Sparger-Withers v. Taylor

• Docket Number: 1:21-cv-02824-JRS-MG
• Decision Date: 14 September 2022
• Citation: 628 F.Supp.3d 821
• Parties: Amya SPARGER-WITHERS, on behalf of herself and others similarly situated, Plaintiff, v. Joshua N. TAYLOR, et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of Indiana

628 F.Supp.3d 821

Amya SPARGER-WITHERS, on behalf of herself and others similarly situated, Plaintiff, v. Joshua N. TAYLOR, et al., Defendants.

No. 1:21-cv-02824-JRS-MG

United States District Court, S.D. Indiana, Indianapolis Division

Signed September 14, 2022

Anthony B. Sanders, Institute for Justice, Minneapolis, MN, Cynthia A. Bedrick, J. Lee McNeely, McNeely Law LLP, Shelbyville, IN, Scott Aaron Milkey, McNeely-law LLP, Shelbyville, IN, Michael N. Greensburg, Pro Hac Vice, Robert M. Belden, Pro Hac Vice, Samuel B. Gedge, Pro Hac Vice, Institute for Justice, Arlington, VA, for Plaintiff.

Sundeep Singh, William N. Riley, Riley-Cate LLC, Fishers, IN, for Defendant Joshua N. Taylor.

Jefferson S. Garn, Melinda Rebecca Holmes, Thomas M. Fisher, Indiana Attorney General, Indianapolis, IN, Julia Catherine Payne, Indiana Office of the Attorney General, Indianapolis, IN, for Defendants Blackford County Prosecuting Attorney, Dearborn and Ohio County Prosecuting Attorney, Decatur County Prosecuting Attorney, Fayette County Prosecuting Attorney, Fulton County Prosecuting Attorney, Grant County Prosecuting Attorney, Hancock County Prosecuting Attorney, Harrison County Prosecuting Attorney, Henry County Prosecuting Attorney, Marshall County Prosecuting Attorney, Miami County Prosecuting Attorney, Morgan County Prosecuting Attorney, Rush County Prosecuting Attorney, Shelby County Prosecuting Attorney, Starke County Prosecuting Attorney, Wabash County Prosecuting Attorney.

Order on Defendants' Motion to Dismiss and Plaintiff's Motion for Class Certification

JAMES R. SWEENEY II, JUDGE

I. Introduction

This is a putative class action civil-rights suit, brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, to challenge the constitutionality of Indiana's civil forfeiture system. The state allows private attorneys working on a contingency fee basis to prosecute civil forfeiture cases on its behalf. Plaintiff Amya Sparger-Withers was subject to a civil forfeiture suit brought by Defendant Joshua Taylor under this arrangement. She now sues Taylor and the prosecuting attorneys of seventeen Indiana counties, seeking declaratory and injunctive relief for herself and similarly situated forfeiture defendants.

Now before the Court are the Defendants' Motion to Dismiss, (ECF No. 46), and Plaintiff's Motion for Class Certification, (ECF No. 6).

II. Background

Plaintiff Amya Sparger-Withers was stopped by police on January 29, 2021. (Compl. ¶ 47, ECF No. 1; Defs.' Mot. Dismiss Ex. 1, ECF No. 46.) The police seized drugs and cash belonging to Sparger-Withers. (Compl. ¶47; Mot. Dismiss Ex. 1, ECF No. 46.)

On February 1, 2021, Defendant Joshua Taylor, acting as a prosecutor for the state of Indiana, brought a civil forfeiture action against the seized property. (Compl. ¶¶ 6, 48.) Taylor is a private attorney who worked the case on a contingency fee basis. (Id. ¶ 49.) Taylor routinely prosecutes civil forfeiture actions on contingency fees, (Id. ¶ 29); he appears to file about a hundred cases per year spread over seventeen counties across the state, (Decl. Michael Greenberg, ECF No. 6 Attach. 2, Ex. 2-7).

On February 2, 2021, the state began criminal proceedings against Sparger-Withers. (Defs.' Mot. Dismiss Ex. 5, ECF No. 46.)

The civil and criminal actions remained pending for most of the year. Then, on November 2, 2021, there was a bench trial in the criminal case. (Id.) The court docketed an "Administrative Event" on November 5, 2021, finding Sparger-Withers guilty of marijuana possession and not guilty of marijuana dealing. (Id.)

On November 10, 2021, Sparger-Withers filed the Complaint opening this case, (Pl.'s Compl., ECF No. 1), along with a Motion to Certify Class, (Pl.'s Mot. Class Certification, ECF No. 6). The civil forfeiture case was still open.

A few days later, though, on November 16, 2021, Taylor filed a "Plaintiff's Motion to Dismiss" in the civil forfeiture case, (Def.'s Mot. Dismiss Ex. 6, ECF No. 46), which the court granted the same day, (id. Ex. 7). The court ordered the money subject to forfeiture returned to Sparger-Withers, (id.), and by December 6, 2021, the police had effected its return, (id. Ex. 9).

III. Motion to Dismiss

Defendant Taylor moves to dismiss this action on Article III grounds, because Sparger-Withers' property is no longer subject to a civil forfeiture prosecution. (Defs.' Mot. Dismiss, ECF No. 46.)

A. Standing

Taylor argues first that Sparger-Withers lacks Article III standing to bring her case. (Def.'s Br. Supp. Mot. Dismiss 3, ECF No. 47.)

