Greene v. U.S. Dep't of Educ. (In re Greene)

• Decision Date: 22 April 2013
• Docket Number: Case No. 10-51071-SCS,APN 11-05016-SCS
• Parties: In re: LURIA NICOLE GREENE, Debtor. LURIA NICOLE GREENE, Plaintiff, v. U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION, Defendant.
• Court: U.S. Bankruptcy Court — Eastern District of Virginia

In re: LURIA NICOLE GREENE, Debtor.

LURIA NICOLE GREENE, Plaintiff,

v.U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION, Defendant.

Case No. 10-51071-SCS

APN 11-05016-SCS

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT EASTERN DISTRICT OF VIRGINIA NEWPORT NEWS DIVISION

Entered on Docket: April 22, 2013

Chapter 7

MEMORANDUM OPINION

Luria Nicole Greene ("Ms. Greene"), an unrepresented debtor, filed an Amended Complaint against the Defendant, United States Department of Education ("United States"), seeking a discharge of her student loan indebtedness. At the conclusion of the trial and after the filing of a trial brief and reply by Ms. Greene and a response by the United States, the Court issued a Memorandum Opinion ("Opinion"), Greene v. United States Department of Education (In re Greene), 484 B.R. 98 (Bankr. E.D. Va. 2012) (hereinafter "Greene"), and entered an Order ("Order") on December 6, 2012, dismissing the Amended Complaint for the reasons set forth in the Opinion. On December 20, 2012, Ms. Greene filed a Motion to Reconsider ("Motion to Reconsider") and a combined Motion to Amend and for a New Trial ("Motion for New Trial"). On December 26, 2012, Ms. Greene filed a Supplement to the Motion to Reconsider ("Supplement"). (The Motion to Reconsider, the Motion to Amend, and the Supplement, along with the exhibits attached to each of these documents, arecollectively referred to herein as "the Motions.").

By order entered on January 2, 2013, the Court directed that the United States file any responses to the Motions on or before January 18, 2013. The order further provided that Ms. Greene would be entitled to file any further response or memorandum on or before January 30, 2013.¹ On January 18, 2013, Ms. Greene filed an additional pleading entitled "Exhibits" ("January Exhibits"). Ms. Greene included with the January Exhibits a document entitled "Riverside Regional Discharge Instructions," dated January 18, 2013 ("Riverside Document"), which she believes constitutes a current diagnosis of her mental state.² Ms. Greene apparently wishes the Court to consider the Riverside Document and the remainder of the January Exhibits as evidence related to the Motions. Additionally, on March 1, 2013, Ms. Green filed a document entitled "Affidavit"³ ("Affidavit") in support of the Motions, wherein she states, "I do not feel capable of representing myself to file [the]Reply Brief because I know that I have chronic post-traumatic stress disorder and dissociative disorder." Affidavit at 1. Ms. Greene attached to the Affidavit additional supportive exhibits ("March Exhibits").⁴

Having now considered the Motions, exhibits, and the written arguments of Ms. Greene and the United States, the Court, by order dated April 22, 2013, denies the Motions for the reasons set forth herein. The Court decides the Motions without oral argument thereupon as the written submissions of Ms. Greene and the United States adequately set forth the arguments of the parties and oral argument of the Motions would not advance the decisional process of this Court.

I. The Motion to Reconsider

In the Motions, Ms. Greene seeks reconsideration of the Court's earlier judgment dismissing her Amended Complaint or, alternatively, the granting of a new trial so that she may adduce additional evidence in support of the Amended Complaint. Judge Moon reminds of the limitations of granting reconsideration:

A court may reconsider a nonfinal judgment. "The purpose of a motion for reconsideration is to correct manifest errors of law or fact or to present newly discovered evidence," and because of the interest in finality, "courts should grant motions for reconsideration sparingly." Dayoub v. Penn-Del Directory Co., 90 F. Supp. 2d 636, 637 (E.D. Pa. 2000) (citations and quotations omitted); see also Madison River Mgmt. Co. v. Bus. Mgmt. Software Corp., 402 F. Supp. 2d 617, 619 (M.D.N.C. 2005) ("A motion to reconsider is appropriate when the court has obviously misapprehended a party's position or the facts or applicable law, or when the party produces new evidence that could not have been obtained through the exercise of due diligence."); Reich v. Hall Holding Co., 990 F. Supp. 955, 965 (N.D. Ohio 1998) ("The major grounds justifying reconsideration of interlocutory ordersare an intervening change of controlling law, the availability of new evidence, or the need to correct a clear error or prevent manifest injustice.") (citing Pet. of U.S. Steel Corp., 479 F.2d 489, 494 (6th Cir. 1973)).

