Jackson v. Florida Department of Corrections et al

Filing 22

ORDER OF DISMISSAL dismissing complaint without prejudice for Plaintiff's failure to comply with Court orders and for Plaintiff's abuse of the judicial process. Alternatively, the complaint is dismissed under 28 U.S.C. § 1915A as frivolous, malicious, or for failure to state a claim upon which relief may be granted. See Order for details. The Clerk shall enter judgment accordingly and close the case. Signed by Judge John E. Steele on 8/31/2017. (RKR)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
MIDDLE DISTRICT OF FLORIDA
FORT MYERS DIVISION
DOUGLAS M. JACKSON, of the
family Yahweh, the Creator,
See Genesis 1:1, a Man only
created in the image of
Yahweh,
Genesis
1:26,
Sovereign Citizen of Heaven,
Philippines 3:20, Sovereign
Ambassador, II Corinthians
5:20, a divine Prophet of
Yahweh and King, et al. aka
Douglas Marshall,
Plaintiff,
v.

Case No:

2:17-cv-321-FtM-99MRM

FLORIDA
DEPARTMENT
OF
CORRECTIONS, (FDOC), JULIE
L. JONES, JOHNNY FRAMBO,
DESOTO
CORRECTIONAL
INSTITUTION ANNEX, PATRICK
MURPHY, LORI NORWOOD, and
SEVERYN KOVALYSHIN,
Defendants.
ORDER OF DISMISSAL
Presently before the Court is Plaintiff Douglas M. Jackson’s
(“Plaintiff’s”) amended civil rights complaint (Doc. 16, filed
July 31, 2017).
complaint

is

For the reasons given in this Order, the amended

DISMISSED

without

prejudice

due

to

Plaintiff’s

failure to comply with Court orders and for his abuse of the
judicial

process.

Alternatively,

the

amended

complaint

is

DISMISSED under 28 U.S.C. § 1915A as frivolous, malicious, or for
failure to state a claim upon which relief may be granted.
Complaint
This action was initiated on June 12, 2017, when a 107-page
civil rights complaint was filed in this Court (Doc. 1).

The

plaintiff or plaintiffs identified themselves on the first page of
the complaint as “Douglas-Marshall, of the family Yahweh, the
Creator, See Genesis 1:1, a ‘Man’ only created in the image of
Yahwah, Genesis 1:26, Sovereign Citizen of Heaven, Philippians
3:20, Sovereign-Ambassador, II Corinthians 5:20, a divine Prophet
of Yahweh and King and Priest, Proverbs 31: 1-2, Original AfricanHebrew ‘Chosen People’, Deuteronomy 7:6, and Overseer of Yahwah’s
divinely created and called Religious Assembly of Afrocentric
Bayith Yahweh Yahdaim African Hebrews (Abyyah) African Tribal
Culture Community Members of the Book of Yahweh, Plaintiffs” (Doc.
1 at 1).

Although generally incoherent, the complaint appeared

to allege that the Florida Department of Corrections refused to
allow

certain

prisoners

to

freely

practice

their

religion.

However, a review of the website for the Florida Department of
Corrections (“FDOC”) indicated that nobody with the listed name,
or with the name “Douglas Marshall,” was currently incarcerated by
the FDOC. 1

1

See http://www.dc.state.fl.us/activeinmates/search.asp

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The Clerk of Court found the name “Douglas Marshall Jackson”
and DOC prisoner number “823916” on an attachment to the original
complaint (Doc. 1 at 94).

A prisoner with that name and number

is currently incarcerated at the Desoto Annex in Arcadia Florida.
Accordingly,

the

pleading

was

filed

Jackson” listed as the plaintiff.

with

“Douglas

Marshall

A Public Access to Court

Electronic Records (“PACER”) review revealed that Jackson has
filed at least 165 cases in federal court under the names of
“Douglas M. Jackson” or “Douglas Marshall.”

Moreover, the Supreme

Court of Florida has banned Jackson from filing pro se actions in
the Florida state courts because of the volume and generally
abusive nature of his litigation.

Jackson v. Fla. Dep’t of Corr.,

790 So. 2d 398 (Fla. 2001).
On June 13, 2017, the Court ordered Plaintiff Jackson to file
an amended complaint on the Court’s standard civil rights form
(Doc. 4).

The Court explained that the standard form was required

so that “it can more efficiently manage prisoner litigation and
determine, among other things, whether the complaint is related to
other cases.

