CLARK v. KEYS et al

Filing 58

OPINION fld. Signed by Judge Claire C. Cecchi on 5/26/16. (sr, )

NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
DISTRICT OF NEW JERSEY

THE ESTATE OF LYNNISE ANGELA
CLARK,

Civil Action No. 12-407 1 (CCC-JBC)

Plaintiff
OPINION
V.

SCOTTKEYS,etal.,
Defendants.

CECCHI, District Judge.
I.

INTRODUCTION

This matter comes before the Court by way of two separate motions by Defendants Ronald
Fans, Ocwen Loan Servicing, LLC, OneWest Bank FSB, and Dondzilla [ECF No. 56] and by
Defendant Fein, Such, Kahn & Shepard, P.C. [ECF No. 57] to dismiss the Second Amended
Complaint {ECF No. 55] of Plaintiff The Estate of Lynnise Angela Clark for lack of subject matter
jurisdiction pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 1 2(b)( 1), for failure to state a claim upon
which relief may be granted pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), and for judgment
on the pleadings pursuant to federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(c). Plaintiff, who is proceeding
pro se, has not responded to either motion. The motions have been decided without oral argument
pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 78. For the reasons discussed below, Defendants’
motions to dismiss Plaintiffs’ Second Amended Complaint are granted, and Plaintiffs Second
Amended Complaint is dismissed without prejudice.

I

II.

BACKGROUND
The following facts are accepted as true for purposes of the instant motion.1 Plaintiff

owned the subject property located at 10 Franklin Street, Vauxhall, New Jersey 07088 (the
“Property”). See Declaration of Brett L. Messinger, Exhibits A and B, ECF No. 58-2; see also
Second Amended Complaint (“Sec. Amend. Compl.”), ECF No. 55, at ¶J 210-212. On September
12, 2006, Plaintiff obtained a $296,000.00 loan from IndyMac Bank FSB (“Indymac”), which later
became IndyMac Federal Bank FSB (“IndyMac Federal”).2 See id.
After Plaintiff defaulted on her loan payments, IndyMac Federal instituted a foreclosure
action against Plaintiff. See IndyMac Federal Bank, FSB v. Lynnise A. Clark, No. F-4806-09
(N.J. Super. Ct. Ch. Div.). The Superior Court of New Jersey, Chancery Division, entered a final
judgment of foreclosure against Plaintiff on February 26, 2010, from which Plaintiff did not
appeal. See Declaration of Brett L. Messinger, Exhibit D, ECF No. 58-2.
More than two years later, Plaintiff brought suit in this Court, on June 8, 2012. See ECF
No. 1.

In essence, Plaintiffs Second Amended Complaint is based on her allegations that

Defendants improperly prepared and handled her loan documents by assigning her loan to a thirdparty without Plaintiffs consent.

$ Sec. Amend. Compi., ¶J 146-207. She states that, after the

This Court previously dismissed Plaintiffs Amended Complaint, by Order dated August
25, 2016, with instructions to file a Second Amended Complaint that “should only contain a short
and plain statement of all of the claims and facts Plaintiff wishes to allege. . . .“ See ECF No. 54.
Although Plaintiff thereafter filed a Second Amended Complaint [ECF No. 55], the pro se Plaintiff
appears to have neglected to include certain facts that would form the basis of her allegations
against Defendants. Accordingly, the Court references documents attached by Defendants and the
publicly available record upon which Plaintiffs allegations are based.
2
Defendants explain that after IndyMac failed in July 2008, the Office of Thrift Supervision
closed Indymac and appointed the FDIC as receiver for IndyMac. The Office of Thrift Supervision
also created a new entity, Indymac Federal, “into which IndyMac’s assets (but almost none of its
liabilities) were transferred, and appointed the FDIC as conservator for IndyMac Federal.” See
Memorandum of Law in Support of Motion to Dismiss, ECF No. 56, at 2.
2

foreclosure action, “I realize that fraud was committed.

.

.

an alleged Mortgage process had taken

place by THE FEDERAL DEPOSIT INSURANCE CORPORATION AS RECEIVER FOR
1NDYMAC FEDERAL BANK FSB for the consideration of the sum of $1.00 but is showing a
secured payment in the amount of $296[,]000.00.

.

.

