Jesse Hammons v. University of Maryland Medical System Corporation

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
• Decided: June 24, 2025
• Docket: 23-1452
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

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UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 23-1394 (L), No. 23-1452

JESSE HAMMONS,

Plaintiff – Appellant/Cross-Appellee,

v.

UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND MEDICAL SYSTEM CORPORATION; UMSJ HEALTH SYSTEM, LLC; UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND ST. JOSEPH MEDICAL CENTER, LLC,

Defendants – Appellees/Cross-Appellants.

Appeals from the United States District Court for the District of Maryland, at Baltimore. Deborah K. Chasanow, Senior District Judge. (1:20-cv-02088-DKC)

Argued: May 9, 2025 Decided: June 24, 2025

Before QUATTLEBAUM, RUSHING, and HEYTENS, Circuit Judges.

Appeals dismissed by unpublished opinion. Judge Heytens wrote the opinion, which Judge Quattlebaum and Judge Rushing joined.

ARGUED: Joshua A. Block, AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION FOUNDATION, New York, New York, for Appellant/Cross-Appellee. Sean Marotta, HOGAN LOVELLS US LLP, Washington, D.C., for Appellees/Cross-Appellants. ON BRIEF: Leslie Cooper, New York, New York, Daniel Mach, Washington, D.C., AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION FOUNDATION; Aron Fischer, Andrew D. Cohen, Joshua M. Goldman, Sean M. Lau, PATTERSON BELKNAP WEBB & TYLER LLP, New York, New York; Louis Ebert, ROSENBERG, MARTIN & GREENBERG, LLP, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellant/Cross-Appellee. Yaakov M. Roth, Brinton Lucas, Joshua S. Ha, Caleb P. USCA4 Appeal: 23-1452 Doc: 89 Filed: 06/24/2025 Pg: 2 of 9

Redmond, JONES DAY, Washington, D.C.; J. Andrew Mackenzie, HOGAN LOVELLS US LLP, Washington, D.C., for Appellees/Cross-Appellants.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.

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TOBY HEYTENS, Circuit Judge: Jesse Hammons filed a lawsuit alleging three claims—one statutory and two

constitutional—based on a hospital’s cancellation of his hysterectomy. The district court

dismissed both constitutional claims but awarded Hammons compensatory damages on his

statutory claim in an amount Hammons stipulated to. Hammons now appeals, arguing he

should have prevailed on his constitutional claims as well. We conclude Hammons lacks

standing to appeal the dismissal of his constitutional claims because he failed to

demonstrate that he could obtain any further relief beyond what he already received from

the district court’s judgment. Accordingly, we dismiss the appeal.

I.

Hammons is a transgender man who has been diagnosed with gender dysphoria. As

treatment for that diagnosis, Hammons’s doctor recommended that he undergo a

hysterectomy. The doctor scheduled the surgery to take place at the University of Maryland

St. Joseph Medical Center, a hospital owned by the University of Maryland Medical

System. Both the hospital and the medical system receive federal funding.

Shortly before the scheduled hysterectomy, Hammons’s doctor called the hospital’s

chief medical officer (CMO) to discuss the procedure. During that call, the CMO said

doctors “cannot do transgender surgery” at St. Joseph’s, JA 228, and later explained that

performing gender-affirming hysterectomies would be “inconsistent” with a set of ethical

healthcare directives guiding Catholic hospitals, JA 599. Hammons underwent a

hysterectomy at a different hospital several months after the cancelled surgery had been

scheduled to take place.

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Hammons filed a three-count complaint against the hospital, the medical system,

and an entity that operates the hospital. The complaint alleged that the defendants’ conduct

violated the Establishment Clause, the Equal Protection Clause, and Section 1557 of the

Affordable Care Act, which prohibits sex-based discrimination in health programs that

receive federal funding. As relief, Hammons requested a declaratory judgment,

compensatory damages, and nominal damages.

