Garey v. James S. Farrin, P.C.

• Decision Date: 03 June 2022
• Docket Number: 21-1478, No. 21-1480
• Citation: 35 F.4th 917
• Parties: William Parker GAREY; Aaron Kent Cruthis; Justin Brent Blakeslee; Adilah Haneefah-Khadi McNeil; Charlotte Moffat Clevenger; Belinda Lee Steinmetz, on behalf of themselves and others similarly situated, Plaintiffs – Appellants, v. JAMES S. FARRIN, P.C., d/b/a Law Offices of James Scott Farrin; Marcari, Russotto, Spencer & Balaban, P.C. ; Riddle & Brantley, L.L.P.; Wallace Pierce Law, PLLC ; R. Bradley Van Laningham; Lanier Law Group, P.A. ; James S. Farrin; Donald W. Marcari ; Sean A. Cole; Jared Pierce; Van Laningham & Associates, PLLC, d/b/a Bradley Law Group; Lisa Lanier; Chris Roberts; Crumley Roberts, LLP ; Hardison & Cochran, PLLC; Benjamin T. Cochran; Ted A. Greve & Associates, P.A.; Ted A. Greve; Law Offices of Michael A. DeMayo, L.L.P.; Michael A. DeMayo; Hardee & Hardee, LLP; Charles Hardee; G. Wayne Hardee; Katherine E. Andrews-Lanier, Defendants – Appellees, and United States of America, Intervenor. Johnathan Hatch; Mark F. Dvorsky; Kelly Epperson, Plaintiffs – Appellants, and Shaterika Nicholson, Plaintiff, v. Michael A. DeMayo; Law Offices of Michael A. DeMayo, L.L.P; The Law Offices of Michael A. DeMayo, P.C.; Jason E. Taylor; Law Offices of Jason E. Taylor, P.C. ; Benjamin T. Cochran; Hardison & Cochran, PLLC; Carl B. Nagle; Nagle & Associates, P.A. ; John J. Gelshenen, Jr.; Davis & Gelshenen, LLP; Mark I. Farbman; Mark Farbman, P.A.; Ted A. Greve; Ted A. Greve & Associates, P.A.; Christopher Thomas May; Estwanik Any May, P.L.L.C., Defendants – Appellees, United States of America, Intervenor, and Michael J. Lewis; Lewis & Associates Attorneys At Law, P.A.; Thomas Kreger, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit

35 F.4th 917

William Parker GAREY; Aaron Kent Cruthis; Justin Brent Blakeslee; Adilah Haneefah-Khadi McNeil; Charlotte Moffat Clevenger; Belinda Lee Steinmetz, on behalf of themselves and others similarly situated, Plaintiffs – Appellants,

v.JAMES S. FARRIN, P.C., d/b/a Law Offices of James Scott Farrin; Marcari, Russotto, Spencer & Balaban, P.C. ; Riddle & Brantley, L.L.P.; Wallace Pierce Law, PLLC ; R. Bradley Van Laningham; Lanier Law Group, P.A. ; James S. Farrin; Donald W. Marcari ; Sean A. Cole; Jared Pierce; Van Laningham & Associates, PLLC, d/b/a Bradley Law Group; Lisa Lanier; Chris Roberts; Crumley Roberts, LLP ; Hardison & Cochran, PLLC; Benjamin T. Cochran; Ted A. Greve & Associates, P.A.; Ted A. Greve; Law Offices of Michael A. DeMayo, L.L.P.; Michael A. DeMayo; Hardee & Hardee, LLP; Charles Hardee; G. Wayne Hardee; Katherine E. Andrews-Lanier, Defendants – Appellees,andUnited States of America, Intervenor.