.“

On September 30, 2015 and October 15,

2015, Defendants filed their respective, unopposed motions, seeking dismissal of Plaintiffs
Second Amended Complaint.
III.

LEGAL STANDARD

A motion to dismiss for lack of standing is properly brought pursuant to Federal Rule of
Civil Procedure 12(b)(l), because standing is a matter ofjurisdiction. Ballentine v. U.S., 486 F.3d
806, 810 (3d. Cir. 2007) (citing St. Thomas-St. John Hotel Tourism Ass’n v. Gov’t of the U.S.
Virgin Islands, 218 F.3d 232, 240 (3d. Cir. 2000)); Kauffman v. Dreyfus Fund, Inc., 434 F.2d 727,
733 (3d Cir. 1970).
“Article III of the Constitution limits the jurisdiction of federal courts to ‘Cases’ and
‘Controversies.” Lance v. Coffinan, 549 U.S. 437, 439 (2007); Luian v. Defenders of Wildlife,
504 U.S. 555, 560 (1992) (“Though some of its elements express merely prudential considerations
that are part of judicial self-government, the core component of standing is an essential and
unchanging part of the case-or-controversy requirement of Article III.”). One key aspect of this
case-or-controversy requirement is standing. Lance, 549 U.S. at 439. “The standing inquiry
focuses on whether the party invoking jurisdiction had the requisite stake in the outcome when the
suit was filed.” Constitution Party of Pennsylvania, 757 F.3d 347, 360 (3d Cir. 2014) (citing Davis
v. FEC, 554 U.S. 724, 734 (2008)).
To establish standing, a plaintiff must satisfy a three-part test, showing: (1) an ‘injury in
fact,’ i.e., an actual or imminently threatened injury that is ‘concrete and particularized’ to the

3

plaintiff; (2) causation, i.e., traceability of the injury to the actions of the defendant; and (3)
redressability of the injury by a favorable decision by the Court. Nat’l Collegiate Athletic Ass’n
v. Gov. of N.J., 730 F.3d 208, 218 (3d. Cir. 2013) (citing Summers v. Earth Island Inst., 555 U.S.
488, 493 (2009)). “The party invoking federal jurisdiction bears the burden of establishing these
elements.” Lujan, 504 U.S. at 561. At the motion to dismiss stage, a plaintiff must demonstrate a
plausible claim of standing. See id.
Additionally, for a complaint to survive dismissal pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil
Procedure 12(b)(6), it “must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to ‘state a claim to
relief that is plausible on its face.” Ashcrofl v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (quoting Bell Atl.
Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007)). In evaluating the sufficiency of a complaint, the
Court must accept all well-pleaded factual allegations in the complaint as true and draw all
reasonable inferences in favor of the non-moving party.

Phillips v. Cnty. of Allegheny, 515

F.3d 224, 234 (3d Cir. 200$). “Factual allegations must be enough to raise a right to relief above
the speculative level.” Twombly, 55Q U.S. at 555. “A pleading that offers labels and conclusions
will not do. Nor does a complaint suffice if it tenders naked assertion[s] devoid of further factual
enhancement.” Igbal, 556 U.S. at 678 (internal citations omitted). However, “the tenet that a court
must accept as true all of the allegations contained in a complaint is inapplicable to legal
conclusions.

Threadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere

conclusory statements, do not suffice.” Id. Additionally, in evaluating a plaintiffs claims,
generally “a court looks only to the facts alleged in the complaint and its attachments without
reference to other parts of the record.” Jordan v. Fox, Rothschild, O’Brien & frankel, 20 F.3d
1250, 1261 (3d Cir. 1994).

4

IV.

DISCUSSION
For the following reasons, the Court finds that Plaintiffs Second Amended Complaint is

dismissed without prejudice.
I.

Plaintiff Lacks Standing To Bring This Action

At the outset, both motions to dismiss note that the pro se Plaintiff instituted this action
under the name of “The Estate of Lynnise Angela Clark” although no such legally recognized
estate exists. Rather, the Plaintiff (Lynnise Angela Clark) is living and appears to have signed and
have notarized certain documents under her own name, instead of the name of the estate. Plaintiff,
as a fictitious estate, lacks standing to bring this action. See Estate of Casimir v. New Jersey,
No. 09-4004, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 78113, at *9 (D.N.J. Aug. 31, 2009) (“[T]he ‘estates’
cannot qualify as litigants since Plaintiffs offer no order by a probate court acknowledging the
existence of these ‘estates’

.

