Raphael Mendez v. Stacey Plaskett ( 2019 )

NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
_____________
No. 18-3309
_____________
RAPHAEL MENDEZ,
Appellant
v.
STACEY PLASKETT, Congresswoman;
CLETIS CLENDINEN;
VIRGIN ISLANDS LEGISLATIVE DIRECTOR
_______________
On Appeal from the District Court of the
Virgin Islands
(D.C. No. 3-16-cv-0026)
District Judge: Hon. Curtis V. Gomez
_______________
Submitted Under Third Circuit L.A.R. 34.1(a)
April 8, 2019
Before: SMITH, Chief Judge, JORDAN and RENDELL, Circuit Judges.
(Filed: April 10, 2019)
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OPINION*
_______________
*
This disposition is not an opinion of the full court and, pursuant to I.O.P. 5.7,
does not constitute binding precedent.
JORDAN, Circuit Judge.
Raphael Mendez appeals the order of the District Court dismissing his petition for
a writ of mandamus. We will affirm.
I. Background
Mendez has for many years been involuntarily committed to the Federal Medical
Center in Rochester, Minnesota (“FMC Rochester”).1 In 2015, he wrote to the Honorable
Stacey Plaskett, the Delegate of the United States Virgin Islands to the United States
House of Representatives, requesting that her office investigate his confinement at FMC
Rochester and provide him with the resulting findings. A member of Plaskett’s district
office staff responded, but not to Mendez’s satisfaction. So Mendez sought a writ of
mandamus, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1361, to compel Representative Plaskett, her
Legislative Director, and the district staff member who had responded to the investigation
request “to provide him with information regarding their investigation of his claim of
false imprisonment[.]” (D.I. 19 at 2.)
The District Court dismissed his petition for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction,
and Mendez has appealed. The appeal is only with respect to the dismissal of his petition
for mandamus as directed at the staff member.2
1
A description of the events leading to Mendez’s commitment is not relevant to
this appeal but can be found in an earlier non-precedential opinion, In re Mendez, 653 F.
App’x 158, 158-59 (3d Cir. 2016) (per curium).
2
Mendez says that he “is NOT challenging his Congresswoman NOR her
Legislative Director, in this U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeal … [a]s they ARE already
Docketed in U.S. Washington DC appellate Court and OPENING BRIEF [sic] already
begun and ended[.]” (Opening Br. at 3.) The reference to “DC appellate Court” is
2
II. Discussion3
Section 1361 states that, “district courts shall have original jurisdiction of any
action in the nature of mandamus to compel an officer or employee of the United States
or any agency thereof to perform a duty owed to the plaintiff.” 28 U.S.C. § 1361. That
the individual be such an officer or employee is a requirement for a court to have subject
matter jurisdiction. Semper v. Gomez, 747 F.3d 229, 250-51 (3d Cir. 2014). Moreover,
we have concluded, in determining whether an individual qualifies as “an officer or
employee of the United States or any agency thereof,” 28 U.S.C. § 1361, that “Congress,
in enacting § 1361 … ‘was thinking solely in terms of the executive branch,’” Semper,
747 F.3d at 250 (quoting Liberation News Serv. v. Eastland, 426 F.2d 1379, 1384 (2d Cir.
1970)). Because Representative Plaskett’s staff member works for the legislative branch
and not the executive branch, the District Court properly determined it was without
subject matter jurisdiction.4
apparently to a then-pending appeal before the United States Court of Appeals for the
District of Columbia Circuit, which also denied a petition he filed for a writ of
mandamus. Mendez v. Trump, 744 F. App’x 706 (D.C. Cir. 2018) (per curium).
3
The District Court concluded 28 U.S.C. § 1361 did not give it subject matter
jurisdiction. We have jurisdiction to review that determination pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §
1291.
4
Even were there jurisdiction, Mendez has failed to make the requisite showing
of a “clear and indisputable” right to issuance of the writ. Hollingsworth v. Perry, 558
U.S. 183, 190 (2010) (per curium) (citation omitted). There is no right to compel a
legislative branch staff member to investigate a constituent’s claims or share investigative
findings.
3
III. Conclusion
The District Court properly dismissed the petition for a writ of mandamus, and we
will therefore affirm.
4