Lebbos v. Judges of Superior Court, Santa Clara County

• Decision Date: 28 August 1989
• Docket Number: No. 87-2105,87-2105
• Citation: 883 F.2d 810
• Parties: Aida Madeleine LEBBOS; Garth Rease; C. Jonlyn Karr; Betsey Warren Lebbos; Genyses Corporation, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. JUDGES OF the SUPERIOR COURT, SANTA CLARA COUNTY; Conrad Rushing, Judge of the Santa Clara Superior Court; Jack Komar, Judge of the Santa Clara Superior Court; Peter Stone, Judge of the Santa Clara Superior Court; John Miller; Mary Ann Grilli; V. Timothy Keene; Lisa Wharton; Jeradlin Spradlin; Linda Wooten; Alan Munn, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

Page 810

883 F.2d 810

Aida Madeleine LEBBOS; Garth Rease; C. Jonlyn Karr Betsey Warren Lebbos; Genyses Corporation Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. JUDGES OF the SUPERIOR COURT, SANTA CLARA COUNTY; Conrad Rushing, Judge of the Santa Clara Superior Court; Jack Komar, Judge of the Santa Clara Superior Court; Peter Stone, Judge of the Santa Clara Superior Court; John Miller; Mary Ann Grilli; V. Timothy Keene; Lisa Wharton Jeradlin Spradlin; Linda Wooten; Alan Munn, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 87-2105.

United States Court of Appeals Ninth Circuit.

Argued and Submitted March 14, 1989.

Decided Aug. 28, 1989.

Betsey Warren Lebbos, San Jose, Cal., for plaintiffs-appellants.

Vanessa Ann Zecher, Deputy County Counsel, San Jose, Cal., John Miller, Palo Alto, Cal., for defendants-appellees.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of California.

Before POOLE, FERGUSON and WIGGINS, Circuit Judges.

WIGGINS, Circuit Judge:

Appellants appeal the district court's dismissal of their suit for failure to state a claim and based on the Younger abstention doctrine. This action springs from the appointment by Santa Clara Superior Court Judge Conrad Rushing of appellee Alan Munn as receiver to aid in the collection of a judgment rendered in favor of appellee Linda Wooten against appellant Betsey Lebbos. Appellants challenge the constitutionality of Cal.Civ.Proc. Sec. 708.620 (West 1987) and Cal.Civ.Proc. Sec. 568 (West 1979), ¹ which together permit the court appointment of, and vest broad authority in, a receiver to aid a successful litigant in the collection of an unpaid judgment. Appellants also challenge the constitutionality of the order appointing Munn as receiver and a subsequent order delineating Munn's authority. Appellants request that the statutory provisions and orders be declared unconstitutional, and that the Santa Clara Superior Court judges be enjoined from invoking the statutory provisions and from enforcing the orders. Appellants also seek an injunction to stop several state court proceedings initiated by Munn to collect Betsey Lebbos's unpaid debt. They allege various constitutional claims under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983 (1982) for which they seek compensatory and punitive damages. We affirm the dismissal of the claims for declaratory and injunctive relief, and also the claims for damages against the judges. We also affirm the dismissal of the claims for damages against the remaining defendants except with respect to Betsey Lebbos's due process claim against Munn, Wooten, and Wooten's attorneys.

I

Betsey Lebbos is an attorney. Sometime in 1983 she brought an action against Wooten in Santa Clara Superior Court to recover attorney fees allegedly owed her from a previous action in which Lebbos had successfully represented Wooten. Wooten filed a counterclaim. Following a jury verdict in favor of Wooten, Lebbos was required to rebate $13,628 of the $29,000 previously paid by Wooten to Lebbos. In attempting to collect her judgment, Wooten hired appellees John Miller and Mary Grilli of the law firm Miller & Grilli. The interaction between Miller and Lebbos during the ensuing three years was less than cordial to say the least. In her complaint, Lebbos sets forth in great detail the various attempts made by Miller to collect the judgment against Lebbos. Apparently unsuccessful in collecting the debt, Miller filed an ex parte motion in Santa Clara Superior Court seeking the appointment of a receiver pursuant to Cal.Civ.Proc.Code Sec. 708.620 (West 1987). Judge Rushing granted the motion on July 15, 1986, appointing Munn, an attorney, as receiver. According to the complaint, Munn, along with Miller and his employees, sought to collect the debt by improperly invading Lebbos's business affairs and by seizing real property owned in trust by her daughter, appellant Aida Lebbos. Betsey Lebbos claims she is an "activist attorney" and that the appellees' actions were designed to discourage her efforts in exposing certain (unspecified) "abuses and deficiencies" in the Santa Clara Superior Court.