Identification of related litigation frequently

enables the Court to dispose of a successive case without further
expenditure

of

finite

judicial

resources.”

Id.

Plaintiff

objected to the Order to amend on the grounds, inter alia, that he
did not want to be identified as Douglas M. Jackson; he was not a

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prisoner; and this case was not brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983
(Doc. 8).
The objection was overruled (Doc. 12).

The Court noted that,

as written, the original complaint did not comply with Rule 8(a)(2)
of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure by containing a short and
plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled
to relief.

The Court also concluded that the complaint was subject

to dismissal as frivolous, malicious, or for failure to state a
claim upon which relief may be granted.
that

Jackson

was

currently

serving

Id.
a

The Court determined

life

sentence

for

his

conviction on five counts of first-degree murder, which indicated
that, notwithstanding his assertions otherwise, he is a prisoner,
and subject to the PLRA.

Id.

The Court also noted that Plaintiff

raised First Amendment 42 U.S.C. § 1983 claims as well as Religious
Land

Use

and

Institutionalized

Person

(“RLUIPA”)

claims.

Id.

Plaintiff was provided an extension of time to file an amended
complaint.

It was explained that:
The complaint shall not exceed 25-pages in
length and shall not contain drawings,
annotations, unexplained sentence fragments,
or citation to any legal authority or
religious
texts.
Rather,
the
amended
complaint must contain only a short and plain
statement showing how Plaintiff believes he is
entitled to relief.
Plaintiff must also
apprise this Court of all prior actions he has
filed in federal or state court, and his
failure to honestly do so will subject his
amended complaint to dismissal for abuse of
the judicial process.

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(Doc. 12 at 3) (emphasis added).

Plaintiff was cautioned that the

Court would only consider the first 25 pages of his amended
complaint.

Id. at n.4.
Amended Complaint

Despite the Court’s warning and page limit, Plaintiff Jackson
filed a 36-page amended complaint on July 31, 2017, under the name
“Douglas-Marshall, a ‘Man’ of the family Yahwah, etc., (see page
2 Attached).”

He signed the complaint as “Douglas-Marshall” (Doc.

16 at 35).

The amended complaint is replete with drawings,

annotations,

unexplained

sentence

fragments,

and

citations to legal authority and religious texts.

numerous
Moreover,

Plaintiff returned only a portion of the standard pre-printed civil
rights form, choosing to scratch through or delete the portions he
did not want to complete, including the portion identifying prior
complaints.

Despite two separate warnings that he must provide

the court with an accounting of his prior litigation, Plaintiff
neither complied, nor explained his failure to do so.

For this

reason alone, Plaintiff’s amended complaint will be dismissed.
See Fed. R. Civ. P. 41(b); Moon v. Newsome, 863 F.2d 835, 837 (11th
Cir. 1989) (recognizing that a dismissal under Rule 41(b) upon
disregard of an order, especially where the litigant has been
warned, is not an abuse of discretion). 2

2

The inquiry concerning a prisoner’s prior lawsuits is not a
matter of idle curiosity, nor is it an effort to raise meaningless

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Prior Complaints
That Plaintiff’s disregard of this Court’s orders was not
inadvertent is underscored by a review of a small fraction of his
prior filings in federal court.

The District Court for the

Northern District of Florida has admonished Plaintiff on at least
two separate occasions that he must use his legal name on his
complaints.
WCS.

See NDFL Case Nos. 4:08cv417-MP/WCS; 4:08-cv-417-MP-

In both cases, the Court dismissed Plaintiff’s claims as

malicious and sanctioned him $350.00, in part for failing to use
his real name on pleadings.
fined an additional $100.

Id.

In the 2008 case, Plaintiff was

In addition, Plaintiff was told that

any future filing in federal district court “must be filed under

obstacles to a prisoner’s access to the courts.
Rather, the
existence of prior litigation initiated by a prisoner is required
in order for the Court to apply 28 U.S.C. § 1915(g) (the “three
strikes rule” applicable to prisoners proceeding in forma
pauperis). Additionally, it has been the Court’s experience that
a significant number of prisoner filings raise claims or issues
that have already been decided adversely to the prisoner in prior
litigation.
Identification of that prior litigation frequently
enables the Court to dispose of the successive case without further
expenditure of finite judicial resources. Indeed, in the instant
case, Plaintiff had already filed these same claims in the Orlando
Division of the District Court for the Middle District of Florida,
yet he failed to alert this Court to that fact. As a result, this
Court was forced to spend considerable time and resources
researching Plaintiff’s litigation history. In the absence of any
basis for excusing a plaintiff’s lack of candor, failure to
disclose and truthfully describe previous lawsuits as clearly
required on the Court’s prisoner civil rights complaint form
warrants dismissal of the complaint for abuse of the judicial
process. See Redmon v. Lake County Sheriff’s Office, 414 F. App’x
221, 225 (11th Cir. 2011).