The district court dismissed both constitutional claims but later granted Hammons’s

motion for summary judgment on liability for the Section 1557 claim. The parties then

filed a “stipulation regarding damages,” which “stipulate[d] and agree[d]” to the amount

of Hammons’s “compensatory damages.” JA 1038. Just over a month later, the district

court entered an order of judgment. After referencing its own previous rulings and the

parties’ stipulation, the district court “ORDERED that: . . . [j]udgment BE, and the same

hereby IS, ENTERED in favor of Plaintiff Jesse Hammons . . . on Plaintiff ’s Affordable

Care Act Claim in the amount of $874.63.” JA 1071–72.

Hammons appeals, arguing that the district court erred in dismissing his

constitutional claims. The defendants filed two motions to dismiss the appeal, arguing that

Hammons “lacks standing to appeal” and the “case is quintessentially moot.” ECF 6 at 1;

see ECF 33. The defendants also filed a “conditional cross-appeal to preserve their right to

appeal” the district court’s judgment “if and only if [this Court] concludes that it has

jurisdiction over [Hammons’s] appeal.” JA 1076.

II.

Although standing questions typically arise at the outset of litigation, those

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“requirement[s] . . . must be met by persons seeking appellate review, just as [they] must

be met by persons appearing in courts of first instance.” Virginia House of Delegates v.

Bethune-Hill, 587 U.S. 658, 662 (2019) (quotation marks removed). “As the party invoking

this Court’s jurisdiction,” Hammons “bears the burden” of establishing his “standing to

appeal” the district court’s judgment. Id. at 669–70. We conclude Hammons has failed to

carry that burden because he has not shown that he has been injured by the district court’s

judgment in a way that is “likely to be redressed by a favorable decision” of this Court. Id.

at 662. We thus grant the defendants’ first motion to dismiss the appeal (ECF 6), deny the

second motion to dismiss (ECF 33) as moot, and dismiss both the appeal (No. 23-1394)

and the conditional cross-appeal (No. 23-1452) without reaching the merits of either.

Hammons argues that he has standing to appeal because he sought two categories

of relief that he did not receive from the district court: “retrospective declaratory relief ”

and nominal damages. ECF 21 at 3. The first part of that argument fails because a

backward-looking declaratory judgment cannot “[b]y itself . . . be the redress that satisfies

the third standing prong” without “some further concrete relief that will likely result from

the declaratory judgment.” Comite de Apoyo a los Trabajadores Agricolas v. United States

Dep’t of Lab., 995 F.2d 510, 513 (4th Cir. 1993). We also conclude that Hammons’s

nominal damages argument fails because a plaintiff cannot recover both nominal damages

and another type of damages to redress one underlying injury. Cf. Bender v. City of New

York, 78 F.3d 787, 793 (2d Cir. 1996) (“If two causes of action provide a legal theory for

compensating one injury, only one recovery may be obtained.”).

To be sure, the Supreme Court has emphasized that nominal damages are a

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“concrete” remedy that “independently provide redress” to an injured plaintiff.

Uzuegbunam v. Preczewski, 592 U.S. 279, 291 (2021). Such damages are not “a mere

judicial token that provide[] no actual benefit to the plaintiff,” nor are they “purely

symbolic.” Id. at 290. Instead, “for the purpose of Article III standing, nominal damages

provide the necessary redress for a completed violation of a legal right.” Id. at 293.

At the same time, not every successful plaintiff is eligible for nominal damages.

Nominal damages are generally “awarded by default.” Uzuegbunam, 592 U.S. at 290.

Because “every legal injury necessarily causes damage,” nominal damages may be

awarded to redress harm “even if [a particular plaintiff] cannot or chooses not to quantify

that harm in economic terms.” Id. at 286, 293. But a plaintiff may also lose the ability to

recover nominal damages: Nominal damages are available only until “the plaintiff

establishes entitlement to some other form of damages, such as compensatory or statutory

damages.” Id. at 290.

Here, Hammons proved his entitlement to and was awarded “some other form of

damages.” Uzuegbunam, 592 U.S. at 290. After the district court granted summary

judgment to Hammons on liability for his Section 1557 claim, the parties stipulated that

Hammons’s “compensatory damages total $748.46,” JA 1038, and the district court

ordered the defendants to pay that amount plus prejudgment interest to compensate

Hammons for the harms caused by the cancellation of his surgery. Once Hammons

obtained compensatory damages as redress for his injury, he lost the ability to recover

nominal damages for that same injury. See Bender, 78 F.3d at 793 (“A basic principle of

compensatory damages is that an injury can be compensated only once.”).