Johnathan Hatch; Mark F. Dvorsky; Kelly Epperson, Plaintiffs – Appellants,

and

Shaterika Nicholson, Plaintiff,

v.Michael A. DeMayo; Law Offices of Michael A. DeMayo, L.L.P; The Law Offices of Michael A. DeMayo, P.C.; Jason E. Taylor; Law Offices of Jason E. Taylor, P.C. ; Benjamin T. Cochran; Hardison & Cochran, PLLC; Carl B. Nagle; Nagle & Associates, P.A. ; John J. Gelshenen, Jr.; Davis & Gelshenen, LLP; Mark I. Farbman; Mark Farbman, P.A.; Ted A. Greve; Ted A. Greve & Associates, P.A.; Christopher Thomas May; Estwanik Any May, P.L.L.C., Defendants – Appellees,United States of America, Intervenor,andMichael J. Lewis; Lewis & Associates Attorneys At Law, P.A.; Thomas Kreger, Defendants.

No. 21-1478

No. 21-1480

United States Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit.

Argued: May 3, 2022

Decided: June 3, 2022

ARGUED: J. David Stradley, WHITE & STRADLEY, LLP, Raleigh, North Carolina, for Appellants. Matthew Nis Leerberg, FOX ROTHSCHILD LLP, Raleigh, North Carolina, for Appellees. Amanda Mundell, UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, Washington, D.C., for Intervenor. ON BRIEF: Robert P. Holmes, IV, WHITE & STRADLEY, LLP, Raleigh, North Carolina; John F. Bloss HIGGINS BENJAMIN, PLLC, Greensboro, North Carolina, for Appellants. Reid C. Adams, Jr., Jonathan R. Reich, WOMBLE BOND DICKINSON (US) LLP, Winston-Salem, North Carolina; Bradley M. Risinger, Troy D. Shelton, Jeffrey R. Whitley, FOX ROTHSCHILD LLP, Raleigh, North Carolina; Harold C. Spears, CAUDLE & SPEARS, P.A., Charlotte, North Carolina; David Coats, BAILEY & DIXON, Raleigh, North Carolina, for Appellees. Brian M. Boynton, Acting Assistant Attorney General, Mark B. Stern, Civil Division, UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, Washington, D.C., for Intervenor.

Before WILKINSON, MOTZ, and THACKER, Circuit Judges.

Affirmed by published opinion. Judge Motz wrote the opinion, in which Judge Wilkinson and Judge Thacker joined.

DIANA GRIBBON MOTZ, Circuit Judge:

The Defendants here, a number of personal injury lawyers, obtained car accident reports from North Carolina law enforcement agencies and private data brokers. The reports included the names and addresses of the drivers involved in those accidents. The Defendants used that personal information to mail unsolicited attorney advertising materials to some of the drivers. Two groups of the drivers who received these materials, the Plaintiffs here, filed suit, asserting that the Defendants violated the Driver's Privacy Protection Act ("DPPA"). That statute provides a private cause of action against "[a] person who knowingly obtains, discloses or uses personal information, from a motor vehicle record," for an impermissible purpose. See 18 U.S.C. § 2724(a). The district court held that the Plaintiffs had standing to bring suit for damages, but rejected the Plaintiffs' claims on the merits, granting summary judgment to the Defendants in both cases. We affirm, albeit on narrower grounds than those on which the district court relied.

I.

Despite the voluminous¹ record in these consolidated cases, the relevant facts are uncontested. When law enforcement officers respond to a car crash in North Carolina, they generate an account of the accident on a standardized form. The form includes the type of information one might expect: the time and location of the accident, the make and model of the involved vehicles, a description of any injuries, a brief narrative of the crash, and so on. Crucially, the form also includes the names and home addresses of the drivers. Underneath the address field in the form is the text: "Same Address on Driver's License?" followed by "Yes" or "No" checkboxes. Law enforcement agencies store these accident reports,² which are public records under North Carolina law. See N.C. Gen. Stat. § 20-166.1(i) ("The [accident] reports made by law enforcement officers ... are public records and are open to inspection by the general public."). In addition, some private data brokers obtain and sell these accident reports.

The Defendants are attorneys who wish to represent people involved in car crashes in North Carolina. They obtained accident reports from North Carolina law enforcement agencies or private data brokers and used the names and addresses on the reports to mail unsolicited attorney advertising materials to the drivers involved in those crashes. Two groups of drivers who received such mailings — the Plaintiffs here — sued, invoking § 2724(a) of the DPPA. That statute provides:

A person who knowingly obtains, discloses or uses personal information, from a motor vehicle record, for a purpose not permitted under this chapter shall be liable to the individual to whom the information pertains, who may bring a civil action in a United States district court.

