Akins v. Islamic Republic of Iran

• Decision Date: 16 July 2021
• Docket Number: Civil Action No. 17-675 (BAH)
• Parties: Todd AKINS, et al., Plaintiffs, v. ISLAMIC REPUBLIC OF IRAN, et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Columbia

549 F.Supp.3d 104

Todd AKINS, et al., Plaintiffs,

v.ISLAMIC REPUBLIC OF IRAN, et al., Defendants.

Civil Action No. 17-675 (BAH)

United States District Court, District of Columbia.

Signed July 16, 2021

Paul G. Gaston, Law Offices of Paul G. Gaston, Washington, DC, for Plaintiffs Todd Akins, George Christopher Anthony, Charles Blank, Andrew Blank, Linda Kay Blank, Nathan Blank, Christopher Galletto, Barbara Gaydos, Elizabeth Gaydos, Ethan Gaydos, John Gaydos, Andrea Jo Grimson, Deborah Homs, Kevin James Hurst, Nancy Kilfoyle, Bruce Russell Lawrence, Kimi Lawrence, Robin Elizabeth Lawrence, Thomas R. Lawrence, Gregory Eric Leinenbach, Joy Leinenbach, Nicholas L. Mackenzie, Deborah Millrany, Jason Porter Remar, Angela Rose, Jerry Timothy Sasser, Jr., Jerry T. Sasser, Sr., Frank David Sills, Iii, Christian William Spicer, Christopher G. Spicer, Eunha Kim Spicer-Lindsy, Matthew Spicer, Alan Jeffrey Wade, Bonnie C. Wade, Michael Kevin Wade, Thomas H. Wade, Richard Williams, Tracy Matthew Winter, Eric Dale Ziegler, Kimberly Watters Sasser.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

BERYL A. HOWELL, Chief Judge

On June 25, 1996, a devastating terrorist bomb exploded at the Khobar Towers apartment complex in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia that housed United States military personnel and contractors and resulted in the death of nineteen American service members and injuries to scores of other residents. Compl. at 3 & ¶ 28, ECF No. 1. Fifteen of the injured service members, along with twenty-three of these members’ " ‘immediate family members’ and one family member of another service member, who was injured in the attack but was not a plaintiff," sued and obtained a default judgment against defendants, the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps ("IRGC"), jointly and severally, in the total amount of $104,700,000. Akins v. Islamic Republic of Iran , 332 F. Supp. 3d 1, 9 (D.D.C. 2018) (quoting Compl. at 3); id. at 46–47. Now, almost a year and a half later, after taking no timely appeal to challenge any part of the judgment entered in their favor, plaintiffs move, under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b), to modify that default judgment and increase the damages awarded to certain plaintiffs in Akins and to add punitive damages and prejudgment interest to all plaintiffs’ final awards. Pls.’ Mot. Relief Under Rule 60(b) ("Pls.’ Mot.") at 1, ECF No. 42. For the reasons detailed below, the motion for relief from judgment is denied.

I. BACKGROUND

Prior procedural history in this case as well as new legal developments since the entry of final judgment are summarized below.

A. Entry of Default Judgment in Akins

On June 25, 1996, fifteen service-member plaintiffs—Todd Akins, George C. Anthony, Charles Blank, John Gaydos, Kevin James Hurst, Thomas R. Lawrence, Gregory Eric Leinenbach, Nicholas L. MacKenzie, Jason Porter Remar, Jerry Timothy Sasser, Jr., Frank David Sills III, Matthew G. Spicer, Alan Jeffrey Wade, Tracy Matthew Winter, and Eric Dale Ziegler—were present and suffered injury from the Khobar Towers sttack in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. Akins , 332 F. Supp. 3d at 13–29 ; see also Pls.’ Mot. at 2. Over twenty years after the attack, in 2017, these service-member plaintiffs and their families sued Iran and the IRGC for damages under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act's ("FSIA") terrorism exception, 28 U.S.C. § 1605A, and ultimately moved for a default judgment when defendants failed to respond. Akins , 332 F. Supp. 3d at 9.

After finding that defendants were liable for assault on the fifteen service-member plaintiffs, id. at 35–37, and for intentional infliction of emotional distress as to the service-member plaintiffs and the 24 family-member plaintiffs, id. at 37–38, plaintiffs were granted default judgment, id. at 46.¹ The service-member plaintiffs’ awards were calculated based on two key considerations. First, the calculations relied on the "baseline assumption" that, "when assessing damages for surviving victims of terrorist hostilities," "persons suffering injuries in terrorist attacks are entitled to $5 million in damages." Id. at 40 (quoting Kaplan v. Hezbollah , 213 F. Supp. 3d 27, 35 (D.D.C. 2016) (quoting Davis v. Islamic Republic of Iran , 882 F. Supp. 2d 7, 12 (D.D.C. 2012) )). Second, the calculations were either "moderated ... upward," id. at 40, if the individual service-member plaintiff suffered "severe instances of physical and psychological pain, such as where victims suffered relatively more numerous and severe injuries, were rendered quadriplegic, including partially lost vision and hearing, or were mistaken for dead," or "downward in the face of ‘minor shrapnel injuries or minor injury from small-arms fire,’ " id. (quoting Kaplan , 213 F. Supp. 3d at 35–36 (quoting Valore v. Islamic Republic of Iran , 700 F. Supp. 2d 52, 84 (D.D.C. 2010) )).²

