Johnnie M. Hayes v. U.S. Bank National Association ( 2016 )

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[DO NOT PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
________________________
No. 15-12986
Non-Argument Calendar
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D.C. Docket No. 9:13-cv-80610-KAM
JOHNNIE M. HAYES,
PRISCILLA Y. DAVIS,
Plaintiffs-Appellants,
versus
U.S. BANK NATIONAL ASSOCIATION,
as Trustee for Structured Asset Investment Loan Trust
Mortgage Pass-Through Certificates Series 2006-2,
JP MORGAN CHASE, N.A.,
OCWEN LOAN SERVICING LLC,
CHASE FULFILLMENT CENTER,
ROBERTSON, ANSCHUTZ & SCHNEID P.I., et al.,
Defendants-Appellees.
________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of Florida
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(April 21, 2016)
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Before MARTIN, ROSENBAUM, and ANDERSON, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Plaintiffs-Appellants Johnnie Hayes and Priscilla Davis, proceeding pro se,
appeal the district court’s dismissal of their civil lawsuit broadly related to the
foreclosure of their home. After careful review, we affirm.
I.
Hayes and Davis obtained a mortgage loan for their house from BNC
Mortgage, Inc. (“BNC”), in 2006. Eventually the mortgage was sold or assigned to
U.S. Bank National Association (“U.S. Bank”), which filed a complaint to
foreclose on the house in Florida state court in August 2009. A final judgment in
favor of U.S. Bank in the foreclosure action appears to have been entered in May
2013, and Hayes and Davis were evicted from the property shortly thereafter. One
of the defendants purchased the property in June 2013.
On June 14, 2013, Hayes and Davis filed the instant action in federal court
and later filed the operative first amended complaint naming a total of eleven
defendants. Among other allegations, Hayes and Davis alleged that they had not
been notified of the assignment of their mortgage or given proof of such
assignment, that several defendants had failed to respond to their qualified written
requests for validation of their mortgage debt, and that U.S. Bank had foreclosed
on their home without authority to do so.
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Hayes and Davis alleged that the defendants had violated the following
federal and state statutes: (1) the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act
(“RESPA”), 12 U.S.C. § 2605(e), by failing to properly respond to their “qualified
written requests”; (2) the Truth in Lending Act (“TILA”), 15 U.S.C. § 1641(g), by
failing to provide notice of their status as creditors; (3) the Fair Debt Collection
Practices Act (“FDCPA”), 15 U.S.C. § 1692, et seq., based on actions taken in
attempting to collect the mortgage debt from the plaintiffs; and (4) the Florida
Consumer Collection Practices Act (“FCCPA”), Fla. Stat. §§ 559.715 and 559.72,
by failing to provide notice of assignment and by attempting to collect a non-
legitimate debt. Various defendants moved to dismiss the complaint.
The district court dismissed the first amended complaint, pursuant to Rule
12(b)(6), Fed. R. Civ. P., concluding that Hayes and Davis had failed to state a
claim upon which relief could be granted. Specifically, the court determined that
Hayes and Davis’s RESPA claim failed because they did not plead details about
the content of their “qualified written requests” or allege actual or statutory
damages. The court further determined that their RESPA claim against U.S. Bank
failed for the additional reason that the statute applied to loan servicers only, and
U.S. Bank was the owner of the debt, not the servicer. The court granted Hayes
and Davis leave to amend the RESPA claim as to Ocwen Loan Servicing
(“Ocwen”).
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The district court determined that Hayes and Davis’s TILA claim against JP
Morgan Chase N.A. failed because TILA did not impose liability on servicers, and
they alleged that JP Morgan was a servicer. The court further concluded that their
TILA claim against U.S. Bank failed because the claim was time barred. See 15
U.S.C. § 1640(e) (claims must be brought within one year of the date of the
occurrence of the violation). Finding that amendment of their TILA claim would
be futile, the court dismissed it without leave to amend.
The district court next concluded that Hayes and Davis’s FDCPA claim
failed because they did not adequately allege that Ocwen and U.S. Bank were
“debt collectors” within the meaning of the act. The court also noted that the
complaint contained only paraphrasing of the statutory language without factual
support. Accordingly, the court dismissed the FDCPA claim with leave to amend.
The court also rejected Hayes and Davis’s FCCPA claim because one of the
statutory sections they relied on, Fla. Stat. § 559.715, did not provide a private
right of action, and their other allegations were mere recitations of statutory
language unsupported by facts.
Finally, the district court noted that the first amended complaint was a
classic “shotgun pleading,” warning Hayes and Davis that any future complaint
must contain “a short and plain statement of the claims,” pursuant to Rule 8 of the
Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.
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In its dismissal order, the district court granted the plaintiffs leave to amend
their complaint by July 21, 2014. On July 23 or 24, 2014, Hayes and Davis filed a
second amended complaint. Then, without leave of court, the plaintiffs filed a
third amended complaint on October 16, 2014. Both proposed amendments were
opposed by defendants.
On April 14, 2015, the district court issued an order closing the case for lack
of jurisdiction. The court concluded that it was powerless to assert jurisdiction
over their second and third amended complaints because Hayes and Davis failed to
timely amend their complaint by July 21, 2014, making the court’s dismissal order
final. After the court entered a final judgment dismissing the action, Hayes and
Davis brought this appeal.
