Baker v. Raimondo
| Docket Number | 2021-1961 |
| Decision Date | 13 June 2022 |
| Parties | DONALD L. BAKER, Plaintiff-Appellant v. GINA M. RAIMONDO, SECRETARY OF COMMERCE, KATHERINE K. VIDAL, UNDER SECRETARY OF COMMERCE FOR INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY AND DIRECTOR OF THE UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE, Defendants-Appellees DONALD L. BAKER, Plaintiff-Appellant v. GINA M. RAIMONDO, SECRETARY OF COMMERCE, ANDREW I. FAILE, ACTING COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS, U.S. PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE (USPTO), KATHERINE K. VIDAL, UNDER SECRETARY OF COMMERCE FOR INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY AND DIRECTOR OF THE UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE, ROBIN O. EVANS, DIRECTOR, TC 2800, USPTO, ELGIN ENAD, SUPERVISORY PE, ART UNIT 2837, USPTO, DAVID S. WARREN, PE, ART UNIT 2837, USPTO, MARLON T. FLETCHER, PE, ART UNIT 2837, USPTO, DANIEL SWERDLOW, ART UNIT 3649, USPTO, Defendants-Appellees UNKNOWN EMPLOYEES OF THE DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE AND USPTO, Defendant |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Federal Circuit |
This disposition is nonprecedential.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia in Nos. 1:20-cv-01245-AJT-MSN 1:20-cv-01367-CMH-MSN, Judge Anthony J. Trenga., Senior Judge Claude M. Hilton.
Donald L. Baker, Tulsa, OK, pro se.
Matthew James Mezger, Office of the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, United States Department of Justice, Alexandria, VA, for defendants-appellees. Also represented by Jessica D. Aber.
Donald L. Baker appeals from two judgments of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia dismissing two complaints filed by Dr. Baker for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. For the reasons below, we affirm both judgments.
Dr Baker represented himself before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) in the prosecution of the four patent applications at issue in this appeal. SAppx 11.[1] In 2020, dissatisfied with the examination process, and before filing any administrative appeals, Dr. Baker filed two civil actions against the Secretary of Commerce, the Director of the (USPTO), and various unnamed USPTO employees in the Eastern District of Virginia, alleging that the patent examiners assigned to his applications were unqualified engaged in fraud, and acted in bad faith. SAppx. 1, 6-37.
These are not the first cases Dr. Baker has pursued regarding the USPTO's determinations in these applications. In 2019, Dr. Baker sued the Director and other USPTO employees in the Northern District of Oklahoma, similarly alleging that the examiners assigned to his patent applications used "junk science," falsified material facts, and generally acted in bad faith. See Baker v. Iancu, No. 19-cv-0289, 2019 WL 5395449, at *1 (N.D. Okla. Oct. 22, 2019), aff'd, 809 Fed.Appx. 552, 553 (10th Cir. 2020).
The Northern District of Oklahoma ultimately determined that it lacked subject matter jurisdiction for two reasons. Id. at *2. First, because Dr. Baker "admit[ted] that he did not file an appeal to the" Patent Trial and Appeal Board, he had thus had not exhausted his administrative remedies, as he was required to do before filing suit in district court. Id. And second, a patent applicant may only appeal final decisions of the Board to the Eastern District of Virginia or the Federal Circuit. Id. Thus, the Northern District of Oklahoma was "not the proper court [in which] to seek judicial review of the denial of a patent application." Id. Accordingly, the district court dismissed the case without prejudice for lack of jurisdiction. Id. at *4. The Tenth Circuit affirmed, Baker, 809 Fed.Appx. at 553, [2] and the Supreme Court denied Dr. Baker's petition for a writ of certi-orari, 141 S.Ct. 624 (2020).
In October 2020, Dr. Baker filed the first of the complaints at issue in this appeal in the Eastern District of Virginia, a complaint effectively identical to that in the Oklahoma case. SAppx. 6-37. Invoking various criminal statutes including the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, Dr. Baker sought, among other things, to prevent the USPTO from "falsif[ying] . . . paperwork and . . . material facts in prior art," "obstructi[ng] . . . his patent applications," and using "junk engineering in patent examination." SAppx. 30. Dr. Baker listed only two patent applications as being at issue, SAppx. 11, but attempted to reserve "any and all rights to raise and try" his other two pending applications, SAppx. 18.
