Chambers v. Habitat Co.

68 F. App'x 711
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
DecidedJune 9, 2003
DocketNo. 02-1990
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 68 F. App'x 711 (Chambers v. Habitat Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Chambers v. Habitat Co., 68 F. App'x 711 (7th Cir. 2003).

Opinion

ORDER

Sandra Ann Chambers was evicted from her federally subsidized apartment and brought this action against various parties involved with her eviction. The district court, reasoning that Chambers was trying to void the earlier state-court eviction ruling, dismissed her suit as barred by the Rooker-Feldman doctrine. We vacated that judgment because the Rooker-Feldman doctrine was inapplicable to some of Chambers’s claims and was of uncertain relevance to the others. We directed the district court on remand to determine whether any of the latter claims implicated issues that could have been raised in the state-court litigation and thus would be subject to the doctrine as “inextricably intertwined” with the state-court judgment. Chambers v. Habitat Co., No. 99-2460, 2000 WL 748117, at *8 (7th Cir. June 7, 2000). On remand Chambers twice amended her complaint, alleging claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1983; the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (“FDCPA”), 15 U.S.C. § 1692-1692o; the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (“RICO”), 18 U.S.C. § 1961-68; as well as other federal and state claims. The district court dismissed both amended complaints, concluding that each claim either was untimely, failed to state a claim upon which relief could be granted, or was barred by the Rooker-Feldman doctrine or collateral estoppel. We affirm.

The details of the eviction were sufficiently set forth in our earlier decision, and we need not repeat them here. It is enough to say that in the state proceedings Chambers unsuccessfully challenged her eviction on the ground that she had gotten behind in her rent payments because her landlord failed to lower her rent to reflect a decrease in her income as required by federal law.

On appeal Chambers first challenges the dismissal of her § 1983 claim that the defendants violated her due process rights by omitting from her lease and her eviction notice language allegedly required by regulations issued by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (“HUD”). The district court dismissed this claim based on the Rooker-Feldman doctrine, which precludes lower federal courts from reviewing claims that were raised in, as well as “inextricably intertwined” with, state-court decisions. Disk of Columbia Ct. of Appeals v. Feldman, 460 U.S. 462, 482-83 & n. 16, 103 S.Ct. 1303, 75 L.Ed.2d 206 (1983); Rooker v. Fidelity Trust Co., 263 U.S. 413, 416, 44 S.Ct. 149, 68 L.Ed. 362 (1923); Epps v. Creditnet, Inc., 320 F.3d 756, 759 (7th Cir. 2003). Chambers argues that the district court erred in relying on that doctrine because we held in our previous decision that her claim was not barred: “the Rooker-Feldman doctrine ... does not bar Chambers’ claims for money damages under ... § 1983 for the alleged violation of her due process rights.” Chambers, 2000 WL 748117, at *3. A few lines later in our decision, however, we instructed the district court to consider on remand whether several of Chambers’s claims-including her claim that the defendants had failed “to comply with federal laws and regula[714]*714tions governing subsidized housing’-raised issues that were “germane” to the dispute over possession of the apartment and thus were “inextricably intertwined” with the state-court judgment. Id. Thus, the district court did not err in considering whether the Rooker-Feldman doctrine barred Chambers’s due process claim premised on the defendants’ purported noncompliance with the HUD regulations.

Still, Chambers argues that the Rooker-Feldman doctrine does not bar this § 1983 claim because she could not have made an issue of the HUD regulations in defending the defendants’ forcible entry and detainer action. The Rooker-Feldman doctrine is inapplicable to a claim that could not have been raised in the state proceedings, even if the claim touches upon issues litigated in state court. Long v. Shorebank Dev. Corp., 182 F.3d 548, 557, 559 (7th Cir.1999). In Illinois, only claims or defenses that are germane to the right of possession may be raised in a forcible entry and detainer proceeding. People ex rel. Dep’t of Transp. v. Walliser, 258 Ill.App.3d 782, 196 Ill.Dec. 345, 629 N.E.2d 1189, 1194 (Ill.App.Ct.1994). One category of such issues includes “claims challenging the vaUdity or enforceabiUty of the agreement on which the plaintiff bases the right to possession.” Id. Because Chambers aUeged that the HUD omissions rendered her lease iUegal, the claim is germane to the issue of possession and could have been raised in the state action. See id. at 1196 (holding that landlord’s aUeged violation of federal housing regulation was a defense germane to possession); S. Austin Realty Assoc. v. Sombright, 47 Ill.App.3d 89, 5 Ill.Dec. 472, 361 N.E.2d 795, 798 (Ill.App. Ct.1977) (holding that defendant in forcible entry and detainer action may assert defenses and counterclaims for equitable relief based on landlord’s violation of federal housing law); see also Johnson v. Ill.Dept. of Pub. Aid, 467 F.2d 1269, 1273 (7th Cir.1972) (“[Njoncompliance with HUD circulars applicable to federally-funded local housing authorities is a defense in an eviction proceeding [in Illinois]....”). As for the aUeged omissions from Chambers’s eviction notice, that issue is also germane to the issue of possession. See Walliser, 196 Ill.Dec. 345, 629 N.E.2d at 1195 (treating challenge to adequacy of notice provided to tenant as germane to possession); Arco Petroleum Prods. Co. v. Williams, 146 Ill.App.3d 218, 100 Ill.Dec. 33, 496 N.E.2d 1098, 1099-1100 (Ill.App.Ct.1986) (analyzing defense of insufficient notice in forcible entry and detainer action). Accordingly, both aspects of this § 1983 claim are “inextricably intertwined” with the state judgment, and therefore the Rooker-Feldman doctrine deprived the district court of jurisdiction.

Chambers also chaUenges the dismissal of another § 1983 claim, which asserts that her due process rights were violated by the adjudication of the forcible entry and detainer claim via summary judgment instead of by a jury trial. The district court found that Chambers was coUateraUy estopped from raising this claim because the state appeUate court fuUy analyzed it and found no due process violation. We conclude, however, that the Rooker-Feldman doctrine bars this claim, and, because that doctrine is jurisdictional, the district court had no power to address the affirmative defense of coUateral estoppel. See Centres, Inc. v. Town of Brookfield, Wis., 148 F.3d 699

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68 F. App'x 711, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/chambers-v-habitat-co-ca7-2003.