II.
We review de novo a district court’s grant of a motion to dismiss for failure
to state a claim under Rule 12(b)(6), accepting the allegations in the complaint as
true and construing them in the light most favorable to the plaintiff. Reese v. Ellis,
Painter, Ratteree & Adams, LLP, 678 F.3d 1211, 1215 (11th Cir. 2012). To
survive a motion to dismiss, the factual allegations in the complaint must be
sufficient “to raise a right to relief above the speculative level.” Bell Atl. Corp. v.
Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555, 127 S. Ct. 1955, 1965 (2007). In essence, the
complaint must “contain enough facts to state a claim to relief that is plausible on
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its face.” Id. at 570, 127 S. Ct. at 1974; see also Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662,
678, 129 S. Ct. 1937, 1949 (2009). “[A] formulaic recitation of the elements of a
cause of action will not do[.]” Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555, 127 S. Ct. at 1965.
We liberally construe the pleadings and briefs of pro se parties. Bingham v.
Thomas, 654 F.3d 1171, 1175 (11th Cir. 2011); Timson v. Sampson, 518 F.3d 870,
874 (11th Cir. 2008). Even though we read pro se filings liberally, however,
“issues not briefed on appeal by a pro se litigant are deemed abandoned.” Timson,
518 F.3d at 874. An issue may be deemed abandoned where a party fails to
address an issue on appeal or only mentions it in passing, without providing
substantive argument in support. See Sapuppo v. Allstate Floridian Ins. Co., 739
F.3d 678, 680-82 (11th Cir. 2014) (describing the various ways in which appellate
abandonment can occur). “When an appellant fails to challenge properly on appeal
one of the grounds on which the district court based its judgment, he is deemed to
have abandoned any challenge of that ground, and it follows that the judgment is
due to be affirmed.” Id. at 680.
Hayes and Davis present three main arguments on appeal, all of which
generally relate to the district court’s alleged failure to require the defendants to
present evidence showing that they had authority to collect on the mortgage debt
and then foreclose on the house. First, they argue, the district court violated their
constitutional rights under the Contracts Clause of Article I, Section 10, and the
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Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment, by failing to demand that the
defendants produce a contract or assignment showing the existence of a bona fide
obligation. Second, they contend, the court violated Rules 1002 and 1003 of the
Federal Rules of Evidence when it did not demand that the defendants produce
evidence showing the validity of their claims to the mortgage debt. Third, they
assert, the court erred in failing to require the defendants to show both that they
sent notice to the appellants within 30 days of assignment, pursuant to Fla. Stat.
§ 559.715, and that they sent an initial communication to Hayes and Davis
containing the information required by the FDCPA under 15 U.S.C. § 1692g(a).
Hayes and Davis also contend that they properly supported their FDCPA, FCCPA,
and RESPA causes of action in their verified second amended complaint and that
the defendants do not qualify for the “bona fide error” defense, which is an
affirmative defense from liability under the FDCPA. Owen v. I.C. Sys., Inc., 629
F.3d 1263, 1271 (11th Cir. 2011); see 15 U.S.C. § 1692k(c).
After careful review of the district court’s dismissal order and Hayes and
Davis’s appellate brief, we affirm the district court’s dismissal of Hayes and
Davis’s lawsuit. Most of Hayes and Davis’s arguments on appeal misunderstand
the nature of the district court’s order, and Hayes and Davis otherwise fail to
challenge the bases of the district court’s dismissal of their claims.
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In evaluating whether a complaint should be dismissed under Rule 12(b)(6)
for failure to state a claim, “[a] court is generally limited to reviewing what is
within the four corners of the complaint.” Bickley v. Caremark RX, Inc., 461 F.3d
1325, 1329 n.7 (11th Cir. 2006); see Day v. Taylor, 400 F.3d 1272, 1275-76 (11th
Cir. 2005) (stating that a judge generally may not consider materials outside of the
four corners of a complaint without first converting the motion to dismiss into a
motion for summary judgment). The question is whether the allegations in the
complaint, accepted as true, state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.
Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555, 127 S. Ct. at 1965. That means, in this case, that Hayes
and Davis bore the burden of alleging sufficient facts that would allow the court
“to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct
alleged.” Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678, 129 S. Ct. at 1949. For reasons explained more
fully above, the district court concluded that Hayes and Davis’s factual allegations
were insufficient. The court did not err in failing to require the defendants to
produce evidence in support of their actions because evidence outside the
complaint, including proof of an affirmative defense, would only become relevant
had Hayes and Davis stated a plausible claim. Accordingly, the district court
properly limited its review to the allegations in Hayes and Davis’s complaint.
Moreover, even liberally construing their appellate brief, Hayes and Davis
have not presented any challenge to the specific reasons given by the district court
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for dismissing each of their claims or for not accepting their second and third
amended complaints. Although Hayes and Davis assert that they cured their
FDCPA, FCCPA, and RESPA claims, they do not challenge the reasons given by
the court for dismissing those claims, nor do they challenge the reason given by the
district court for rejecting their untimely filed second or third amended complaints.
Because Hayes and Davis have not challenged properly “the grounds on which the
district court based its judgment,” they have abandoned their challenge to those
grounds. See Sapuppo, 739 F.3d at 680. Accordingly, “the judgment is due to be
affirmed.” Id.
AFFIRMED.
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