Truckers United for Safety v. Mead

• Decision Date: 01 March 2000
• Docket Number: No. Civ.A.98-2793(TFH).,Civ.A.98-2793(TFH).
• Citation: 86 F.Supp.2d 1
• Parties: TRUCKERS UNITED FOR SAFETY, et al., Plaintiffs, v. Kenneth M. MEAD, Inspector General, Department of Transportation, Defendant.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Columbia

Page 1

86 F.Supp.2d 1

TRUCKERS UNITED FOR SAFETY, et al., Plaintiffs, v. Kenneth M. MEAD, Inspector General, Department of Transportation, Defendant.

No. Civ.A.98-2793(TFH).

United States District Court, District of Columbia.

March 1, 2000.

Anthony Joseph McMahon, Bethesda, MD, for plaintiffs.

AUSA Halsey B. Frank, U.S. Attorney's Office, Washington, D.C., for defendant.

Memorandum Opinion and Order

HOGAN, District Judge.

This matter is before the Court on Plaintiffs' Amended Motion for Preliminary Injunction and Defendant's Motion to Dismiss or Alternatively for Summary Judgment.¹ Based on the briefs in support of those motions, the oppositions and replies thereto, the parties' oral arguments, and the supplemental briefs filed in response to recent legislation, the Court finds: 1) that only the individual plaintiffs have standing, and therefore, the Inspector General's Motion to Dismiss will be granted with respect to the organizational plaintiff; and 2) that, in light of a recent amendment to the Inspector General Act of 1978, Congress has provided the Inspector General of the Department of Transportation the authority to investigate motor carrier compliance with safety regulations.

I. Background

Plaintiffs are a number of named motor carriers and a not-for-profit corporation representing other unnamed motor carriers. Pursuant to 49 U.S.C. § 104 (1994), motor carriers are regulated by the Federal Highway Administration ("FHWA") of the U.S. Department of Transportation ("DOT"). The FHWA's responsibilities include investigating motor carriers' compliance with the Motor Carrier Safety Act of 1984, 49 U.S.C. §§ 31101-31504 ("MCSA"), and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations, 49 C.F.R. §§ 350.1-399.207 (1998) ("FMC Safety Regulations"). This case, however, does not arise out of the FHWA's investigative conduct. Rather, this case arises out of compliance investigations that are conducted by the Inspector General of DOT.

Although the FHWA's Office of Motor Carriers ("OMC") conducts regulatory compliance reviews on motor carriers, the Inspector General's office is also conducting criminal investigations of certain carriers. As it currently is implemented, the enforcement process allows OMC to conduct its compliance reviews and then refer egregious violators to the Inspector General for investigation. The Inspector General asserts that his investigations differ from those of OMC because the investigations focus on criminal conduct. The criminal nature of the Inspector General's investigation permits him to utilize a number of investigative techniques unavailable to OMC, for example, search warrants and seizure of documents.² In furtherance of his current investigations, the Inspector General has issued subpoenas, obtained search warrants, and effected those warrants on several of the plaintiffs' premises. Pursuant to these warrants, the Inspector General's office has seized some of the Plaintiffs' property. Plaintiffs seek a declaration, and injunctive relief pursuant to that declaration, that the Inspector General has exceeded the scope of his authority under the Inspector General Act of 1978, 5 U.S.C. app. 3 §§ 1-12 (1994) ("Inspector General Act" or the "Act").

The Inspector General has raised a number of arguments in defense of his investigatory conduct. First, the Inspector General claims that Plaintiffs lack standing to pursue this case. Second, the Inspector General argues that he has authority under several provisions of the Inspector General Act to investigate motor carrier compliance with DOT safety regulations. Finally, the Inspector General asserts that recent legislation has provided his office with the requisite authority to conduct such investigations. The Court addresses these arguments in turn.

II. Standing

As a preliminary matter, Defendant alleges that Plaintiffs lack standing to challenge the Inspector General's investigatory conduct. The case or controversy requirement of Article III of the U.S. Constitution requires a plaintiff to show: 1) that he suffered "injury in fact"; 2) that the injury be "fairly traceable to the challenged action of the defendant"; and 3) that the injury will be "redressed by a favorable decision." Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560-61, 112 S.Ct. 2130, 119 L.Ed.2d 351 (1992); see Animal Legal Defense Fund, Inc. v. Glickman, 204 F.3d 229 (D.C.Cir.2000). These requirements apply regardless of whether the plaintiff is an individual or an organization. See Spann v. Colonial Village, Inc., 899 F.2d 24, 27 (D.C.Cir.1990) ("An organization has standing on its own behalf if it meets the same standing test that applies to individuals."). The Plaintiffs claim injury from the Inspector General's current investigation of several companies, and possible investigation of others in the future. Only five plaintiffs are currently being investigated by the Inspector General. The other plaintiff, TUFS, is an organization seeking to assist the five individual plaintiffs in representing other similarly situated motor carriers. Collectively, the plaintiffs seek class certification.

