Cowan v. Hunter ( 2019 )

FILED
United States Court of Appeals
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS Tenth Circuit
FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT February 1, 2019
_________________________________
Elisabeth A. Shumaker
Clerk of Court
DONALD RAY COWAN ,
Plaintiff - Appellant,
v. No. 18-5024
(D.C. No. 4:17-CV-00324-TCK-FHM)
MIKE HUNTER, Attorney General (N.D. Okla.)
for the State of Oklahoma in his
individual and official capacity;
STEVEN KUNZWEILER, District
Attorney for Tulsa County,
Oklahoma in his individual and
official capacity; MIKE HUFF,
Tulsa Police Detective, in his
individual and official capacity;
MICHAEL NANCE, Tulsa Police
Detective, in his individual and
official capacity; RICHARD
GERALD MEULENBERG, IV,
Tulsa Police Officer, in his
individual and official capacity;
CITY OF TULSA; SHERIFF OF
TULSA COUNTY; DIRECTOR OF
THE OKLAHOMA DEPARTMENT
OF CORRECTIONS,
Defendants - Appellees.
_________________________________
ORDER AND JUDGMENT *
*
We have determined that oral argument would not materially aid our
consideration of the appeal, so we have decided the appeal based on the
briefs. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2); Tenth Cir. R. 34.1(G).
This order and judgment does not constitute binding precedent except
under the doctrines of law of the case, res judicata, and collateral estoppel.
_________________________________
Before BACHARACH, PHILLIPS, and EID, Circuit Judges.
_________________________________
This appeal grew out of Mr. Donald Cowan’s conviction on a state
charge of first-degree manslaughter. After unsuccessfully challenging the
conviction, Mr. Cowan sued under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The district court
dismissed all of the causes of action, some based on a lack of jurisdiction
and others based on the failure to state a valid claim. We affirm.
1. Background
Mr. Cowan, who is white, shot an African-American man and
unsuccessfully argued self-defense at his criminal trial. Mr. Cowan also
appealed his conviction and sought post-conviction relief in state court.
Both efforts proved unsuccessful.
He then sought federal habeas relief, claiming invalidity of the state
statutes used to convict him, race discrimination, creation and presentation
of false evidence, unlawful seizure of a gun, violation of the Second
Amendment right to bear arms, retaliation for exercising a right under the
Second Amendment, cruel and unusual punishment, and failure to
supervise officers on how to comply with the Second Amendment. The
district court dismissed all of the claims.
But our order and judgment may be cited as otherwise appropriate. See
Fed. R. App. P. 32.1(a); Tenth Cir. R. 32.1(A).
2
2. The Rooker-Feldman Doctrine
We first address the dismissal of Mr. Cowan’s claims involving
 invalidity of the state statute on first-degree manslaughter and
the Oklahoma Firearm Control Act of 1971,
 race discrimination,
 creation and presentation of false evidence, and
 violation of the Second Amendment right to bear arms.
These dismissals were based on the Rooker-Feldman doctrine, which
precludes federal jurisdiction over a challenge to the correctness of a state-
court judgment. Miller v. Deutsche Bank Nat’l Tr. Co. (In re Miller), 666
F.3d 1255, 1261 (10th Cir. 2012).
For these dismissals, we engage in de novo review. Erlandson v.
Northglenn Mun. Ct., 528 F.3d 785, 788-89 (10th Cir. 2008). To conduct
this review, we must consider the remedies being sought: vacatur of the
state-court conviction and money damages. The claims for vacatur of the
state-court judgment trigger the Rooker-Feldman doctrine; the claims for
money damages don’t.
Mr. Cowan argued in part that his conviction was void and asked the
district court to vacate the judgment of conviction. This request triggers
the Rooker-Feldman doctrine. See id. at 788–89 (holding that the Rooker-
Feldman doctrine bars a request for reversal of a municipal conviction).
Thus, we held in Mr. Cowan’s previous appeal that the same claims
3
(against another defendant) were barred by the Rooker-Feldman doctrine.
Cowan v. Oklahoma, 658 F. App’x 892 (10th Cir. 2016) (unpublished).
