Case: 18-10843 Date Filed: 10/19/2018 Page: 1 of 3
[DO NOT PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
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No. 18-10843
Non-Argument Calendar
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D.C. Docket No. 1:17-cv-01712-TCB
THELMA OWENS,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
versus
REAL TIME RESOLUTIONS INC.,
Defendant-Appellee.
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Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Northern District of Georgia
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(October 19, 2018)
Before WILSON, WILLIAM PRYOR and JULIE CARNES, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
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Thelma Owens appeals pro se the dismissal with prejudice of her complaint
that Real Time Resolutions, Inc., violated federal and state law when it attempted
to foreclose on her home. After Owens filed her complaint in a Georgia court, Real
Time Resolutions promptly removed the action to the district court and filed a
motion to dismiss. The district court dismissed Owens’s complaint for failure to
state a claim and denied her motion for reconsideration. We affirm.
Owens argues that the district court violated her right to a trial by jury by
dismissing her complaint, but her argument fails. A district court may dismiss a
complaint for “failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted.” Fed. R.
Civ. P. 12(b)(6). The district court did not violate Owens’s right to a trial by jury
because it determined that her complaint failed to state a claim as a matter of law.
See Garvie v. City of Fort Walton Beach, Fla.,
366 F.3d 1186, 1190 (11th Cir.
2004).
Under Georgia law, Owens has no right to challenge the validity of the
assignment of her security deed to Real Time Resolutions. Although Owens argues
that she did not sign a waiver of rights, Owens admitted in her complaint that she
executed a security deed in favor of BNC Mortgage Inc., in which she did “grant
and convey to MERS [Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc.] (solely as
nominee for Lender and Lender’s successors and assigns) and the successors and
assigns of MERS, with power of sale,” of her home. Mortgage Electronic Systems
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Case: 18-10843 Date Filed: 10/19/2018 Page: 3 of 3
exercised its authority to assign Owens’s security deed to Property Asset
Management, Inc., which assigned the instrument to a third party, which then
assigned it to Real Time Resolutions. If there was a flaw in the assignment, only
Real Time Resolutions and the earlier deed holder could challenge the assignment.
See Ames v. JP Morgan Chase Bank, N.A.,
783 S.E.2d 614, 620 (Ga. 2016) (“The
assignment of a security deed is a contract between the deed holder and the
assignee. . . . And a lawsuit on a contract generally may be brought only by a party
to the contract or an intended third-party beneficiary of the contract.”). As a
stranger to their agreement, Owens has no right to challenge the assignment to
Real Time Resolutions.
Owens has abandoned any challenge she could have made to the dismissal
of her claims that Real Time Resolutions violated the Fair Debt Collection
Practices Act, the Fair Credit Reporting Act, the Truth in Lending Act, or the Fair
Trade Commission Act. “[T]he law is by now well settled in this Circuit that a
legal claim or argument that has not been briefed before the court is deemed
abandoned and its merits will not be addressed.” Access Now, Inc. v. Sw. Airlines
Co.,
385 F.3d 1324, 1330 (11th Cir. 2004). Owens makes no argument against the
dismissal of her claims against Real Time Resolutions under federal law.
We AFFIRM the dismissal of Owens’s complaint.
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