HENRY v. STATE OF NEW JERSEY et al
Filing
17
MEMORANDUM OPINION. Signed by Judge Jerome B. Simandle on 11/30/2011. (TH, )
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF NEW JERSEY
CAROLYN HENRY,
HON. JEROME B. SIMANDLE
Plaintiff,
Civil No. 11-2469 (JBS/KMW)
v.
MEMORANDUM OPINION
STATE OF NEW JERSEY, et al.,
Defendants.
SIMANDLE, District Judge:
This matter is before the Court on the motions to dismiss
of several Defendants.
Specifically the Court considers the
motions by (1) Defendant Steven J. Petersen [Docket Item 5]; (2)
Defendant John Oros (incorrectly pled as “Orsin”) [Docket Item
11]; (3) Defendants State of New Jersey, D.Y.F.S., Attorney
General Paula T. Dow, and Deputy Attorney General Sharon L.
Piccioni [Docket Item 14]; (4) and Defendants the Honorable Nancy
S. Famular, J.S.C., the Honorable Deborah Silverman-Katz, J.S.C.,
and Donald Jackson [Docket Item 16].1
The Court finds as
follows:
1.
On April 29, 2011, Plaintiff Carolyn Henry filed the
Complaint in this matter, which was written without the
assistance of a lawyer.
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[Docket Item 1.]
Plaintiff’s Complaint
Plaintiff submitted a response only to Defendant
Peterson’s motion [Docket Item 8] which does not address the
movant’s arguments and appears to complain about the processing
of her case. No other opposition to the remaining motions has
been filed by Plaintiff.
is difficult to decipher, but she appears to allege a conspiracy
among all Defendants to deprive Plaintiff of her constitutional
rights, in particular her due-process rights as a parent,
resulting in the termination of her parental rights in a Superior
Court of New Jersey child abuse and neglect civil action.
1-4 & Ex. 1.
Compl.
Ms. Henry alleges that her child was taken from her
in one of several state court actions, and alleges that the
result was in error and should not have happened.
2.
The moving Defendants have all moved to dismiss the
action for lack of subject matter jurisdiction; specifically, all
moving Defendants except for Defendant Petersen have argued that
the Court lacks subject matter jurisdiction under the U.S.
Supreme Court’s Rooker-Feldman doctrine.
The gist of this
doctrine is that a federal district court such as this one is not
empowered under the United States Constitution to review a final
decision of a state court.
If a party like Plaintiff Carolyn
Henry feels that a state court decision was incorrectly decided,
the proper response is to appeal that decision to the appropriate
state appellate court; the federal district court cannot provide
any relief in such a case.
This doctrine is explained in greater
detail in the case of Parkview Associates Partnership v. City of
Lebanon, 225 F.3d 321, 324 (3d Cir. 2000).
3.
The Court finds that Ms. Henry’s Complaint is precluded
under the Rooker-Feldman doctrine because, based upon the Court’s
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best effort at understanding the Complaint, Ms. Henry’s state
court custody dispute was “actually litigated” in state court and
her claims for relief in this Court are “inextricably
intertwined” with that underlying state court adjudication.
See
ITT Corp. v. Intelnet Int’l Corp., 366 F.3d 205, 210 (3d Cir.
2004).
Plaintiff describes the relief she seeks as “Justice for
my son and to be given back to me” and that she seeks “to be
heard” which she believes was not done in the state court
proceedings. Compl. at 2.
In order to grant this relief, the
Court would be required to determine that a state court’s
decision was wrong, or to void a state court’s ruling.
This is
precisely what this federal court is prohibited from doing under
the Rooker-Feldman doctrine.
4.
ITT Corp. at 211.
Subject matter jurisdiction is also lacking as to
Defendant Steven J. Peterson, an attorney in private practice
whom Plaintiff accuses of violating her rights.
To the extent
Plaintiff may be accusing Defendant Peterson of malpractice, such
a claim cannot be heard in this Court because there is no
diversity of citizenship -- Plaintiff and Defendant Peterson are
both citizens of New Jersey and the required diversity under 28
U.S.C. § 1332 is absent.
To the extent Plaintiff claims
Defendant Peterson violated her rights to due process or equal
protection, he is clearly a private attorney and not a state
actor as required by the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. §§ 1983,
3
1985.
See Polk County v. Dodson, 454 U.S. 312, 325 (1981)
(holding that even a public defender does not act under color of
state law for purposes of the Civil Rights Act when functioning
as counsel to a defendant); Winters v. Devecka, 130 F. App’x 612,
613 (3d Cir. 2005) (holding that a private attorney representing
the accused in a criminal case does not act under color of state
law for purposes of the Civil Rights Act).
This result does not
change when the Plaintiff accuses the attorney of conspiring with
state actors where, as in the present case, the conclusory label
of a “conspiracy” is not backed by any allegations of the grounds
for such an allegation.
Reardon v. Reardon, 1988 WL 134699, Civ.
No. 87-3605 at *4-5 (D.N.J. Dec. 13, 1988).
Accordingly
Defendant Peterson’s motion to dismiss for lack of subject matter
jurisdiction and for failure to state a claim upon which relief
may be granted, pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(1) and 12(b)(6)
will be granted.
5.
Consequently, the Court finds that it lacks subject
matter jurisdiction to hear Plaintiff’s Complaint, and must grant
Defendants’ motions to dismiss the action.
The Court expresses
no opinion on the merits, if any, of Plaintiff’s allegations
because it lacks jurisdiction over the subject matter of her
Complaint.
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The accompanying Order shall be entered.
November 30, 2011
Date
s/ Jerome B. Simandle
JEROME B. SIMANDLE
United States District Judge
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