31 Foster Children v. Bush
| Decision Date | 08 May 2003 |
| Docket Number | No. 02-10180.,02-10180. |
| Citation | 329 F.3d 1255 |
| Parties | 31 FOSTER CHILDREN, on behalf of themselves and all other Children in Florida Foster Care, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. Jeb BUSH, as Governor of the State of Florida, Kathleen Kearney, as Secretary of the Florida Department of Children and Families, Chuck Bates, District Administrator, Robert Williams, District Administrator, Ester Tibbs, District Administrator, et al., Defendants-Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit |
Marcia Robinson Lowry, Children's Rights, Inc., New York City, Karen A. Gievers, Tallahassee, FL, Robert M. Montgomery, Jr., Montgomery & Larmoyeux, West Palm Beach, FL, Roy D. Wasson, Miami, FL, Christina A. Zawisza, Children First Project, Fort Lauderdale, FL, William H. Fraser, Legal Aid Society of Palm Beach County, Inc., West Palm Beach, FL, Deborah A. Schroth, Florida Legal Services, Inc., Jacksonville, FL, Bernard P. Perlmutter, University of Miami School of Law, Children & Youth Law Clinic, Miami FL, for Plaintiffs-Appellants.
Jason Vail, Tallahassee, FL, for Defendants-Appellees.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida.
Before ANDERSON and CARNES, Circuit Judges, and HAND*, District Judge.
This case involves a proposed class action brought on behalf of all children in Florida's foster care system against the Governor of Florida, the Secretary of Florida's Department of Children and Families ("the Department"), and the administrators of fourteen of the Department's fifteen districts, all of whom collectively administer Florida's foster care system. The individual plaintiffs' amended complaint alleges widespread deficiencies in the state's foster care system, in violation of the United States Constitution and federal statutory law. The plaintiffs appeal the district court's order insofar as it grants the defendants' motions to dismiss parts of the amended complaint on grounds of Younger v. Harris abstention and Eleventh Amendment immunity.
In Part I of this opinion, we set out the allegations contained in the multi-count complaint and the procedural history of the case. In Part II, we address the justiciability concerns raised by the defendants and conclude that although the claims of two of the plaintiffs are moot, the other plaintiffs have standing to pursue their claims. In Part III, we review the plaintiffs' federal statutory claims and affirm the district court's order dismissing those claims, because the statutes at issue do not give rise to enforceable rights. In Part IV, we discuss the Younger abstention doctrine and conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion in abstaining from deciding the plaintiffs' claims. Part V contains our conclusions and instructions for the district court on remand.
In June of 2000, the plaintiffs filed suit on behalf of themselves and a statewide class of children in custody of the defendants. The amended complaint contains six counts, alleging that the defendants' practices deny and threaten the plaintiffs'1 claimed rights to: (1) safe care that meets their basic needs, prompt placements with permanent families, and services extended after their eighteenth birthdays, as guaranteed by substantive due process (Count I); (2) procedural due process in determining the services they will receive (Count II); (3) family association with siblings as guaranteed by the First, Ninth, and Fourteenth Amendments (Count III); (4) prompt placement with permanent families and to have their medical and educational backgrounds provided to their care givers, as guaranteed by 42 U.S.C. §§ 675(5)(D) and (E), which are provisions of the Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act of 1980, Pub.L. No. 96-272, 94 Stat. 500, 516 (June 17, 1980) () ("the Adoption Act") (Count IV); (5) health screening and followup under schedules established pursuant to the Medicaid Act, 42 U.S.C. §§ 1396a(a)(43)(B), 1396(a)(43)(C), and 1396d(r) (Count V); and (6) in the case of the black plaintiff foster children, freedom from racial discrimination in the provision of care and services, as guaranteed by Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act (Count VI).
