Clarence Jackson v. Office of the Mayor DC , 911 F.3d 1167 ( 2018 )


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  •  United States Court of Appeals
    FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT
    Argued November 6, 2018            Decided December 28, 2018
    No. 17-7056
    CLARENCE JACKSON,
    APPELLANT
    v.
    OFFICE OF THE MAYOR OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
    AND DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA COURT OF APPEALS ADMISSIONS
    COMMITTEE,
    APPELLEES
    Appeal from the United States District Court
    for the District of Columbia
    (No. 1:16-cv-02049)
    Sarah G. Boyce, appointed by the court, argued the cause
    on behalf of the amicus curiae in support of the appellant.
    Chad I. Golder, appointed by the court, was with her on brief.
    Clarence Jackson, pro se, was on brief for the appellant.
    Lucy E. Pittman, Assistant Attorney General, Office of the
    Attorney General for the District of Columbia, argued the cause
    for the appellees. Karl A. Racine, Attorney General, Loren L.
    AliKhan, Solicitor General, and Caroline S. Van Zile, Deputy
    Solicitor General, were with her on brief.
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    Before: HENDERSON, GRIFFITH and WILKINS, Circuit
    Judges.
    Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge HENDERSON.
    KAREN LECRAFT HENDERSON, Circuit Judge:
    In 2010, the District of Columbia Court of Appeals
    Committee on Admissions (“Committee”) denied Clarence
    Jackson’s application to sit for the D.C. Bar Examination
    (“Bar”). Since then, Jackson has challenged that decision and,
    in turn, the handling of his challenge. His case reached the
    federal district court in 2016. The district court dismissed his
    complaint based on three alternative doctrines: the Rooker-
    Feldman doctrine, the Younger abstention doctrine and the
    doctrine of res judicata. Because none of the three doctrines
    applies, we reverse.
    I.
    Clarence Jackson sat unsuccessfully for the Bar four times.
    In 2010, he applied to sit a fifth time. He failed to pay the
    required fees or to provide proof of law school graduation and
    the Committee denied his application.
    Five years later, Jackson sued the Committee in the D.C.
    Superior Court (“State Complaint”). He alleged that the denial
    of his application violated the Fourteenth Amendment to the
    United States Constitution, constituted a breach of contract and
    resulted in the intentional infliction of emotional distress. On
    April 1, 2016, the Superior Court granted without explanation
    the Committee’s motion to dismiss the State Complaint.
    On or around April 5, 2016, Jackson submitted a petition
    to the D.C. Mayor’s Office in an apparent attempt to seek
    review of the decision denying him a further opportunity to
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    take the bar exam. The Mayor’s Office denied his petition on
    the ground that he had already filed a lawsuit making the same
    claim. Jackson then petitioned for review in the D.C. Court of
    Appeals, but his petition was denied as untimely.
    On April 7, 2016, Jackson asked the Superior Court to
    explain why it dismissed the State Complaint. The request
    remained pending for more than one year.
    In the interim, Jackson filed the instant complaint
    (“Federal Complaint”). This time Jackson sued both the
    Committee and the Mayor’s Office (“Defendants”). He alleged
    that the denial of his application and the rejection of his
    challenge to that denial violated the Sixth, Thirteenth and
    Fourteenth Amendments, 1 as well as the Americans with
    0F
    Disabilities Act of 1990, 42 U.S.C. § 12101 et seq. He also
    reasserted his breach of contract and intentional infliction of
    emotional distress claims and asserted a claim for negligent
    infliction of emotional distress. In March 2017, the district
    court granted the Defendants’ motion to dismiss the Federal
    Complaint. The district court construed the Federal Complaint
    as a suit against the District and characterized the claims
    contained therein as “effectively the same as those advanced
    [in the State Complaint].” It then identified three alternative
    grounds in dismissing the Federal Complaint: the Rooker-
    Feldman doctrine, the Younger abstention doctrine and the
    doctrine of res judicata.
    In June 2017, the Committee asked the Superior Court to
    resolve Jackson’s request that the court explain its decision to
    1
    Reading the pro se Federal Complaint “liberally,” Richardson
    v. United States, 
    193 F.3d 545
    , 548 (D.C. Cir. 1999), we construe the
    Fourteenth Amendment claim as a Fifth Amendment claim, see
    English v. District of Columbia, 
    717 F.3d 968
    , 972 (D.C. Cir. 2013)
    (noting that Fifth Amendment applies to D.C.).
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    dismiss the State Complaint. In July 2017, the Superior Court
    stated that it had not ruled on the request over the previous
    fifteen months because it believed its earlier decision was “a
    final adjudication” and that “the matter was closed.” It clarified
    that it had dismissed the State Complaint “for many reasons,”
    including its “lack[] [of] subject-matter jurisdiction over this
    action.” See Kennedy v. Educ. Testing Serv., Inc., 
    393 A.2d 523
    , 525 (D.C. 1978) (D.C. Court of Appeals has exclusive
    jurisdiction over challenges to bar application denials).
    Jackson timely appealed the district court’s dismissal of
    the Federal Complaint. We review each alternative ground of
    the district court’s decision de novo. See Croley v. Joint Comm.
    on Judicial Admin., 
    895 F.3d 22
    , 28 (D.C. Cir. 2018) (district
    court’s application of Rooker-Feldman is reviewed de novo);
    Havens v. Mabus, 
    759 F.3d 91
    , 97 (D.C. Cir. 2014) (district
    court’s application of res judicata is reviewed de novo); Handy
    v. Shaw, Bransford, Veilleux & Roth, 
    325 F.3d 346
    , 349 (D.C.
    Cir. 2003) (whether district court applied proper abstention
    standard is reviewed de novo).
    II.
