Clark v. United States
| Decision Date | 28 July 2014 |
| Docket Number | No. 11-10C,11-10C |
| Parties | JAMES HEDMAN CLARK, Plaintiff, v. THE UNITED STATES, Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. Claims Court |
ORIGINAL
NOT FOR PUBLICATION
Pending before the Court is defendant's motion to dismiss plaintiff's amended complaint. For the reasons discussed below, the motion is GRANTED.
Plaintiff, James Hedman Clark, filed this lawsuit pro se on January 5, 2011. See Compl. In response to plaintiff's original complaint, the government filed a motion to dismiss and plaintiff subsequently requested leave to file an amended complaint --- which was granted by the Court. Mister Clark then filed his amended complaint, a document consisting of approximately 628 handwritten pages and 2,255 numbered paragraphs.1 The government responded with a motion to dismiss plaintiff's amended complaint in its entirety ("Def.'s Mot.").
The first 228 pages of plaintiff's amended complaint contain lengthy descriptions of the asserted jurisdictional bases for plaintiff's claims, facts spanning several decades, and various exhibits submitted by plaintiff. See Am. Compl. at 1-228D. Among other things, this portion of the amended complaint covers topics such as plaintiff's education, medical, and employment history, the surveillance of plaintiff by various government agencies, and the development of the purported invention which underlies the bulk of plaintiff's allegations. See id. Plaintiff's invention, which is entitled the Out of Area (OOA) program, is a student behavior modification program designed for use in schools. See id. ¶¶ 189-96. In the remainder of his amended complaint, plaintiff alleges twenty-eight causes of action, many of which contain multiple counts. See id. at 231-628.
Plaintiff's invention, the OOA program, is based on the premise that "[disruptive and disrespectful student behaviors almost always occur when students are not in their assigned/proper area" --- that is, when they are "out of area." Am. Compl. ¶ 192. The OOA program includes at least four documents created by plaintiff — a student quiz, a referral form, a parental information notice letter, and a hall pass. Id. ¶ 238. On April 22, 2005, Mr. Clark obtained a federal copyright registration for the OOA program. See id. ¶¶ 315, 421, 1070; Pl.'s Claim of Copyright(s) and Assignment Ownership, Ex. V, ECF No. 8. A copy of the document registered by plaintiff was filed with the court. See Filings Made Under Seal, ECF No. 6. While Mr. Clark's amended complaint contains numerous allegations, the thrust of his complaint relates to his allegation that the St. Louis Public School District (SLPS) "became aware" of plaintiff's OOA program and "developed a 'plan of action' to [T]ake Plaintiff‘s OOA program trade secrets in January 2004,"2 see Am. Compl. ¶¶ 261-62, and that the federal government subsequently infringed his copyright of the OOA program, see Am. Compl. ¶¶ 846, 849, 887, 934. More specifically, plaintiff contends that the United States Department of Education's Response to Intervention (RTI) program infringes his copyright. See, e.g., Am. Compl. ¶¶ 846, 849, 934, 1168. According to plaintiff, RTI is "an inclusive partnership between all school personnel and families to identify and address the behavioral academic needs of both regular and special education students," Am. Compl. ¶ 856, which was based upon plaintiff's copyrighted OOA program, see, e.g., Am. Compl. ¶¶ 847-48, 887.
On June 15, 2005, plaintiff applied for a patent for the OOA program by-submitting United States Patent Application No. 11/153,118 to the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). See Am. Compl. ¶ 1896; Ex. 253, ECF No. 11; Def.'s Mot App. at 13. The USPTO never issued a patent based on this application, and on October 25, 2010, issued a Notice of Abandonment to plaintiff because he did not "timely file a proper reply" to a letter from the USPTO. See Def.'s Mot. App. at 13-14.
Plaintiff previously filed a similar lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri. Clark v. Crues, No. 4:05CV1344, 2007 WL 906702 (E.D. Mo. March 23, 2007). In that case, Mr. Clark alleged that school and school system employees, as well as the City of St. Louis, the Board of Education, and the SLPS, infringed the same patent application and copyrighted work at issue in this case. Id. In March of 2007, the district court granted summary judgment for the defendants, dismissing Mr. Clark's complaint with prejudice. Id. Mister Clark appealed to the Federal Circuit, and his appeal was denied on January 8, 2008. Clark v. Crues, No. 2007-1377, 2008 WL 145255 (Fed. Cir. Jan. 8, 2008). The present case appears to be based in large part on the same underlying facts, with many of the claims now styled as against the United States "acting through" the state and local entities that were named as defendants in Mr. Clark's prior litigation.