A motion to reconsider may also be appropriate where the Court has misunderstood a party, has made a decision outside the adversarial issues presented by the parties, or has made an error of apprehension. Above the Belt, Inc. v. Mel Bohannan Roofing, Inc., 99 F.R.D. 99, 101 (E.D. Va. 1983). A controlling or significant change in the law or the facts also provides a potential basis for a motion for reconsideration. Id. A motion to reconsider is inappropriate where it merely reiterates previous arguments. Id. (denying a motion to reconsider that improperly "ask[ed] the Court to rethink what the Court had already thought through—rightly or wrongly").

Univ. of Va. Patent Found. v. Gen. Elec. Co., 755 F. Supp. 2d 738, 743-44 (W.D. Va. 2011). Thus, the interests of finality and the conservation of judicial resources remain central considerations, since a motion for reconsideration is not an opportunity for a litigant "to present a better and more compelling argument than was originally presented." Madison River Mgmt. Co. v. Bus. Mgmt. Software Corp., 402 F. Supp. 2d 617, 619 (M.D.N.C. 2005); see also Katz v. Enter. Solutions, Inc., No. 1:04-CV-1240-JCC, 2005 WL 1871176, at *1 (E.D. Va. Aug. 5, 2005) (unreported decision). Remembering these principles, the Court considers the Motion to Reconsider.

A. Constitutional Arguments

In the Motion to Reconsider, Ms. Greene summarizes the constitutional issues raised therein as follows:

This motion raises the issue of whether barring plaintiff from hardship relief under 11 U.S.C. § 523(a)(8)(B) because she, as an indigent, has an assigned zero payment under the Income Contingent Plan⁵ unfairly discriminates against the poverty-stricken, denies plaintiff full and equal benefit of the Bankruptcy [C]ode,denies her equal protection under the law, and violates her rights to due process guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment of the [United States] Constitution.

Motion to Reconsider at 1; see also Affidavit ¶¶ 8-10, 12-13. This argument was not raised by Ms. Greene at trial or in any of her post-trial briefs until the Motion to Reconsider. In the Motion to Reconsider, Ms. Greene argues that due process requires that the Court consider whether the student loan debt itself, not the monthly payment amount, imposes an undue hardship, even if the monthly payment amount is zero:

Plaintiff respectfully submits that while the zero payment is not undue hardship, the debt is- the debt of which plaintiff undisputedly has no hope of ever having the means to repay any portion is undue hardship as a debt which cannot be repaid, as explained below, traps an indigent in a cycle of poverty with bars akin to a debtor's prison.

Plaintiff further respectfully submits that due process requires Fourth Circuit courts, in applying Brunner, to strictly adhere to the adopted standards in the Fourth Circuit and consider if the debt is an undue hardship, not if the payment of zero is. Those who are truly desperately poor and unable to ever repay their debt cannot fairly be denied equal benefit under the law because they are too poor to have an assigned payment greater than zero under the Income Contingent Repayment Plan. All citizens must have free and equal benefit of all laws.

Motion to Reconsider at 2.⁶ More specifically, Ms. Greene asserts that:

Brunner, as it was interpreted and applied by this Court in the Memorandum Opinion, resulted in a decision that patently and wholly precludes all indigent debtors from ever receiving hardship relief under 11 U.S.C. § 523(a)(8)(B) by virtue of the zero payments assigned to indigents under the Income Contingent Repayment Plan. Specifically, indigents, who are necessarily too poor to pay their debts and too poor to afford any payments under the Income Contingent Repayment Plan are assigned a zero payment - a payment which the Court determined was not undue hardship and therefore precluded relief under 11 U.S.C. § 523(a)(8)(B). The Court's far-reaching decision unfairly and absolutely relegates all indigents to administrative options, which as explained below, are separate, but not equal to the relief provided under the Bankruptcy [C]ode. Plaintiff respectfully submits that this cannot be correct: this disparate treatment conflicts with the principles of justice, fairness, and equality that are central to due process and are guaranteed by the Fourteenth and Fifth Amendments of the [United States] Constitution.

As equality and justice demands that all persons have full and equal benefit of all laws, no determination can properly categorically bar an entire class of people from a benefit under the law solely on the basis of poverty absent any compelling government interest or rational justification. Just as the Income Contingent Repayment Plan cannot categorically replace relief under 11 U.S.C. § 523(a)(8)(B) for all other debtors, the Income Contingent Repayment Plan cannot abolish relief under 11 U.S.C. § 523(a)(8)(B) for indigents.

Motion to Reconsider at 2-3.

1. Equal Protection Under the Law

The Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution provides, in pertinent part, that"[n]o state shall . . . deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." U.S. Const. amend. XIV § 1. The same standard for equal protection imposed upon the states by the Fourteenth Amendment is also required of the federal government pursuant to the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution.⁷ Schweiker v. Wilson, 450 U.S. 221, 226 n.6 (1981) (citing Weinberger v. Salfi, 422 U.S....