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Plaintiff’s legal name” and must include a statement that he is
barred from proceeding pro se in federal court absent imminent
danger of serious physical injury. See Case NDFL No. 4:08-cv-417MP-WCS at docket 48 (emphasis added).

In the instant case, neither

Plaintiff’s original complaint (Doc. 1), nor his amended complaint
(Doc. 16), were filed under Plaintiff’s legal name and neither
contained the phrase ordered by the Northern District of Florida.
More

recently,

on

February

7,

2017,

Plaintiff

filed

a

virtually identical complaint as the instant one in the Orlando
Division of the District Court for the Middle District of Florida.
See Case MDFL No. 6:17-cv-255-ACC-DCI (Orlando Case).

On March

3, 2017, the Orlando Case was dismissed by the Honorable Anne C.
Conway for several reasons, the first being that Plaintiff had
lied about his name in his pleadings by signing them as “Douglas
Marshall”:
First, Plaintiff Marshall filed and signed the
Complaint under penalty of perjury using the
name Douglas Marshall.
According to the
Florida Department of Correction (“FDOC”)
website, no such individual is in the custody
of the FDOC. Instead, the individual with the
inmate number associated with this person is
Douglas Marshal Jackson. “Rule 10(a) requires
that the name of the parties be disclosed in
the complaint; Rule 11 forbids lying in
pleadings, motions, and other papers filed
with the court; and Rule 41(b) provides for
dismissal with prejudice as the ultimate
sanction for violation of the rules.” See
Zocaras v. Castro, 465 F.3d 479, 484-85 (11th
Cir. 2006) (affirming dismissal of case with
prejudice and stating “[b]ecause courts must

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be able to preserve the integrity of the
judicial process, we have no hesitation in
concluding that a party who files suit under
a false name and proceeds with that deception
right up to trial loses the right to seek
judicial relief for the claims he was
advancing.”) (citing Fed. R. Civ. P. 10(a);
Fed. R. Civ. P. 11; Fed. R. Civ. P. 41(b)).
Orlando Case at docket 16.

Judge Conway specifically cautioned

Plaintiff that if he decided to initiate another action, he should
“use his legal name (Douglas Marshal Jackson) and complete a
standard civil rights form that contains a short brief statement
of his claims.”

Id.

Despite this warning, Plaintiff neither used

his legal name, nor completed a standard civil rights form when he
initiated the instant suit.

Again, Plaintiff’s failure to comply

with Court orders justifies dismissal of this case under Rule 41(b)
of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.
28 U.S.C. § 1915A
The Prison Litigation Reform Act (“PLRA”) requires federal
courts to conduct early screening of all suits filed by prisoners
or detainees for the purpose of identifying claims that are subject
to immediate dismissal because they are frivolous or malicious,
fail to state a claim for relief, or seek monetary damages from a
defendant who is immune from such relief. 28 U.S.C. § 1915A (which
applies to prisoner complaints against governmental entities or
officials, whether plaintiff is proceeding IFP or has paid the
filing fee).

On initial screening of a prisoner complaint, only

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“cognizable

claims”

may

be

allowed

to

proceed.

28

U.S.C.

§

1915A(b).
In Plaintiff’s Orlando Case, Judge Conway concluded that
Plaintiff’s

complaint

consisted

of

a

“rambling

and

confusing

litany of largely unintelligible statements that seemingly serve
no

legal

purpose.”

Id.

Likewise,

in

the

instant

amended

complaint, Plaintiff has filed nonsensical pleadings suggesting
that this Court lacks jurisdiction over him.

