Ardis v. Anderson

• Decision Date: 20 January 2015
• Docket Number: Case No. 3:14cv328/MCR/CJK
• Court: U.S. District Court — Northern District of Florida
• Parties: ROBERT MICHAEL ARDIS, Plaintiff, v. PAIGE ANDERSON, et al., Defendants.

ROBERT MICHAEL ARDIS, Plaintiff, v. PAIGE ANDERSON, et al., Defendants.

Case No. 3:14cv328/MCR/CJK

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT NORTHERN DISTRICT OF FLORIDA PENSACOLA DIVISION

January 20, 2015

REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION

Plaintiff Robert Michael Ardis, who is proceeding pro se, filed suit against the defendants asserting causes of action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and the Federal Arbitration Act ("FAA"), 9 U.S.C. § 1, et seq., stemming from the termination of his employment at Pensacola State College ("PSC").¹ Based upon its review of plaintiff's complaint, the undersigned finds that it is frivolous and malicious, fails to state a claim upon which relief can be granted, and should be dismissed. Indeed, considering the history and posture of this claim, further proceedings would constitute an abuse of the judicial system.

BACKGROUND²

Plaintiff was employed as a tenured associate professor at PSC when he was terminated on January 18, 2011, for submitting false statements regarding a Master's Degree he allegedly earned during a sabbatical.³ Plaintiff challenged his termination, ultimately invoking the arbitration provision in the Collective Bargaining Agreement between the Pensacola State College Board of Trustees and the United Faculty of Florida - Pensacola State College Faculty Association ("Union"), of which plaintiff was a member at the time of his termination.⁴ The parties proceeded to arbitration, which resulted in a decision unfavorable to plaintiff. Specifically, the arbitrator found that plaintiff made false representations concerning a Master's Degree allegedly earned during his sabbatical which amounted to misconduct in office, warranting termination. After the arbitrator rendered her decision, plaintiff filed suit in Escambia County Circuit Court seeking to void both the arbitration decision and his termination. The lawsuit was decided adversely to plaintiff, and he appealed the decision to the First District Court of Appeal ("First DCA"), which affirmed the trialcourt per curiam. Plaintiff then sought review in the Florida Supreme Court and the United States Supreme Court, both of which declined to exercise jurisdiction over the matter.

Having seemingly exhausted all other avenues of potential relief, plaintiff filed suit in this court, again challenging the arbitration proceeding and his termination. See Ardis v. Pensacola State Coll. Bd. of Trs., 3:13cv352/MCR/CJK, June 10, 2013 (doc. 1). On April 16, 2014, the parties filed a Stipulation for Dismissal with Prejudice. Several months later, on July 11, 2014, plaintiff filed the instant complaint. See Ardis v. Anderson, et al., 3:14cv328/MCR/CJK, July 11, 2014 (doc. 1). Shortly thereafter, on August 27, 2014, plaintiff filed a motion to set aside the final judgment and re-open the prior federal court case, arguing that the judgment was based on extrinsic fraud - specifically, that a confidentiality provision contained in the parties' settlement agreement was prohibited under § 69.081, Fla. Stat., and thus rendered the entire agreement void. While that motion was pending, plaintiff filed a motion to consolidate the prior case with the instant case, arguing that the two cases involved common questions of law and fact, as both included claims under § 1983 and the FAA and both included a request for declaratory relief. The district judge denied plaintiff's motion to re-open the prior case, finding that the court lacked jurisdiction as a result of the parties' stipulation of dismissal under Fed. R. Civ. P. 41(a). The court also denied all other pending motions as moot and advised plaintiff that the case was closed and the court would accept no additional filings.

Having carefully reviewed plaintiff's second amended complaint, along with all of the filings in the prior action filed in this court, the undersigned finds that plaintiff has merely attempted to revive his former (settled) claims and has failed tostate a claim up which relief can be granted and that his complaint therefore should be dismissed.

