the action, and [3] be effectively unreviewable on appeal from a final judgment." Id. (quotation marks omitted); Miccosukee Tribe, 559 F.3d at 1198. "[E]ach part of the Cohen test is a critical condition for jurisdiction." Miccosukee Tribe, 559 F.3d at 1199; Feldspar Trucking Co. v. Greater Atlanta Shippers Ass'n, 849 F.2d 1389, 1392 (11th Cir.1988) ("If any one criteria is not met, jurisdiction cannot be invoked...."). Plaintiff A v. Schair, ibid.
The collateral order doctrine extends to appeals of a denial of state immunity only when the state immunity in question would provide complete immunity from suit; if the state immunity is merely from liability, then [the court has] no jurisdiction to review the denial until a final judgment is rendered. Sabo v. City of Mentor, 657 F.3d 332, 336 (6th Cir. 2011); Chesher, 477 F.3d at 793. Range v. Douglas, 763 F. 3d 573 (6th Cir. 2014).
THIS CASEBOOK contains a selection of 24 U. S. Court of Appeals decisions that analyze and interpret the collateral order doctrine. The selection of decisions spans from January 2012 to the date of publication.