For example, on page

6 of his amended complaint, Plaintiff asserts:
This is a “Religious” cause of action and, at
all times during this cause of action before
the Court, the living breathing, flesh and
blood, living soul ‘Man’ Douglas-Marshall,
d/b/a/ A ‘Prophet’ of Yaweh, Private-Man,
Private-Citizen and Sovereigh-Citizen (‘We
the People’) shall be a ‘Man’ created by
Almighty Yahweh, the Creator, see Genesis
1:26-27, The Book of Yahweh, The Holy
Scriptures, shall at NO time during these
legal
proceedings
before
the
Court
be
unlawfully converted into a non-party Man-Made
Statutory – created, Congress – created or,
Legislative – created fraudulent or fictitious
party Plaintiff, i.e.:
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
(f)
(g)
(h)
(i)
(j)
That
Son,

Person/PERSON!
Inmate/INMATE!
Prisoner/PRISONER!
DC Number/DC NUMBER!
Defendant/DEFENDANT!
Human/HUMAN!
Individual/INDIVIDUAL!
Suspect/SUSPECT!
Convict/CONVICT!
Etc/ETC!
plaintiff Douglas-Marshall, Yahweh’s
A ‘Man’ is absolutely none of the

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‘Fictions’ above!!!
Every one of the
foregoing is a Man-Made FRAUDULENT “IDOL” or
“FICTION”!!! They do NOT apply to the “MAN”
Plaintiff!!!
See Sovereignty Contract and
the Declaration of Status Contract that 100%
exist between the Parties and are envoked
that 100% exist between the Parties and are
envoked [sic] Legal Defenses before this
Federal
Court
and
through
these
Court
Proceedings!!!
(Doc. 16 at 6) (emphases and underlining in original).

When

confronted with similar statements in the Orlando pleadings, Judge
Conway concluded that:
[I]t appears Plaintiff Marshall may be
attempting to raise a claim that Defendants do
not have jurisdiction over the members of
ABYYAH
in
relation
to
their
criminal
convictions and that the members of ABYYAH are
not subject to the laws of Florida and the
United States of America. See id. at 5-10.
However, such claims are frivolous and may not
proceed. United States v. Benabe, 654 F.3d
753, 767 (7th Cir. 2011) (“Regardless of an
individual’s claimed status of descent, be it
as a ‘sovereign citizen,’ a ‘secured-party
creditor,’ or a ‘flesh-and-blood human being,’
that person is not beyond the jurisdiction of
the courts. These theories should be rejected
summarily, however they are presented.”);
Akbar v. Clarke, No. 1:15cv338, 2016 WL
4150456, at *7 (E.D. Va. Aug. 1, 2016) (noting
that sovereign citizen claims are “wholly
frivolous”).
Orlando Case at docket 16.

The undersigned also concludes that

Plaintiff attempts to reject the jurisdiction of this Court by
raising claims as a “sovereign citizen.” Accordingly, in addition
to

being

subject

to

dismissal

under

Rule

41(b),

Plaintiff’s

complaint is dismissed as frivolous, malicious for failure to state

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a claim under 28 U.S.C. § 1915A(b)(1); United States v. Sterling,
738 F.3d 228, 233 n.1 (11th Cir. 2013) (recognizing that courts
routinely reject “sovereign citizen” claims as frivolous).
Finally, Plaintiff has filed multiple pleadings and “motions”
that seemingly re-argue or add arguments to support the seventy
counts already alleged in his amended complaint (Doc. Nos. 6, 7,
10, 11, 13, 14, 15, 17, 18, 21).

A complaint must name the

appropriate parties to an action and include a brief statement of
facts to support each count instead of relying on supplemental
pleadings. A plaintiff may not amend in a piecemeal fashion by
filing separate documents that are intended to be read together as
a single complaint.
ACCORDINGLY, it is hereby
ORDERED:
1.

The instant action is DISMISSED without prejudice for

Plaintiff’s failure to comply with Court orders and for Plaintiff’s
abuse of the judicial process.

Alternatively, the complaint is

DISMISSED under 28 U.S.C. § 1915A as frivolous, malicious, or for
failure to state a claim upon which relief may be granted.
2.

Any future complaint filed by Plaintiff in this Court

must be filed under his legal name and must identify his full
litigation

history.

imposition

of

Failure

sanctions,

to

comply

including,

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but

may
not

result
limited

in

the

to,

the

immediate dismissal of the complaint without further consideration
of Plaintiff’s claims.
3.

The Clerk of Court is directed to terminate any pending

motions, close this case, and enter judgment accordingly.
DONE and ORDERED in Fort Myers, Florida on this
of August, 2017.

SA: OrlP-4
Copies: Douglas M. Jackson

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31st

day