Culley v. Marshall
| Decision Date | 29 September 2021 |
| Docket Number | CIV. ACT. 1:19-cv-701-TFM-MU |
| Parties | HALIMA TARIFFA CULLEY, Plaintiff, v. STEVE MARSHALL, in his official capacity as Attorney General of the State of Alabama, et al ., Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Southern District of Alabama |
Now pending before the Court are the Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings of Attorney General Steve Marshall and District Attorney Ashley Rich (Doc. 18, filed 1/3/20, as supplemented by Doc. 33, filed 11/23/20) and the Motion to Dismiss (Doc. 20, filed 1/6/20, as supplemented by Doc. 34, filed 11/23/20). Plaintiff timely filed its responses in opposition. See Docs. 25, filed 2/3/20; Doc. 38, filed 12/14/20. Defendants timely replied. See Docs. 26, 27, 39. The motions are fully submitted and ripe for review. After a careful review of the motions, responses, replies, the pleadings, and the relevant case law, the Court GRANTS the motions for the reasons articulated below.
Plaintiff Halima Tariffa Culley (“Plaintiff” or “Culley”) filed a purported class action complaint against three defendants: (1) Steve Marshall, in his official capacity as the Attorney General of the State of Alabama (“AG Marshall”) (2) Defendant Ashley Rich, in her official capacity as the District Attorney for the 13th Judicial Circuit of Alabama - Mobile County (“DA Rich”), and (3) and the City of Satsuma Alabama (“the City”). The Court will collectively refer to AG Marshall and DA Rich as (“the State”) as utilized by the Plaintiff and reference all three collectively as “the Defendants.”
The Court has subject matter jurisdiction over the claims in this action pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1331 (federal question) and § 1343 (civil rights jurisdiction) as Plaintiff brings claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The parties do not contest personal jurisdiction or venue, and there are adequate allegations to support both.
The City filed a motion to dismiss pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6), while the State filed a motion for judgment on the pleadings pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(c).
Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure authorizes a motion to dismiss an action on the ground that the allegations in the complaint fail to state a claim upon which relief can be granted. On such a motion, the “issue is not whether a plaintiff will ultimately prevail but whether the claimant is entitled to offer evidence to support the claims.” Little v. City of N. Miami, 805 F.2d 962, 965 (11th Cir. 1986) (per curiam) (quoting Scheuer v. Rhodes, 416 U.S. 232, 236 (1974)). “When considering a motion to dismiss, all facts set forth in the plaintiff's complaint ‘are to be accepted as true and the court limits its consideration to the pleadings and exhibits attached thereto.'” Grossman v. Nationsbank, N.A., 225 F.3d 1228, 1231 (11th Cir. 2000) (per curiam) (quoting GSW, Inc. v. Long Cty., 999 F.2d 1508, 1510 (11th Cir. 1993)). The court must draw “all reasonable inferences in the plaintiff's favor.” St. George v. Pinellas Cty., 285 F.3d 1334, 1337 (11th Cir. 2002).
However, the court is not required to accept a plaintiff's legal conclusions. Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678, 129 S.Ct. 1937, 1950, 173 L.Ed. 868 (2009). The U.S. Supreme Court has suggested that courts adopt a “two-pronged approach” when considering motions to dismiss: “1) eliminate any allegations in the complaint that are merely legal conclusions; and 2) where there are well-pleaded factual allegations, ‘assume their veracity and then determine whether they plausibly give rise to an entitlement to relief.'” Am. Dental Ass'n v. Cigna Corp., 605 F.3d 1283, 1290 (11th Cir. 2010) (quoting Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 679, 129 S.Ct. at 1950). Importantly, “courts may infer from the factual allegations in the complaint ‘obvious alternative explanation[s],' which suggest lawful conduct rather than the unlawful conduct the plaintiff would ask the court to infer.” Id. (quoting Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 682, 129 S.Ct. at 1951-52).
Rule 12(b)(6) is read in consideration of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a)(2), which requires “‘a short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief,' in order to ‘give the defendant fair notice of what the . . . claim is and the grounds upon which it rests.'” Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555, 127 S.Ct. 1955, 1964, 167 L.Ed.2d 929 (2007) (quoting Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 47, 78 S.Ct. 99, 2 L.Ed.2d 80 (1957)). Although Rule 8 does not require detailed factual allegations, it does demand “more than an unadorned, the-defendant-unlawfully-harmed-me accusation.” Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678, 129 S.Ct. at 1949. To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must state on its face a plausible claim for relief, and “[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. Unless the plaintiffs have “nudged their claims across the line from conceivable to plausible, their complaint must be dismissed.” Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570, 127 S.Ct. at 1974. “The plausibility standard is not akin to a ‘probability requirement,' but it asks for more than a sheer possibility that a defendant has acted unlawfully.” Iqbal, 556 U.S at 678, 129 S.Ct. at 1949 (quoting Twombly, 550 U.S at 556, 127 S.Ct. at 1965).