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In a post-argument letter, Hammons cites a 2002 decision from one of our sister

circuits holding that a plaintiff who had been awarded just compensation as redress for a

violation of the Takings Clause was nonetheless entitled to nominal damages to redress a

violation of the Due Process Clause. See Schneider v. County of San Diego, 285 F.3d 784,

794–95 (9th Cir. 2002). But “the proper use of letters filed under Federal Rule of Appellate

Procedure 28(j) is to alert the court to new authority that has come to a party’s attention

after briefing or oral argument,” not “to advance new arguments couched as supplemental

authorities.” United States v. Heyward, 42 F.4th 460, 470 n.6 (4th Cir. 2022) (quotation

marks removed) (first emphasis added).

In any event, Schneider does not move the needle here. For one thing, Schneider

was decided almost two decades before the Supreme Court’s pathmarking decision in

Uzuegbunam v. Preczewski, 592 U.S. 279 (2021), and the core of its reasoning seems hard

to square with Uzuegbunam’s. In concluding that there was no duplication between the two

damages awards, Schneider relied on the view that “[c]ompensatory damages and nominal

damages serve distinct purposes,” with nominal damages functioning as “a purely symbolic

vindication of a constitutional right.” 285 F.3d at 795 (alterations and quotation marks

removed). In contrast, Uzuegbunam “expressly rejected” the view “that nominal damages

are purely symbolic” or “a mere judicial token that provide[] no actual benefit to the

plaintiff.” 592 U.S. at 290. Instead, Uzuegbunam explained that “nominal damages are in

fact damages paid to the plaintiff ” that “provide redress.” Id. at 291.

But even if we assume that Schneider’s bottom-line result remains correct, it would

not establish Hammons’s standing to appeal here. The two legal violations at issue in

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Schneider arose from discrete wrongful acts by the defendant: failing to provide process

before taking property (the Due Process Clause violation) and failing to pay adequate

compensation after the property was taken (the Takings Clause violation). Here, by

contrast, Hammons has only ever alleged one wrongful act by the defendants that gives

rise to a right to seek compensation: cancelling his surgery. Based on the record and the

arguments before us, we conclude that Hammons has not met his burden to show that he

could have received nominal damages even if he prevailed on his constitutional claims.

At oral argument, Hammons asserted a new theory: that he has standing to appeal

the district court’s dismissal of his constitutional claims because prevailing on those claims

would permit him to receive a type of damages (emotional distress damages) that were not

available under Section 1557. See Cummings v. Premier Rehab Keller, PLLC, 596 U.S.

212, 230 (2022) (holding “that emotional distress damages are not recoverable under”

Section 1557). We decline to consider that late-breaking argument because Hammons did

not present it in any of his briefing before this Court.

As the party invoking our jurisdiction, Hammons bears the burden of showing that

he has standing to appeal. See Bethune-Hill, 587 U.S. at 670. Hammons had ample

opportunity to put forward any theories of standing he wanted us to consider, including

two full rounds of motions briefing and two merits briefs. At no point until oral argument

did Hammons argue that his claims were not moot or that he had standing to appeal because

he could receive emotional distress damages if he were to prevail on his constitutional

claims. See Oral Arg. 35:05–:19 (responding “no” when asked if he had ever previously

argued “there’s a category of compensatory damages that [he was] still entitled to and ha[s]

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not received”). This Court has declined to consider “newly minted argument[s]” “made for

the first time at oral argument” in similar circumstances, United States v. Clay, 627 F.3d

959, 966 n.2 (4th Cir. 2010), and we decline to do so here as well.

* * *

The first motion to dismiss the appeal in No. 23-1394 (ECF 6) is granted and that

appeal is dismissed. The second motion to dismiss the same appeal (ECF 33) is denied as

moot. The conditional cross-appeal (No. 23-1452) is dismissed.

SO ORDERED