Plaintiff's amended complaint contains twenty-eight "causes of action," each of which contains between one and six counts. As explained in the government's motion to dismiss, the twenty-eight causes of action and their sub-counts can be broadly grouped into nine categories: (1) illegal exaction claims, Causes of Action 1 (Counts I-V) and 24; (2) secrecy order claims, Causes of Action 2 and 22 (Counts I-III); (3) tort claims, Causes of Action 3 (Counts I-VI), 4 (Counts I-II), 9, 15 (Counts I-III), 18, and 25-26; (4) copyright infringement claims, Causes of Action 5-8, 10-14, and 20 (Counts I-III); (5) unauthorized use of a patent claims, Cause of Action 19 (Counts I-III); (6) 19 U.S.C. § 1337 claims, Cause of Action 16; (7) Constitution Article I claims, Cause of Action 17; (8) Fifth Amendment takings claims, Causes of Action 21 (Counts I-II), and 23; and (9) implied-in-fact contract claims, Causes of Action 27-28.3 The government has moved to dismiss plaintiff's entire amended complaint under Rules 41(b), 12(b)(1), and 12(b)(6) of the Rules of the United States Court of Federal Claims (RCFC). The government argues that the entire complaint should be dismissed under RCFC 41(b) because it fails to comply with the "short and plain statement" requirements of RCFC 8(a). Def.'s Mot. at 9. In addition, thegovernment contends that plaintiff's illegal exaction claims, secrecy order claims, tort claims, unauthorized use of patent claims, 19 U.S.C. § 1337 claims, Constitution Article I claims, and implied contract claims should be dismissed for lack of jurisdiction pursuant to RCFC 12(b)(1), and that plaintiff's remaining claims for copyright infringement and takings under the Fifth Amendment should be dismissed for failure to state a claim pursuant to RCFC 12(b)(6). Id. at 9-10. Mister Clark has filed a response in opposition to the government's motion to dismiss ("PL's Resp."), and the government filed a reply in support of its motion ("Def.'s Reply").4
While pro se plaintiff's' filings are to be liberally construed, see Erickson v. Pardus, 551 U.S. 89, 94 (2007), this lenient standard "does not relieve a pro se plaintiff from meeting jurisdictional requirements." See, e.g., Bernard v. United States, 59 Fed.Cl. 497, 499, aff'd, 98 F. App'x 860 (Fed. Cir. 2004) (Table) (emphasis omitted). Under RCFC 12(b)(1), claims brought before our court must be dismissed when it is shown that we lack jurisdiction over their subject matter. When considering a motion to dismiss for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction, a court will normally accept as true all factual allegations made by the pleader and draw all reasonable inferences in the light most favorable to that party. See Scheuer v.Rhodes, 416 U.S. 232, 236 (1974); Pixton v. B&B Plastics, Inc., 291 F.3d 1324, 1326 (Fed. Cir. 2002) ().
Because the Tucker Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1491, does not create any substantive rights, a plaintiff must identify a separate source of law that creates a right to money damages for his claims to be within our jurisdiction. Jan's Helicopter Serv., Inc. v. FAA, 525 F.3d 1299, 1306 (Fed. Cir. 2008) (). The test for determining whether a statute or regulation can support jurisdiction in our court is whether it can be fairly interpreted as mandating compensation. See, e.g., United States v. White Mountain Apache Tribe, 537 U.S. 465, 472-73 (2003); United States v. Mitchell, 463 U.S. 206, 216-17 (1983); Fisher, 402 F.3d at 1173-74; Contreras v. United States, 64 Fed. Cl. 583, 588-92 (2005).
In addition, to survive a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim under RCFC 12(b)(6), "a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to 'state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face."' Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (quoting Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007)). "A claim has facial plausibility when the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged." Id. (citing Twombly, 550 U.S. at 556). When determining whether to grant a Rule 12(b)(6) motion, the court "must accept as true all the factual allegations in the complaint" and make "all reasonable inferences in favor of the non-movant." Sommers Oil Co. v. United States, 241 F.3d 1375, 1378 (Fed. Cir. 2001) (citations omitted). However, "threadbare recitals of a cause of action's elements, supported by mere conclusory statements" are insufficient. See Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678 (citing Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555).
Rule 8(a) requires complaints filed in our court to contain "a short and plain statement of the grounds for the court's jurisdiction," and "a short and plain...
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