    The Defendants have all but abandoned their attempt to
    defend the district court’s reliance on the Rooker-Feldman and
    Younger abstention doctrines and for good reason. The Rooker-
    Feldman doctrine prevents a federal district court from hearing
    “cases brought by state-court losers complaining of injuries
    caused by state-court judgments rendered before the district
    court proceedings commenced and inviting district court
    review and rejection of those judgments.” Exxon Mobil Corp.
    v. Saudi Basic Indus. Corp., 
    544 U.S. 280
    , 284 (2005). Because
    Jackson did not ask the district court to review and reject the
    Superior Court’s dismissal of the State Complaint, Rooker-
    Feldman does not apply. The Younger doctrine prevents a
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    federal court from interfering with certain categories of
    ongoing state proceedings. Sprint Commc’ns, Inc. v. Jacobs,
    
    571 U.S. 69
    , 72–73 (2013). We need not decide whether
    Younger applied at the time of the district court’s decision;
    because Jackson’s state court proceedings are not currently
    ongoing, Younger does not apply. See Stanton v. D.C. Court of
    Appeals, 
    127 F.3d 72
    , 74 (D.C. Cir. 1997).
    Nor does D.C.’s doctrine of res judicata apply. The full
    faith and credit statute dictates that D.C. law governs this issue.
    See 28 U.S.C. § 1738; Hurd v. District of Columbia, 
    864 F.3d 671
    , 679 (D.C. Cir. 2017) (holding that full faith and credit
    statute, 28 U.S.C. § 1738, requires federal court to give D.C.
    court’s decision same preclusive effect D.C. court does). D.C.
    law establishes that, “[u]nder the doctrine of claim preclusion
    or res judicata, when a valid final judgment has been entered
    on the merits, the parties or those in privity with them are
    barred, in a subsequent proceeding, from relitigating the same
    claim or any claim that might have been raised in the first
    proceeding.” Wash. Med. Ctr., Inc. v. Holle, 
    573 A.2d 1269
    ,
    1280–81 (D.C. 1990) (emphasis added). The Superior Court
    dismissed the State Complaint for lack of subject matter
    jurisdiction. Although the Superior Court noted alternative
    bases for dismissal, including the Committee’s immunity from
    suit, the running of the statute of limitations and the
    complaint’s failure to state a claim, it had no authority to
    consider them having determined it was without jurisdiction.
    See In re D.M., 
    771 A.2d 360
    , 364 (D.C. 2001) (“Without
    jurisdiction, the Court cannot proceed at all in any cause.
    Jurisdiction is power to declare the law, and when it ceases to
    exist, the only function remaining to the court is that of
    announcing the fact and dismissing the cause.” (quoting Steel
    Co. v. Citizens for a Better Env’t, 
    523 U.S. 83
    , 94 (1998))). A
    dismissal for lack of subject matter jurisdiction is not a
    judgment “on the merits.” UMC Dev., LLC v. District of
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    Columbia, 
    120 A.3d 37
    , 48–49 (D.C. 2015) (“[A] court which
    lacks subject matter jurisdiction may not issue a ruling on the
    merits.”). Res judicata, then, also does not apply.
    The Defendants acknowledge that the State Complaint was
    not dismissed “on the merits” but argue that res judicata
    nevertheless applies. They claim that res judicata applies if a
    party seeks to relitigate the same jurisdictional issue that led to
    an earlier dismissal, notwithstanding a jurisdictional dismissal
    is not rendered “on the merits.” The Defendants are incorrect.
    Without exception, an earlier judgment must have been
    rendered “on the merits” for res judicata to apply. Washington
    Med. 
    Ctr., 573 A.2d at 1280
    –81.
    A dismissal for lack of jurisdiction does “preclude
    relitigation of the precise issue of jurisdiction that led to the
    initial dismissal.” GAF Corp v. United States, 
    818 F.2d 901
    ,
    912 (D.C. Cir. 1987). But that result arises from the application
    of the doctrine of collateral estoppel, or issue preclusion. See
    Nat’l Ass’n of Home Builders v. EPA, 
    786 F.3d 34
    , 41 (D.C.
    Cir. 2015). Collateral estoppel prevents a party from
    relitigating an issue that has already been decided, whether
    there has been a judgment “on the merits” or not. GSS Grp. Ltd.
    v. Nat’l Port Auth. of Liberia, 
    822 F.3d 598
    , 608 (D.C. Cir.
    2016) (issue preclusion applies if “a later argument ‘is related
    to the subject-matter and relevant to the issues that were
    litigated and adjudicated previously, so that it could have been
    raised’” (quoting Hall v. Clinton, 
    285 F.3d 74
    , 80 (D.C. Cir.
    2002))). But even collateral estoppel would not apply here
    because the Federal Complaint does not require the district
    court to relitigate the same jurisdictional issue that led to the
    dismissal of the State Complaint. The Superior Court dismissed
    the State Complaint because it—a state court—lacked
    jurisdiction of the State Complaint. The Federal Complaint
    requires the district court to decide whether a federal court has
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    jurisdiction of the Federal Complaint. These are different
    issues and therefore collateral estoppel—as an alternative basis
    for dismissal—cannot save the district court’s judgment.
    For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the district
    court is reversed. The case is remanded for further proceedings
    consistent with this opinion. The district court is free to
    consider, inter alia, the alternative bases for dismissal set forth
    in the Defendants’ motion to dismiss. See District Court
    Docket, ECF No. 17, at 1 (defendants’ unaddressed grounds
    include their legal incapacity; Committee’s immunity from
    suit; statute of limitations bar; Jackson’s failure to comply with
    D.C. Code § 12-309; and Jackson’s failure to state plausible
    claim for relief).
    So ordered.