Article III standing is a threshold requirement for this Court's subject-matter jurisdiction over the case; the Court must have a justiciable case or controversy at all stages of review. Alvarez v. Smith, 558 U.S. 87, 92, 130 S.Ct. 576, 175 L.Ed.2d 447 (2009) (citing U.S. Const. art. III, § 2 and Preiser v. Newkirk, 422 U.S. 395, 401, 95 S.Ct. 2330, 45 L.Ed.2d 272 (1975)). "Standing is an essential component of Article Ill's case-or-controversy requirement." Apex Digital, Inc. v. Sears, Roebuck & Co., 572 F.3d 440, 443 (7th Cir. 2009) (citing Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560, 112 S.Ct. 2130, 119 L.Ed.2d 351 (1992)). "[T]he plaintiff bears the burden of establishing standing." Id. (citing Perry v. Vill. of Arlington Heights, 186 F.3d 826, 829 (7th Cir. 1999)). To do so, the plaintiff must show "(1) that she has 'suffered a concrete and particularized injury that is either actual or imminent'; (2) 'that the injury is fairly traceable to the defendant'; and (3) 'that it is likely that a favorable decision will redress that injury.' " Milwaukee Police Ass'n v. Bd. of Fire & Police Comm'rs of City of Milwaukee, 708 F.3d 921, 926 (7th Cir. 2013) (quoting Massachusetts v. EPA, 549 U.S. 497, 517, 127 S.Ct. 1438, 167 L.Ed.2d 248 (2007)). "Standing is evaluated at the time suit is filed." Id. at 928. The Court, even at the motion to dismiss stage, "may properly look beyond the jurisdictional allegations of the complaint and view whatever evidence has been submitted on the issue to determine whether in fact subject matter jurisdiction exists." Apex Digital, 572 F.3d at 444 (quoting Evers v. Astrue, 536 F.3d 651, 656-57 (7th Cir. 2008)).

Here, the operative date is November 10, 2021, when the case was filed. On November 10, Sparger-Withers' property was subject to Taylor's prosecution of an ongoing civil forfeiture proceeding. (Compl. ¶ 48, ECF No. 1; Def.'s Mot. Dismiss Ex. 7, ECF No. 46.) She thus easily satisfies the three standing elements listed above. The injury she alleges—a violation of her due process right to be free from improperly-motivated civil forfeiture prosecution—was then "actual." (Compl. ¶ 61.) That injury was also "fairly traceable" to Taylor, the improperly motivated prosecutor behind the case. (Compl. ¶ 63; Def.'s Mot. Dismiss Ex. 6.) Finally, the injury would be redressed by a favorable decision: Sparger-Withers seeks an injunction that would remove Taylor's allegedly improper motivation from the civil forfeiture prosecution against her property. (Compl. ¶ 68.)

Therefore, considering both the allegations in Sparger-Withers' Complaint and the exhibit evidence introduced by Taylor with his Motion to Dismiss, the Court holds that Sparger-Withers had standing when the case was filed.

B. Mootness

Much of Defendants' Brief in Support of the Motion to Dismiss, (ECF No. 47), argues against Sparger-Withers' continued stake in this case now that the civil forfeiture proceeding against her has been dismissed. Those arguments are framed in terms of standing, but "it is the doctrine of mootness, not standing, that addresses whether an intervening circumstance has deprived the plaintiff of a personal stake in the outcome of the lawsuit. The distinction matters because the [defendant], not petitioners, bears the burden to establish that a once-live case has become moot." West Virginia v. EPA, — U.S. —, 142 S. Ct. 2587, 2607, 213 L.Ed.2d 896 (2022) (cleaned up). With that caveat about the burden of proof in mind, the Court is willing to take Defendants' suggestion that it look past the misnaming to address the substance of their arguments. (Def.'s Reply Supp. Mot. Dismiss 2, ECF No. 65.)

Mootness, like standing, is an Article III requirement. DM Trans, LLC v. Scott, 38 F.4th 608, 616 (7th Cir. 2022). Mootness is jurisdictional, so the Court will dismiss the case where it is lacking. Id. A case is moot when the Court can no longer "grant the litigants any effectual relief." Id.

Here, Taylor argues that because Sparger-Withers has been mooted out, the whole case is moot. (Def.'s Br. Supp. Mot. Dismiss 3, ECF No. 47.) The Court agrees that Sparger-Withers was mooted out when the civil forfeiture case against her property closed and that property was returned—she had no injury after December 6, 2021, for which the Court could grant "effectual relief." In a single-plaintiff case, that would be the end of it.

But class actions play by different rules. Even after the named plaintiff is mooted out, "timely filing for class certification can save a cause of action if it falls within the exception to the mootness doctrine announced in Gerstein v. Pugh, 420 U.S. 103, 95 S.Ct. 854, 43 L.Ed.2d 54 (1975)." Olson v. Brown, 594 F.3d 577, 580 (7th Cir. 2010). The Gerstein exception for "inherently transitory" cases allows relation back, for mootness purposes, to the date the motion for class certification was filed. Id. at 581 (citing Swisher v. Brady, 438 U.S. 204, 213 n.11, 98 S.Ct. 2699, 57 L.Ed.2d 705 (1978)). If the named plaintiff's case was live at the time of filing, it is allowed to continue despite having been mooted out since. Id. at 580-81. The Court applies a two-prong test to determine whether the "inherently transitory" exception applies: "(1) it is uncertain that a claim will remain live for any individual who could be named as a plaintiff long enough for a court to certify the class; and (2) there will be a constant class of persons suffering the deprivation complained of in...