Betsey Lebbos, her daughter Aida, and the other plaintiffs, Garth Rease, C. Jonlyn Karr, and Genyses Corporation filed this action on October 2, 1986. Rease is a tenant of Aida Lebbos and leases a house owned by Lebbos in San Jose. Karr was the trustee of Aida Lebbos's trust from its inception in 1973 until 1985. While acting as trustee, she purchased two properties from the proceeds of the trust. In May 1977 she purchased the property in San Jose, and in December 1983 she purchased a house located in Menlo Park. Martha McCutcheon apparently also is a tenant of Aida Lebbos's. Genyses Corporation was the entity through which Betsey Lebbos operated her trust account for her legal practice.

Named as defendants are "the judges of the Santa Clara Superior Court"; Superior Court Judges Rushing, Jack Komar, and Peter Stone; attorneys Miller and Grilli; Timothy Keene, a process server utilized by Miller & Grilli; Elizabeth Wharton, an employee of Miller & Grilli; Jeradlin Spradlin, an associate with Miller & Grilli; Wooten; and Munn.

In their complaint, appellants challenge the constitutionality of Cal.Civ.Proc. Secs. 708.620 and 568 under the due process and equal protection clauses of the fourteenth amendment, and seek to enjoin the judges of the Santa Clara Superior Court from enforcing either statute. They raise similar arguments and request similar relief with respect to the order entered by Judge Rushing on July 15, 1986, appointing Munn receiver, as well as a subsequent order entered by Judge Rushing on September 29, 1986, modifying the July 15, 1986, order. They also seek an injunction precluding appellees from prosecuting: (1) Munn, Court Appointed-Receiver v. Lebbos, Lebbos, Rease and McCutcheon, an unlawful detainer action pertaining to the San Jose property; (2) Wooten v. Betsey Lebbos, Jonlyn Karr, and Aida Lebbos, a "Complaint for Failure of Garnishee to Deliver Attached Property and Fraudulent Conveyance," also pertaining to the San Jose property; and (3) from enforcing the judgment in the original proceeding, Lebbos v. Wooten. Appellants base their request for an injunction in each of these actions on the unconstitutionality of sections 708.620 and 568 and the orders relating to the appointment of Munn. Appellants allege various constitutional claims under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983 (1982) against Miller, Grilli, Keene, Wharton, Spradlin, Wooten, and Munn (private defendants) for which they seek compensatory and punitive damages. ²

The district court granted appellees' motion to dismiss with leave to amend on April 14, 1987. The court dismissed with prejudice the claims against the unnamed judges, concluding that the complaint failed to allege any facts demonstrating the judges were actively involved in appellants' proceedings. The court also dismissed any claims for damages against the named judges finding them immune from liability. The court abstained from reaching the appellants' claims for injunctive and declaratory relief against the individual judges and constitutional claims against the other appellees under Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37, 91 S.Ct. 746, 27 L.Ed.2d 669 (1971). The court concluded that appellants had the opportunity to present their federal claims in the state proceedings, that they offered no evidence that the judges acted in bad faith in the state proceedings, and that the challenged statutes did not flagrantly violate express constitutional prohibitions. Appellants amended their complaint, but it was dismissed again by the district court. The court held that the amended complaint failed to rectify the deficiencies in the original complaint. The court also held that the complaint failed to state a claim for relief under section 1983. This appeal followed. ³ The district court had jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. Secs. 1331, 1343 (1982), ⁴ and we have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. Sec. 1291 (1982).

II

The district court dismissed appellants' action on several bases. In its initial order of dismissal, it dismissed (1) the claims against the unnamed judges and the claim for damages against the named judges based on the failure to state a claim; and (2) the claims for injunctive and declaratory relief against the individual judges and the claims for damages against the private defendants under the Younger abstention doctrine. In its second order, the court affirmed its prior order and also held that the complaint failed to state a claim under section 1983.

In order to facilitate a more orderly analysis of appellants' arguments, we discuss the various claims for injunctive and declaratory relief separately from the claims for damages under section 1983.

A. Prospective Relief ⁵

Appellants claim the court improperly abstained from considering whether injunctive and declaratory relief is proper. The decision whether to abstain under the Younger abstention doctrine is reviewable de novo. See World Famous Drinking Emporium, Inc., v. City of Tempe, 820 F.2d 1079, 1081 (9th Cir.1987). Because "the same equitable principles relevant to the propriety of an injunction must be taken into consideration by federal district courts in determining whether to issue a declaratory judgment," Samuels v. Mackell, 401 U.S. 66, 73, 91 S.Ct. 764, 768, 27 L.Ed.2d 688 (1971), we consider together appellants' arguments that the district court erred in abstaining from their requests for both injunctive and declaratory relief.

Abstention is appropriate based on "interests of comity and federalism [that] counsel federal courts to abstain from jurisdiction whenever federal claims have been or could be presented in ongoing state judicial proceedings that concern important state interests." Hawaii Housing Auth. v. Midkiff, 467 U.S. 229, 237, 104 S.Ct. 2321, 2327-28, 81 L.Ed.2d 186 (1984). "Abstention from the exercise of federal jurisdiction is the exception, not the rule," and "[a]bsent significant countervailing...