§ 2724(a). Both groups of Plaintiffs sought monetary damages and injunctive relief, and one group also sought a declaratory judgment.

After a flurry of motions and amended complaints, the district court denied the Defendants' motions to dismiss the damages claims for lack of standing but granted those motions insofar as the Plaintiffs sought injunctive relief. Ultimately, the district court ruled for the Defendants on cross-motions for summary judgment. The court reasoned that the DPPA applies only to persons who obtain personal information directly from a state DMV. Here, the court noted, the "Defendants either obtained these reports directly from a local law enforcement office or they subscribed to third-party services that aggregated crash records." Because the Defendants never obtained records from a DMV, the court concluded that their "conduct thus falls outside the ambit of the DPPA, and they are entitled to judgment as a matter of law."

The Plaintiffs then appealed. Because the Hatch and Garey cases present substantively identical legal questions (with a few minor exceptions noted herein), we consolidated them for appeal. We now affirm.

II.

The Defendants challenge the Plaintiffs' standing to seek monetary and injunctive relief. The district court held that the Plaintiffs had standing to pursue damages but lacked standing to obtain an injunction. Because "[s]tanding ‘is a threshold jurisdictional question,’ " we address it first. Dreher v. Experian Info. Sols., Inc. , 856 F.3d 337, 343 (4th Cir. 2017) (quoting Pye v. United States , 269 F.3d 459, 466 (4th Cir. 2001) ). Our review of standing questions is de novo. Wikimedia Found. v. NSA , 857 F.3d 193, 207 (4th Cir. 2017).

A.

Plaintiffs who do not have a legally cognizable injury lack standing to bring suit in federal court.³ Congress may, of course, "elevat[e] to the status of legally cognizable injuries concrete, de facto injuries that were previously inadequate in law." Lujan v. Defs. of Wildlife , 504 U.S. 555, 578, 112 S.Ct. 2130, 119 L.Ed.2d 351 (1992). But as the Defendants correctly point out, plaintiffs cannot establish a cognizable injury simply by pleading a statutory violation. See Spokeo, Inc. v. Robins , 578 U.S. 330, 341, 136 S.Ct. 1540, 194 L.Ed.2d 635 (2016) ("Article III standing requires a concrete injury even in the context of a statutory violation.").

Balancing these two rules has in the past caused some confusion, but the Supreme Court recently clarified when a statutory cause of action identifies an injury sufficient for standing purposes. In TransUnion LLC v. Ramirez , the Court explained that plaintiffs proceeding under a statutory cause of action can establish a cognizable injury by "identif[ying] a close historical or common-law analogue for their asserted injury" for which courts have "traditionally" provided a remedy. ––– U.S. ––––, 141 S. Ct. 2190, 2204, 210 L.Ed.2d 568 (2021) (citing Spokeo , 578 U.S. at 341, 136 S.Ct. 1540 ). A plaintiff who does so has standing even if the precise injury would not, absent the statute, be sufficient for Article III standing purposes.

Consistent with TransUnion , the district court here found standing because "[p]laintiffs' alleged harms are closely related to the invasion of privacy, which has long provided a basis for recovery at common law." We agree. Indeed, following Spokeo and foreshadowing TransUnion , we recently rebuffed a nearly identical standing challenge in a case arising under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act ("TCPA"), another consumer privacy statute that, like the DPPA, provides a private right of action against offenders. See Krakauer v. Dish Network, LLC , 925 F.3d 643, 652–54 (4th Cir. 2019).

In Krakauer , we explained that by enacting the TCPA, "Congress responded to the harms of actual people by creating a cause of action that protects their particular and concrete privacy interests." Id. at 653. And we noted that injuries to personal privacy have long been "recognized in tort law and redressable through private litigation." Id. We acknowledged that although the TCPA provides claims that differ from common law privacy torts, Spokeo does not require us to "import the elements of common law torts, piece by piece, into any scheme Congress may devise." Id. Rather, we concluded that our inquiry "focuse[s] on types of...