The Inspector General's investigations of the Plaintiffs involve searches of their premises and seizure of their business records. Plaintiffs allege that the Inspector General's searches of their premises disrupts their daily business, thereby costing them money. Similarly, Plaintiffs claim that by seizing their business records, the Inspector General, in essence, puts them out of business. In addition, the Inspector General interrogates the Plaintiffs' current and former employees, and therefore, drivers are reluctant to work for the Plaintiffs. Such investigative conduct surely creates an injury. As the Inspector General stated: "The only carriers that have suffered injury that could give them standing ... are those that are actually under criminal investigation and have suffered some arguably adverse action." (Def.'s Mot.Dismiss at 7.)

Although investigative conduct, i.e., subpoenas, searches, and seizures, may create an injury to Plaintiffs, that injury does not arise until the conduct takes place. Further, judicial review should be conducted at the time an agency attempts to act, not when it simply indicates an intent to act. The Plaintiffs claim that they have suffered "injury in fact" because the Inspector General is conducting raids of their premises, seizing documents, interrogating employees and customers, and, in general, putting them out of business. For example, the Inspector General conducted a raid on Lone Wolf and K & C trucking, the facts of which were submitted in an amended complaint that added Lone Wolf and K & C as parties.

These raids were conducted in October 1998, after the FHWA attempted to subpoena documents from the companies and encountered opposition from the companies' attorney. Plaintiffs allege that this search was done in response to their challenges to the FHWA's authority to investigate. As described by the Plaintiffs, the force involved in the raid "included approximately 36 law enforcement vehicles and more than 40 law enforcement officers, mostly in combat dress and heavily armed." (Pl.'s Mot.Prelim.Inj. at 10.) The law enforcement officials then confined the employees and interrogated them individually. See id. "Officers acting at the request of an agent of the IG have seized all operating records of Lone Wolf and K & C, including computer software necessary for continuing operations." Id. at 12. The other individual Plaintiffs have also been subjected to similar criminal investigations conducted by the Inspector General.

Plaintiffs have alleged an injury that would be redressable by a favorable order of this Court. These plaintiffs have standing to challenge the continued seizure of their documents, assuming they are still seized, as well as the Inspector General's ongoing investigation. Although this challenge could be raised in the court that issued the search warrant and authorized the seizure, see FED.R.CRIM.P. 41(e), Plaintiffs are not precluded from seeking a declaration of their rights when an agency acts outside the scope of its authority.

TUFS, however, has not sufficiently alleged that its organization has suffered an injury. An organization can show injury in fact by "point[ing] to a `concrete and demonstrable injury to [its] activities,' not `simply a setback to the organization's abstract social interests.'" Id. (quoting Havens Realty Corp. v. Coleman, 455 U.S. 363, 379, 102 S.Ct. 1114, 71 L.Ed.2d 214 (1982)). "[A]n organization establishes Article III injury if it alleges that purportedly illegal action increases the resources the group must devote to programs independent of its suit challenging the action." Id. TUFS has made no allegations of this sort. TUFS merely claims that its members are subject to a common regulatory scheme. Nor does TUFS claim that any of its members has suffered or is about to suffer injury because of a possible Inspector General investigation beyond the general allegation that the Inspector General might someday choose to investigate a member company. "Since Article III prohibits federal courts from recognizing injuries that are neither `actual' nor `imminent,' we have no authority to reach the claim." American Trucking Ass'ns, 166 F.3d at 386.³

III. Standard of Review

A. Jurisdiction

Plaintiffs bring their suit based on this Court's jurisdictional grant of authority in 28 U.S.C. § 1331, the federal question statute. This jurisdiction is premised on the Court's authority to determine whether federal officials are acting within the scope of their statutory authority or ultra vires — that is, "without any authority to act on subject," BLACK'S LAW DICTIONARY 1522 (6th ed.1990). Plaintiffs do not rely on the Administrative Procedures Act, 5 U.S.C. §§ 701-706 (1994), and the Inspector General Act does not provide an administrative review provision.⁴ "If a plaintiff is unable to bring his case...