We reach the same result here. Federal district courts do not sit as
appellate forums over state courts. Pittsburg Cty. Rural Water Dist. No. 7
v. City of McAlester, 358 F.3d 694, 706 (10th Cir. 2004). In some
situations, a federal district court can consider collateral challenges, such
as petitions for habeas corpus. See Bear v. Patton, 451 F.3d 639, 641 n.4
(10th Cir. 2006) (“We note that Rooker-Feldman does not apply in the
habeas context because Congress has authorized federal district courts to
review state prisoners’ petitions.”). But Mr. Cowan has not presented a
habeas claim or another recognized form of collateral relief. He instead
treated the federal district court as an appellate forum, requesting vacatur
of the state-court judgment. For this type of relief, the Rooker-Feldman
doctrine prevented federal jurisdiction. So the dismissal of these claims
was correct.
But the dismissal covered requests not only to vacate the state-court
judgment but also to award money damages. An award of money damages
would imply the invalidity of the state-court conviction, and the Rooker-
Feldman doctrine applies only if the claimant seeks to “modify or set aside
a state-court judgment because the state proceedings should not have led to
that judgment.” Mayotte v. U.S. Bank Nat’l Ass’n, 880 F.3d 1169, 1174
(10th Cir. 2018). In requesting money damages, Mr. Cowan was not
4
seeking invalidation of the state-court judgment, an essential attribute of
the Rooker-Feldman doctrine.
An award of money damages would presumably conflict with the
judgment of conviction. But inconsistency with that judgment implicates
preclusion rather than the Rooker-Feldman doctrine. Id. at 1174–75. So the
claim for money damages doesn’t trigger the Rooker-Feldman doctrine. See
Nesses v. Shepard, 68 F.3d 1003, 1005–06 (7th Cir. 1995) (stating that
when recovery on a claim would effectively invalidate a conviction,
without an express request for vacatur, the claim would not trigger the
Rooker-Feldman doctrine).
3. Failure to State a Valid Claim
Mr. Cowan not only sought money damages for the invalidity of his
conviction but also asserted constitutional theories involving the seizure of
his gun, the use of false evidence to support the seizure of his gun, and the
humiliation from going to prison. The district court dismissed these
constitutional theories for failure to state a valid claim.
A. Standard of Review
For these dismissals, we again engage in de novo review, applying
the same standard applicable in district court. See Cty. of Santa Fe v. Pub.
Serv. Co., 311 F.3d 1031, 1034 (10th Cir. 2002) (“Because the district
court dismissed [a] complaint under Rule 12(b)(6), we review that
dismissal de novo, applying the same standards as the district court.”). The
5
district court had to determine whether Mr. Cowan’s allegations in the
amended complaint stated a facially plausible claim. See Ashcroft v. Iqbal,
566 U.S. 662, 678 (2009).
B. Unavailability of Money Damages for Invalidity of the State-
Court Judgment
As noted above, Mr. Cowan sought money damages for invalidity of
the statutes used to convict him, race discrimination, use of false evidence,
and violation of the Second Amendment. For these claims, the federal
district court relied on the Rooker-Feldman doctrine, which wouldn’t have
barred pursuit of money damages. See pp. 4–5, above. But the defendants
argue in the alternative that these claims failed under Fed. R. Civ. P.
12(b)(6), which addresses failure to state a valid claim. We can affirm on
this basis even though the district court mistakenly dismissed the claims
for money damages based on the Rooker-Feldman doctrine. See Aguilera v.
Kirkpatrick, 241 F.3d 1286, 1289–90 (10th Cir. 2001) (stating that even if
the district court had erroneously ordered dismissal on jurisdictional
grounds, we can affirm for failure to state a valid claim because a remand
would be futile).
Though the requests for money damages fell outside the Rooker-
Feldman doctrine, the district court could not award money damages until
Mr. Cowan separately obtained expungement, reversal, or collateral relief.
See Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477, 487–88 (1994). In the absence of
6
expungement, reversal, or collateral relief, the district court properly
dismissed these claims for money damages.
C. Statute of Limitations
Mr. Cowan also asserted claims stemming from the seizure of a gun.
The seizure preceded the lawsuit by roughly thirteen years, and the
limitations period is only two years. So the district court properly
dismissed these claims as time-barred.
Mr. Cowan also claimed a violation of the Eighth Amendment based
on his humiliation in having to go to prison. The prison sentence was
imposed in 2007, and Mr. Cowan left prison roughly six years before he
asserted the Eighth Amendment claim. This claim was thus also properly
dismissed as untimely.
Affirmed.
Entered for the Court
Robert E. Bacharach
Circuit Judge
7