The plaintiffs brought their lawsuit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, seeking declaratory and injunctive relief relating to the operation of Florida's foster care system. Specifically, they requested that the court:
(1) declare unconstitutional and unlawful the following alleged practices: (a) the failure to provide for the plaintiffs' basic needs, safety, freedom from harm, freedom from unreasonable restraints on their liberty, care and treatment, freedom from being placed into unnecessary state-created danger, and freedom from arbitrary and capricious actions and decisions that deprive them of benefits to which they are entitled; (b) deprivation of state-created entitlements without an adequate and fair procedure; (c) unnecessary separation of siblings and denial of visitation among them; (d) failure to comply with the Adoption Act and the Medicaid Act; and (e) discrimination on the basis of race (2) enjoin the Department and the defendants from violating the plaintiffs' constitutional rights, including those described in (1) above;
(3) order appropriate remedial relief to ensure compliance with the Constitution and laws of the United States;
(4) appoint an expert panel to develop and oversee the implementation of a plan for reform;
(5) appoint a permanent ombudsman or children's advocate to present the plaintiffs' interests to the defendants, and require the defendants to meet regularly and frequently with that ombudsman; and
(6) grant other equitable relief as the court sees fit.
After amending the complaint, the plaintiffs moved to certify the statewide class of all children who are or would be in foster care in Florida, along with a subclass of black children.2 Upon motion of the defendants, the court appointed a guardian ad litem, who concluded after investigation that "a class action lawsuit is an appropriate mechanism to secure a remedy for all the children in State custody ... [and] that the prosecution of this lawsuit to a final resolution ... will be in the best interests of the Plaintiff children and the class they represent."
The district court dismissed all of the plaintiffs' claims on the pleadings. It ruled that Count IV, which involves the Adoption Act claims, is barred by the Eleventh Amendment and dismissed those claims with prejudice. The court also dismissed with prejudice the constitutional claims — Counts I, II, and III — as to all plaintiffs who are not in extended foster care (which exists only for persons age 18 or older); it did so based upon the abstention doctrine of Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37, 91 S.Ct. 746, 27 L.Ed.2d 669 (1971). The court dismissed with prejudice the portion of Count VI that alleges disparate impact discrimination under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Concluding that the amended complaint was not a "short and plain statement" of claims, the court dismissed all the other claims (including the Title VI claims for intentional discrimination) in the amended complaint without prejudice, granting the plaintiffs leave to replead those claims that had not been dismissed on some other basis.
Thereafter, eleven of the twenty-two named plaintiffs who had filed the amended complaint settled all of their claims, executed a release, and are no longer part of the lawsuit. Some of the eleven plaintiffs who remain in the lawsuit also settled some of their claims. More specifically, all the intentional racial discrimination claims and all the Medicaid Act claims have been settled and dismissed.3 The settlement left no unadjudicated claims pending in the district court.
The plaintiffs who appealed to this Court are the remaining eleven named plaintiffs still in foster care in Florida for persons under the age of eighteen.4 The issues they raise in this appeal concern only Counts I through IV, which involve some of the claims that were dismissed with prejudice.5
Initially, we are faced with some threshold questions about whether the plaintiffs' claims present a justiciable case or controversy. Specifically, we must decide whether the claims of two of the plaintiffs are moot and whether the other plaintiffs have standing to challenge the practices at issue.
The exercise of jurisdiction by the federal courts "depends upon the existence of a case or controversy." North Carolina v. Rice, 404 U.S. 244, 246, 92 S.Ct. 402, 404, 30 L.Ed.2d 413 (1971) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). "[A] case is moot when the issues presented are no longer `live' or the parties lack a legally cognizable interest in the outcome." Powell v. McCormack, 395 U.S. 486, 496, 89 S.Ct. 1944, 1951, 23 L.Ed.2d 491 (1969). "Put another way, [a] case is moot when it no longer presents a live controversy with respect to which the court can give meaningful relief." Fla. Ass'n of Rehab. Facilities, Inc. v. Fla. Dep't of Health & Rehabilitative Servs., 225 F.3d 1208, 1217 (11th Cir.2000) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). We consider questions of mootness under a plenary standard of review. United States v. Fla. Azalea Specialists, 19 F.3d 620, 621 (11th Cir.1994).
The defendants contend that Larissa C.'s and Leanne G.'s claims are moot, and we agree. Because Larissa C. and Leanne G. have been adopted, they are no longer in the defendants' legal or physical custody and therefore cannot be further harmed by the defendants' alleged illegal practices. Because the plaintiffs' amended complaint seeks only prospective injunctive relief against the defendants to prevent future harm, no live controversy exists between them and...
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