.

.

.

Since

.

.

.

[n]either one of the ‘estates’ is an existing person, this

matter should be dismissed because no Plaintiff named in this action has standing to sue.”)
Accordingly, Plaintiffs Second Amended Complaint is dismissed for lack of standing.
II.

Subject Matter Jurisdiction Is Lacking Pursuant To The Rooker-Feidman
Doctrine

To the extent Plaintiff could prove the existence of The Estate of Lynnise Angela Clark,
Defendants contend that this Court lacks subject matter jurisdiction to hear Plaintiffs claims due
to the Rooker-Feldman doctrine, because there was a fully adjudicated foreclosure action in state
court. The Rooker-Feldman doctrine divests federal courts of subject matter jurisdiction where
the requested relief would reverse a prior state court decision or void its ruling. çç Rooker v.
Fidelity Trust Co., 263 U.S. 413 (1923); District of Columbia Court of Appeals v. Feldman, 460
U.S. 462 (1983); see also 28 U.S.C.

§

1257. There are four factors used to determine whether the

Rooker-Feldman Doctrine applies: “(1) the federal plaintiff lost in state court; (2) the plaintiff
5

complains of injuries caused by the state court judgments; (3) those judgments were rendered
before the federal suit was filed; and (4) the plaintiff is inviting the district court to review and
reject the state judgments.” Great Western Mining & Mineral Co. v. Fox Rothschild LLP, 615
F.3d 159, 166 (3d Cir. 2010).
Here, all four factors are met.

First, a foreclosure proceeding was instituted against

Plaintiff in state court, which resulted in a final foreclosure judgment against Plaintiff. Second,
the gravamen of Plaintiffs Second Amended Complaint is that Defendants were not the true
holders of the note and thus did not have standing to enforce the loan and proceed with the
foreclosure action against Plaintiff. Third, the final foreclosure judgment was rendered in February
2010, before Plaintiff instituted the action before this Court. And fourth, Plaintiffs Second
Amended Complaint now seeks review by this Court to invalidate the foreclosure proceeding that
was fully litigated in state court. Plaintiff asks that this Court instead declare her “the true owner
of the Land and Improvements located at 10 Franklin Street”, nullify “all assignments of
mortgage”, strike “all court records recording this matter

.

.

.

from the record in Trenton”, and

order compensation to Plaintiffby way of a sum in excess of “One Billion, One Hundred fourteen
Million.

.

.

Dollars” for damages incurred. See Sec. Amend. Compl., ¶J 210-20, 224-26, 342-57.

Accordingly, because the Rooker-Feldman doctrine applies here, this Court lacks subject
matter jurisdiction to review Plaintiffs’ Second Amended Complaint.
III.

Any Remaining Claims Would Be Dismissed For Failure To State A Claim

Last, it appears that Plaintiffs Second Amended Complaint lists or makes passing
reference to several claims that may not be germane to the foreclosure action.3 Apart from the

The Court is referring to Plaintiffs list of several possible causes of action including those
for trademark infringement, fraud, extortion, mail fraud, conspiracy, fictitious obligations,
6

primary basis for dismissal (that Plaintiff is a fictitious estate that lacks standing) and the
applicability of the Rooker-Feidman doctrine to certain of these claims, they would also be
dismissed under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) for failure to state a claim. Although
Plaintiff lists several statutes and treaties, she fails to articulate any facts in support of these
statutory violations and does not tie these purported claims to any of the recited facts in the Second
Amended Complaint or otherwise amplify her pleadings. Accordingly, these claims must be
dismissed because there is insufficient factual matter to state a claim to relief that is plausible on
its face. See Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570.
V.

CONCLUSION

For the reasons set forth above, Defendants’ motion to dismiss Plaintiffs Second Amended
Complaint is granted without prejudice. An appropriate Order accompanies this Opinion.

Dated:

Fy

(...

2S
/

CLAIRE C. CECCHI, U.S.D.J.

interstate stalking, false claims, abuse of authority, violation of RICO, and the violation of several
international peace treaties. See Sec. Amend. Compl., ¶J 71-77, 119-23, 305-32.
7