DISCUSSION

A. Standard of Review

Because plaintiff is proceeding in forma pauperis, the court may dismiss his complaint if it determines that it is "(i) frivolous or malicious; (ii) fails to state a claim on which relief may be granted; or (iii) seeks monetary relief against a defendant who is immune from such relief." 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B). The court must read plaintiff's pro se allegations in a liberal fashion. See Haines v. Kerner, 404 U.S. 519, 520-21 (1972). Dismissals for failure to state a claim are governed by the same standard as FEDERAL RULE OF CIVIL PROCEDURE 12(b)(6). See Mitchell v. Farcass, 112 F.3d 1483, 1485 (11th Cir. 1997). In determining whether the complaint states a claim upon which relief may be granted, the court accepts all factual allegations in the complaint as true and evaluates all reasonable inferences derived from those facts in the light most favorable to the plaintiff. See Hunnings v. Texaco, Inc., 29 F.3d 1480, 1483 (11th Cir. 1994). The complaint may be dismissed if the facts as pleaded do not state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face. See Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007) (retiring the negatively-glossed "no set of facts" language previously used to describe the motion to dismiss standard and dismissing plaintiffs' case for failure to state a claim because plaintiffs had "not nudged their claims across the line from conceivable to plausible"). A complaint also is subject to dismissal under Rule 12(b)(6) when its allegations, on their face, show that an affirmative defense bars recovery on the claim. Marsh v. Butler Cnty., Ala., 268 F.3d 1014, 1022 (11th Cir. 2001).

B. Individual Capacity Claims

As set forth above, in his complaint, plaintiff asserts claims under § 1983 and the FAA against nine named defendants - Paige Anderson, Thomas Gilliam, Jr., Martin Gonzalez, Charles Edward Meadows, K. Blaine Wall, Thomas Wazlavek, the Pensacola State College Faculty Association, the United Faculty of Florida, and the Florida Education Association - and twenty unnamed defendants in their individual and official capacities as agents of the other defendants. Although plaintiff sues the defendants in their individual capacities, he has wholly failed to allege any action by these defendants in that regard. To the contrary, plaintiff has alleged that the defendants "acted under the color of State law," which the undersigned construes as an assertion that they acted in the course and scope of their employment. Plaintiff's claims against the defendants in their individual capacities, therefore, should be dismissed.

C. Official Capacity Claims

1. Res judicata

"The doctrine of res judicata bars the filing of claims which were raised or could have been raised in an earlier proceeding." Dixon v. Bd. of Cnty. Com'rs Palm Beach Cnty., Fla., 518 Fed. Appx. 607, 609 (11th Cir. 2013). In determining "whether to give res judicata effect to a state court judgment," a federal court "must apply the res judicata principles of the law of the state whose decision is set up as a bar to further litigation." Muhammad v. Sec'y, Fla. Dept. of Corrections, 739 F.3d 683, 688 (11th Cir. 2014) (internal marks omitted). Under Florida law, "'[a] judgment on the merits rendered in a former suit between the same parties or their privies, upon the same cause of action, by a court of competent jurisdiction, isconclusive not only as to every matter which was offered and received to sustain or defeat the claim, but as to every other matter which might with propriety have been litigated and determined in that action.'" Id. (quoting Fla. Dep't of Transp. v. Juliano, 801 So.2d 101, 105 (Fla. 2001)). "In other words, a judgment on the merits bars a later-filed complaint when the following four conditions are present: (1) identity of the thing sued for; (2) identity of the cause of action; (3) identity of persons and parties to the action; and (4) identity of quality in persons for or against whom [the] claim is made." Id. (internal marks omitted).

"Florida law defines identical causes of action as causes sharing similarity of facts essential to both actions. Id. (internal marks omitted). Hence, under Florida law, "[i]dentity of the cause of action is a question of 'whether the facts or evidence necessary to maintain the suit are the same in both actions.'" Lozman v. City of Riviera Beach, Fla., 713 F.3d 1066, 1074-75 (11th Cir. 2013) (quoting Tyson v. Viacom, Inc., 890 So.2d 1205, 1209 (Fla. 4th DCA 2005) (en banc and per curiam)). In the Eleventh Circuit, "the determination of whether the causes of action in two proceedings are the same is governed by whether the primary right and duty are the same." Manning v. City of Auburn, 953 F.2d 1355, 1358 (11th Cir. 1992). "The test is one of substance, not form." Id. "Res judicata applies not only to the precise legal theory presented in the previous litigation, but to all legal theories and claims arising out of the same 'operative nucleus of fact.'" Id. at 1358-59 (internal marks omitted).

Here, plaintiff filed a complaint in state court seeking to vacate the arbitrator's decision arguing, among other things, that the arbitrator was biased and that the arbitrator exceeded her authority in finding that his termination was justified. Thestate court found otherwise, stating that there was "no reasonable basis for concluding that there was evident partiality by the arbitrator toward the Defendant or against the Plaintiff" and that the arbitrator determined the issue before her - whether there was just cause for the plaintiff's termination - in a decision based on competent and substantial evidence. Plaintiff lost.

Plaintiff then challenged the very same arbitration - claiming procedural violations - in the earlier suit filed in this court; he also challenged the validity of his termination, claiming he was discriminated against based on his sex. Now, having stipulated to dismissal of the first federal suit,...