Rayfield Ransom v. State of Georgia ( 2006 )

[DO NOT PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT FILED
________________________ U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
No. 05-16914 MAY 12, 2006
Non-Argument Calendar THOMAS K. KAHN
CLERK
________________________
D. C. Docket No. 05-00043-CV-WLS-1
RAYFIELD RANSOM,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
versus
STATE OF GEORGIA,
JAMES MATTHEW HOLMAN,
GRADY HOLMAN,
Defendants-Appellees.
________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Middle District of Georgia
_________________________
(May 12, 2006)
Before DUBINA, MARCUS and WILSON, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Appellant Rayfield Ransom, proceeding pro se, appeals the district court’s
order dismissing his civil action. Ramson filed a pro se complaint, pursuant to 42
U.S.C. § 1983 and the Fourteenth Amendment against the State of Georgia. The
district court dismissed the complaint for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction under
the Rooker-Feldman doctrine.1
We have held, in Cadet v. Bulger, 377 F.3d 1173, 1179 (11th Cir. 2004), that
“[f]ederal courts are obligated to inquire into subject-matter jurisdiction sua sponte
whenever it may be lacking.” (quotation omitted). Questions of subject-matter
jurisdiction are reviewed de novo. Goodman ex rel. Goodman v. Sipos, 259 F.3d
1327, 1331 (11th Cir. 2001). In Goodman, we explained that:
[t]he Rooker-Feldman doctrine provides that federal courts, other than
the United States Supreme Court, have no authority to review the final
judgments of state courts. The doctrine extends not only to
constitutional claims presented or adjudicated by a state court, but
also to claims that are “inextricably intertwined” with a state court
judgment. A federal claim is inextricably intertwined with a state
court judgment if the federal claim succeeds only to the extent that the
state court wrongly decided the issues before it. However, even if a
claim is “inextricably intertwined” with the state court’s judgment, the
doctrine does not apply if the plaintiff had no reasonable opportunity
to raise his federal claim in state proceedings.
1
The Rooker-Feldman doctrine is derived from Rooker v. Fidelity Trust Co., 263 U.S. 413,
415-16, 44 S. Ct. 149, 150, 68 L. Ed. 362 (1923) and District of Columbia Court of Appeals v.
Feldman, 460 U.S. 462, 476-82, 103 S. Ct. 1303, 1311-15, 75 L. Ed. 2d 206 (1983).
2
Id. at 1332 (citation and quotation omitted).
In order for the Rooker-Feldman doctrine to bar a district court’s
jurisdiction, the following four criteria must be met:
(1) the party in federal court is the same as the party in state court; (2)
the prior state court ruling was a final or conclusive judgment on the
merits; (3) the party seeking relief in federal court had a reasonable
opportunity to raise its federal claims in the state court proceeding;
and (4) the issue before the federal court was either adjudicated by the
state court or was inextricably intertwined with the state court’s
judgment.
Amos v. Glynn County Bd. of Tax Assessors, 347 F.3d 1249, 1265 n.11 (11th Cir.
2003) (citations omitted). Recently, the Supreme Court held that the Rooker-
Feldman doctrine is confined to cases that are “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, ___, 125 S. Ct. 1517, 1521-22, 161 L. Ed. 2d 454 (2005).
Here, Ransom’s case fits squarely within the type of cases to which the
Supreme Court determined the Rooker-Feldman doctrine applies. In his complaint,
Ransom acknowledges that the trial court determined that the property should be
sold in a private sale and that the Supreme Court of Georgia affirmed the trial
court’s decision. Upon losing in the aforementioned state court proceedings,
3
Ransom requested that the district court review those judgments, enjoin the trial
court’s order directing either private or public sale of the property, and set the case
for trial. Therefore, the procedural framework in Ransom’s case falls directly
under the Rooker-Feldman doctrine in that it is a case “brought by [a] state-court
loser[] complaining of injuries caused by [his] state-court judgment[] rendered
before the district court proceedings commenced and inviting district court review
and rejection of those judgments.” See Exxon Mobil, 544 U.S. at ___, 125 S. Ct. at
1521-22.
The instant case also satisfies the four criteria set forth in Amos. First, the
parties to the instant action are the same parties as in state court. Second, the prior
state court ruling was a final judgment on the merits because the Georgia Supreme
Court affirmed the trial court’s decision. Third, Ransom had a reasonable
opportunity to raise his federal claims in the state court proceedings since, during
the property hearing, he presumably could have raised his concerns regarding his
constitutional right to a fair and impartial hearing, and there is no evidence in the
record indicating the state court prevented him from doing so. Also, the Supreme
Court of Georgia addressed the issue of the trial court’s alleged failure to address
the forged deeds by explaining that the trial court had reserved the issue for later
decision once the final decree was entered.
4
Finally, the issues Ransom presented before the district court were
inextricably intertwined with the state courts’ judgments. Ransom asserted the
following actions as violations of due process: (1) the trial court’s failure to
appoint a Special Master to examine deeds to determine proper parties to the
action, an omission that Ransom used as a basis for a motion to set aside the
previous order of sale, the denial of which was affirmed on appeal; and (2) the
Florida Supreme Court’s affirmance of the lower court’s decision, “thereby
abridg[ing] the legal process which could have resulted in a trial by jury.”
Ransom’s allegations that the Holmans forged the deeds and the state court
violated his constitutional rights by denying him due process are inextricably
intertwined with the prior state court judgments because, in order for the district
court to find Ransom’s allegations true, it would inevitably need to find that the
state courts wrongly decided the property and forged deed issues. This is further
evidenced by the fact that Ransom requested that the district court enjoin the
defendants from conducting a sale of the property and set the matter for jury trial
of all questionable facts and issues.
Accordingly, for the above stated reasons, we affirm the district court’s
judgment of dismissal.
AFFIRMED.
5