The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure provide that “[a]fter the pleadings are closed-but early enough not to delay trial-a party may move for judgment on the pleadings.” Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(c). Judgment on the pleadings pursuant to Rule 12(c) is appropriate when “no issues of material fact exist, and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Ortega v. Christian, 85 F.3d 1521, 1524-25 (11th Cir. 1996). When reviewing a judgment on the pleadings, the court must accept the facts in the complaint as true and view them in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party. Id. A judgment on the pleadings is limited to consideration of “the substance of the pleadings and any judicially noticed facts.” Bankers Ins. Co. v. Fla. Residential Prop. & Cas. Joint Underwriting Ass'n, 137 F.3d 1293, 1295 (11th Cir. 1998). In other words, a Rule 12(c) motion “is subject to the same standard as a motion to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6).” Doe v. Myspace, Inc., 528 F.3d 413, 418 (5th Cir. 2008); see also Edwards v. City of Goldsboro, 178 F.3d 231, 243-44 (4th Cir. 1999) (applying 12(b)(6) standard of review to a 12(c) motion).
Eleventh Circuit precedent discussing the standard of review for a motion under Rule 12(c) indicates “[j]udgment on the pleadings is appropriate only when the plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of his claim which would entitle him to relief.”). Horsley v. Feldt, 304 F.3d 1125, 1131 (11th Cir. 2002) (quoting Moore v. Liberty Nat'l Life Ins. Co., 267 F.3d 1209, 1213 (11th Cir. 2001)); see also Horsley v. Rivera, 292 F.3d 695, 700 (11th Cir. 2002) (). These cases have not yet been explicitly overturned. However, that same language was previously utilized in the context of a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss prior to Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 127 S.Ct. 1955. In Twombly, the Supreme Court explained that this “no set of facts” language “earned its retirement” because it is simply “an incomplete, negative gloss on an accepted pleading standard: once a claim has been stated adequately, it may be supported by showing any set of facts consistent with the allegations in the complaint.” Id. at 563, 127 S.Ct. at 1969. As caselaw is clear that the standards are functionally identical for a Rule 12(b)(6) and Rule 12(c) motion, the Court will apply the Twombly standard. See, e.g., Perez-Acevedo v. Rivero-Cubano, 520 F.3d 26, 29 (1st Cir. 2008) (); Tucker v. Middleburg-Legacy Place, LLC, 539 F.3d 545, 549-50 (6th Cir. 2008) (same); Doe v. MySpace Inc., 528 F.3d at 418 (same); Pisciotta v. Old Nat'l Bancorp, 499 F.3d 629, 633 (7th Cir. 2007) (same).
As noted above, the Court accepts Plaintiff's allegations as true for the purposes of this review. Plaintiff resides in Rockdale County, Georgia. In 2019, her son, Tayjon was a student at the University of South Alabama located in Mobile, Alabama. When he went to college, Plaintiff purchased a 2015 Nissan Altima (“the Vehicle”) for his use, though the vehicle is titled to Culley and registered in the state of Georgia. Plaintiff also paid the registration and insurance on the vehicle. See Doc. 1 at ¶¶ 22-26.
On or about February 17, 2019, Tayjon was arrested and charged with the possession of marijuana and drug paraphernalia. Incident to that arrest, police officers with the City seized the Vehicle. Plaintiff was not charged with a crime and had no knowledge that her son had marijuana and drug paraphernalia in the Vehicle. Upon learning the Vehicle had been seized incident to arrest, Plaintiff contacted the City to retrieve the Vehicle. The City then contacted DA Rich who on behalf of the State of Alabama filed a civil forfeiture action on or about February 27, 2019. Id. at ¶¶ 27-33. On September 16, 2019, Plaintiff filed an answer in the civil forfeiture action. See Doc. 18-3.
Plaintiff filed the instant suit on September 23, 2019. See generally Doc. 1. Plaintiff asserts a proposed class of “All persons who...
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