Charles A. Pinson, Jr. v. Donald Rumsfeld

192 F. App'x 811
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit
DecidedMay 18, 2006
Docket05-16548; D.C. Docket 04-00076-CV-JTC-3
StatusUnpublished
Cited by38 cases

This text of 192 F. App'x 811 (Charles A. Pinson, Jr. v. Donald Rumsfeld) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Charles A. Pinson, Jr. v. Donald Rumsfeld, 192 F. App'x 811 (11th Cir. 2006).

Opinion

PER CURIAM:

Charles A. Pinson, Jr., (“Pinson”), proceeding pro se, appeals the district court’s dismissal of his suit alleging discrimination and other constitutional violations. The district court did not abuse its discretion in finding that Pinson’s claims of discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e, et seq. (“Title VII”), were filed in the improper venue and that the interests of justice did not warrant a transfer to another district. The district court also did not err in finding that Pinson’s claims of civil rights violations under 42 U.S.C. § 1985 and constitutional claims regarding his federal employment were precluded and that Pinson failed to establish that the court had personal jurisdiction over the individual defendants named in his First Amendment claims. We AFFIRM.

I. BACKGROUND

On 19 July 2004, Pinson filed a pro se complaint, naming four defendants: (1) Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of the Department of Defense (“DOD”); (2) William Cohen, former Secretary of the DOD; (3) Louis Caldera, Secretary of the Department of the Army (“DA”); and (4) Leslie Brownlee, acting Secretary of the DA. The complaint was filed on a “Title VII Complaint” form but a handwritten note at the *813 top of the first page indicates that it was “not primarily a Title VII case” but was primarily filed to address violations of 42 U.S.C. § 1985, and the First, Fourth, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution. Rl-8 at 1. Pinson stated that the defendants discriminated against him because of his race, religion, gender, and his mixed-race marriage by failing to promote him and terminating his employment. Id. at 2. He did not allege any facts regarding the district court’s personal jurisdiction over the defendants or that they were Georgia residents. Simultaneously with his complaint, Pinson filed an “amendment” and a document entitled “Initial Disclosure” with appendix; in both the amendment and the disclosure, he incorporated additional arguments. Id. at 3; Rl-4. In the amendment, he claimed that he was unlawfully dismissed from employment based on the pretextual reason that he was unable to hold a security clearance. Rl-3, Amendment at 1. He asserted that various military personnel and other government officials unlawfully denied him a security clearance and discriminated against him in his performance reviews because of his race, gender, and marital status; confiscated his copyrighted property; and refused to hire him for many positions for which he was qualified. Rl-3, Amendment at 1-4, 8-15. He alleged that his supervisors discriminated against him by requesting that he marry a Filipino woman. Id. at 5-6.

In the “Initial Disclosure,” he claimed that the defendants: (1) violated the First Amendment by classifying portions of his EEO complaint; (2) violated the Fifth Amendment by denying him access to the courts; (3) violated the Fourth Amendment by seizing his computer and his copyrighted documents; (4) violated 42 U.S.C. § 1985 and the Fifth Amendment by conspiring to alter a document in order to show that he had disobeyed the orders of his superior, which caused the suspension of his security clearance; (5) violated § 1985 and the Fourteenth Amendment by conspiring to pressure him to marry a Filipino woman; (6) violated § 1985, Title VII, and the First, Fourth, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments by conspiring to revoke his security clearance, via coded messages; (7) violated § 1985 by conspiring to discriminate against him by refusing to hire him and by giving him inaccurate performance evaluations; (8) conspired under § 1985 and violated his Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment rights by sabotaging his military intelligence project when he refused to marry one of the defendant’s Jewish daughter; and (9) violated his First Amendment rights by refusing to conduct a pre-publication review of his book, entitled Depraved Indifference. Id. at 2-8.

Pinson was granted leave to amend his complaint to add additional defendants. Rl-10 at 1-2. He subsequently amended his complaint, adding as defendants Bill R. Wagoner, Jerry Porter, Charlie L. Cor-nett, George W. Reyes, Paul J. Mason, Maria R. DiMarco, Dean P. Quain, Thomas D. Dale, Alita A. Farr, and Robert Lasky. Rl-14. 1 Pinson alleged no facts regarding the district court’s personal jurisdiction over these defendants and did not allege that defendants were Georgia residents.

The original defendants 2 moved to dismiss, arguing first that Pinson’s Title VII *814 claims should be dismissed for improper venue under Title VII and that the interests of justice did not warrant a transfer of Pinson’s Title VII claims to another judicial district, because Pinson had waived his right to pursue any discrimination and retaliation claims in the Northern District of Georgia by appealing the Merit System Protection Board’s (“MSPB’s”) adverse ruling in his case to the Federal Circuit. They also alleged that, to the extent Pin-son sought to sue the defendants in their official capacities, his claims were barred by the doctrine of sovereign immunity. To the extent Pinson sought to sue the defendants in their individual capacities, the defendants claimed that Pinson had failed to plead an action pursuant to Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388, 91 S.Ct. 1999, 29 L.Ed.2d 619 (1971), and that any potential Bivens claims that Pinson could bring were precluded by the comprehensive statutory scheme set forth in the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 (“CSRA”), 5 U.S.C. § 1101, et seq. The defendants further noted that, because security clearance issues are not reviewable by the judiciary, to the extent Pinson alleged that the defendants violated § 1985 by denying him security clearance, his complaint failed to state a claim. The defendants argued that Pinson’s other § 1985 claims were preempted by Title VII and the CSRA and that Pinson had not established that the district court had personal jurisdiction over certain defendants.

As an exhibit, the defendants attached the “Statement Concerning Discrimination” that Pinson had submitted with his appeal of the MPSB’s decision to the Federal Circuit and cited Pinson v. Department of the Army, No. 99-3407, 2000 WL 565517, at *1 (Fed.Cir. May 10, 2000) (per curiam) (stating that “Pinson waived any claim of discrimination when he submitted his Statement Concerning Discrimination pursuant to Federal Circuit Rule 15(c).”). Rl-19 at 8; Id., Exh. A.

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192 F. App'x 811, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/charles-a-pinson-jr-v-donald-rumsfeld-ca11-2006.