On November 4, 2020, Dr. Baker filed a notice with the district court indicating that the Supreme Court had denied certiorari in his Oklahoma case, which he asserted "remove[d] any bar to raising issues from" the Oklahoma case in the current Virginia case. SAppx. 39. The notice also informed the court that he planned to file another lawsuit against the USPTO. SAppx. 39. Dr. Baker did so on November 12, 2020, filing a second lawsuit in the Eastern District of Virginia alleging almost identical claims against the USPTO regarding his two remaining patent applications. See Baker v. Raimondo, No. 1:20-cv-1367, 2021 WL 1381560, at *1 (E.D. Va. Mar. 30, 2021); see also Appeal No. 21-2116 SAppx. 16 ().
The Government moved to dismiss Dr. Baker's complaints in both cases for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Because both lawsuits presented "the same allegations and rest[ed] on the same issues" as the Oklahoma lawsuit, the district court determined that the doctrine of collateral estoppel precluded Dr. Baker from relitigating his failure to exhaust his administrative remedies. SAppx. 1-2; Appeal No. 21-2116 SAppx. 1-4. Because it determined it did not have subject matter jurisdiction in either case, the district court granted the Government's motions to dismiss. SAppx. 2; Appeal No. 21-2116 SAppx. 4.
Dr. Baker appeals. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1295(a)(1).
We review a district court's dismissal of a complaint for lack of subject matter jurisdiction under the law of the regional circuit, here the Fourth Circuit. Toxgon Corp v. BNFL, Inc., 312 F.3d 1379, 1380 (Fed. Cir. 2002). Under Fourth Circuit law, we review a district court's dismissal for lack of subject matter jurisdiction de novo. Taylor v. Kellogg Brown & Root Servs., Inc., 658 F.3d 402, 408 (4th Cir. 2011). For the reasons below, we affirm the district court in both cases.
On appeal, Dr. Baker argues the district court (1) "unjustly applied" collateral estoppel, Appellant's Br.[3] 1, and (2) erred in failing to address his reliance on various other sources of law, including his Bivens[4] claim and several provisions of the criminal code, id. at 2. We take each argument in turn.
We begin with Dr. Baker's argument that the district court inappropriately applied the doctrine of collateral estoppel to the two cases at issue. Dr. Baker asserts that by applying collateral estoppel, the district court "put[] its own convenience above the public damages of government corruption." Id. at 1.
Because the application of general collateral estoppel principles "is not a matter within the exclusive jurisdiction of this court, we must apply the law of the circuit in which the district court here sits, i.e., the Fourth Circuit." Pharmacia & Upjohn Co. v. Mylan Pharms., Inc., 170 F.3d 1373, 1381 n.4 (Fed. Cir. 1999). We note that the Fourth Circuit has, in some circumstances declined to apply collateral estoppel where the judgment in a prior case is supported by independently sufficient alternative holdings. See, e.g., In re Microsoft Corp. Antitrust Litig., 355 F.3d 322, 328 (4th Cir. 2004). As the Fourth Circuit has explained, Id. (quoting Ritter v. Mount St. Mary's Coll., 814 F.2d 986, 993 (4th Cir. 1987)); see also Intell. Ventures I LLC v. Cap. One Fin. Corp., 937 F.3d 1359, 1372-76 (Fed. Cir. 2019) ().
In this case, the Oklahoma court determined that it lacked subject matter jurisdiction for two reasons-both because Dr. Baker did not exhaust his administrative remedies before the USPTO and because a patent applicant may only appeal final decisions of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board to the Eastern District of Virginia or the Federal Circuit. Baker, 2019 WL 5395449, at *2 (). In other words, the Oklahoma court "determined two issues, either of which could independently support the result" of dismissal, Microsoft, 355 F.3d at 328, and thus Fourth Circuit law indicates that collateral estoppel might not apply to either issue.
Setting aside collateral estoppel, and without resolving that issue we nonetheless affirm the district court's dismissal of both cases because it properly determined that it did not have jurisdiction. Specifically, because Dr. Baker did not exhaust his administrative remedies at the USPTO before filing suit, the district court did not have subject matter jurisdiction over his claims.
A patent applicant who remains dissatisfied with the final decision of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board has two primary options to appeal. He may appeal directly to the Federal Circuit. 35 U.S.C. § 141. Alternatively, he may sue the USPTO Director in the Eastern District of Virginia. 35 U.S.C. § 145. To pursue either option, however, an appellant must have received a "final decision" from the Patent Trial and Appeal Board; that is, he must exhaust his administrative remedies...
To continue reading
Request your trial