Following close analysis of the sworn affidavits and documentation submitted by plaintiffs, nine service-member plaintiffs—Akins, Anthony, Blank, Gaydos, Leinenbach, Sasser, Sills, Wade, and Ziegler—were each awarded $5,000,000 in pain and suffering damages for "severe physical injuries ... [and] lasting and severe psychological pain" id. at 40–41 (quoting Khaliq v. Republic of Sudan , 33 F. Supp. 3d 29, 33 (D.D.C. 2014) ); see id. at 13–19, 21–25, 27–29, 47 ; five service-member plaintiffs—Hurst, MacKenzie, Remar, Spicer, and Winter—were each awarded $2,500,000 for "severe emotional injury accompanied by relatively minor physical injuries," id. at 41 (quoting Khaliq , 33 F. Supp. 3d at 33 ); see id. at 14–15, 19–21, 27, 47 ; and a single service-member plaintiff, Lawrence, was awarded $1,500,000 for suffering exclusively "severe emotional injury without physical injury" as a result of the attack, id. at 41 (citing Kaplan , 213 F. Supp. 3d at 36 ); see id. at 25–27, 47. Awards for eight service-member plaintiffs—Akins, Anthony, Gaydos, Leinenbach, Sasser, Sills, Winter and Ziegler—and consequently the awards of their related family-member plaintiffs, were premised on factual representations that included information about the "disability ratings" assigned by the Department of Veterans Affairs ("VA") to these plaintiffs based on their injuries. Id. at 13–14, 17–19, 21–24, 27. Awards for the remaining seven service-member plaintiffs were also based on the details provided in their associated declarations, but those declarations made no reference to any formal disability rating by the VA. See id. at 14–17, 19–21, 25, 27–28 (citing submitted records for service-member plaintiffs Blank, Hurst, MacKenzie, Lawrence, Remar, Spicer and Wade).

Additionally, family-member plaintiffs were awarded solatium damages "to compensate for the emotional distress they experienced as family members of victims of the attacks." Id. at 42.³ Solatium damages were awarded according to a "standardized ... Heiser damages framework," id. at 42 (citing Estate of Heiser v. Islamic Republic of Iran , 466 F. Supp. 2d 229, 269 (D.D.C. 2006) ), which awards $4,000,000 to spouses of surviving victims, $2,500,000 to parents of surviving victims, $1,500,000 to children of surviving victims and $1,250,000 to siblings of surviving victims, id. at 43–45 ; see also Wultz v. Islamic Republic of Iran , 864 F. Supp. 2d 24, 39 (D.D.C. 2012) ("[I]n the context of distress resulting from injury to love ones–rather than death–courts have applied a framework where awards are valued at half the awards to family members of the deceased" (internal quotation marks omitted)); Spencer v. Islamic Republic of Iran , 71 F. Supp. 3d 23 (D.D.C. 2014) (determining that "[c]hildren of a surviving victim receive $1.5 million on average"). Consistent with that framework, " ‘proportional[ ]’ downward deviation[s] from the Heiser framework" were also applied where "[the] proposed solatium award would exceed the pain and suffering award received by a surviving victim." Akins , 332 F. Supp. 3d at 44 (quoting Spencer , 71 F. Supp. 3d at 28 ). Family-member plaintiffs of severely injured service members received the standard compensation afforded by the Heiser framework: plaintiff-spouses and ex-spouses Linda Kay Blank, Barbara Gaydos, Joy Leinenbach, and Nancy Kilfoyle, were each awarded $4,000,000, id. at 44, 47 ; plaintiff-parents Jerry Timothy Sasser, Sr., Deborah Homs, Bonnie C. Wade, Thomas H. Wade, and Richard M. Williams were each awarded $2,500,000, id. at 44–45, 47 ; plaintiff-children Nathan Blank, Ethan Gaydos and Elizabeth Gaydos were each awarded $1,500,000, id. at 45, 47 ; and plaintiff-siblings Andrew P. Blank, Deborah Millrany, Michael Kevin Wade and the estate of Jason Allen Sasser were each awarded $1,250,000, id. Family-member plaintiffs related to service-members who sustained severe emotional injuries and some physical injuries received awards with slightly less than the standard rates. Specifically, plaintiff-spouses and ex-spouses received eighty percent of the awards granted to their service-member husbands or ex-husbands, resulting in an award to plaintiff ex-spouse Cathy Eunha Kim Spicer-Lindsy of $2,000,000 and to plaintiff-spouse Robyn Elizabeth Lawrence of $1,200,000. Id. at 44, 47. Plaintiff-parents received fifty percent of the awards granted to their service-member children, resulting in an award to plaintiff parent Angela Rose of $1,250,000 and to plaintiff parents Kimi Lawrence and Bruce Russell Lawrence of $750,000 each. Id. at 45, 47. Plaintiff-children received thirty percent of the amount awarded to their service-member parents, resulting in an award to plaintiff child Christian William Spicer of $750,000. Id. Finally, plaintiff-siblings received twenty-five percent of the amounts awarded to their respective brothers, resulting in an award to plaintiff-sibling Christopher G. Spicer of $625,000 and to plaintiff-sibling Andrea Jo Grimson of $375,000. Id.

Plaintiffs’ requests for prejudgment interest and punitive damages were denied. Id. at 45–47. Recognizing that "whether pre-judgment interest is...