Kurdistan Victims Fund v. Kurdistan Regional Government

• Court: District Court, District of Columbia
• Decided: May 9, 2025
• Docket: Civil Action No. 2024-0278
• Status: Published

Opinion

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

KURDISTAN VICTIMS FUND, et al.,

Plaintiffs,

v. Civil Action No. 24-278 (RDM) KURDISTAN REGIONAL GOVERNMENT, et al.,

Defendants.

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

Plaintiffs Kurdistan Victims Fund, Maki Revend, Shakhwan Abdulrahman (individually

and on behalf of the estate of Jihan Taha Abdulrahman), and “John Does 1-5000,” bring this

action against dozens of individual defendants, many of whom are foreign officials of the

Kurdistan Regional Government, a semi-autonomous political subdivision of Iraq. See Dkt. 61

(SAC). The defendants include, for example, the Kurdistan Regional Government’s sitting

Prime Minister, Masrour Barzani, as well as its current official Representative to the United

States and former President. Id. at 31–34, 160 (SAC ¶¶ 39–40, 51). The operative complaint is

Plaintiffs’ third iteration; with Plaintiffs’ consent, the Court dismissed their prior complaint

without prejudice for failure to comply with Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8. Dkt. 59 at 36.

For the reasons explained below, the Court will dismiss Plaintiffs’ second amended

complaint pursuant to Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 8, 12(b)(1), and 12(b)(6).

1.

Plaintiffs filed this action over a year ago. Dkt. 1 (Compl.). Their original complaint

alleged, over the course of 332 pages, a broad conspiracy and campaign of violence perpetrated by the Kurdistan Regional Government and its officers. Plaintiffs sought “Nine Billion Dollars”

in damages. See id. In the ensuing months, Plaintiffs attempted to effect service, but were not

successful with respect to many Defendants. In the meantime, several individual Defendants

who had been served filed a motion for an extension of time to respond to the complaint and to

set a deadline for service of other Defendants. Dkt. 11. In response, Plaintiffs filed an amended

complaint, spanning 416 pages and nearly 1,000 paragraphs, asserting—among many other

things—a new claim against the attorney who filed the motion for an extension; that new claim

alleged that the attorney’s statements in the motion constituted “defamation of character.” Dkt.

20 at 85, 95 (Am. Compl. ¶¶ 181, 193). The amended complaint is difficult to parse, but aside

from this claim of “libel and defamation,” id. at 411, Plaintiffs generally alleged that Defendants

are associated with “a coldly-efficient transnational criminal organization” called “the Barzani

Continuing Criminal Enterprise,” which is rooted in the Kurdistan Regional Government. Id. at

7, 9 (Am. Compl. ¶¶ 1, 5). Despite these sweeping allegations and the extraordinary length of

the amended complaint, it did not reasonably describe what, exactly, this “criminal organization”

did.

The following paragraph, describing the acts giving rise to Plaintiffs’ claims, is

illustrative:

Defendants as individuals engaged in and do engage in unlawful means, each of whom had conduct, knowledge, and intent, and each of whom is aware of the criminal enterprise’s contumacious conduct and has some participation in the operation of the enterprise itself, and with orchestrated intent to enrich themselves and further the object of the criminal enterprise, and are directly responsible for various related heinous criminal activities, having the same or similar intents, results, accomplices, victims, or methods of commission or otherwise are interrelated by distinguishing characteristics and are not isolated incidents, knowingly violating basic human principles and international norms including, but not limited to, atrocity crimes; indiscriminate violence; arson; claims for murder; attempted murder; genocide; abduction; hostage taking and kidnapping; torture and other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or

2 punishment; collaboration with terrorist organizations; prolonged arbitrary detention; extrajudicial killing; enforced disappearance; cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment; crimes against humanity; theft; drug trafficking; counterfeiting; defrauding the United States Government and others; financial crimes; identify theft and access device fraud, mail fraud, wire fraud; laundering of monetary instruments; engaging in transactions with the proceeds of specified unlawful activity; acts involving perjury, false statements and declarations; comprehensive computer data theft and destruction; obstruction of justice; bribery and facilitation payments; deprivation of income and employment; willful concealment of tax data; tax fraud and tax perjury; immigration fraud and immigration perjury; and in violation of the Torture Victim Protection Act of 1991, the Alien Tort Statute of 1789, and other laws and statutes of the United States and the law of nations and international treaties, agreements, and conventions more fully set forth herein; and conspiracy to commit all above criminal acts; and did fraudulently and through material misrepresentations gain control for personal enrichment over money that was property of the Defendant Iraqi Kurdistan Regional Government. Defendants’ acts were all carried out with mens rea and actus reus.

Dkt. 20 at 7–8 (Am. Compl. ¶ 3).

Then, nine months after initiating this action, Plaintiffs moved for an order authorizing

alternative service, including a request to be relieved of the mandatory procedures for serving

foreign nations under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (the Kurdistan Regional

Government was a Defendant named in the amended complaint), and a request for the Court to

order one of the individual Defendants to accept service on behalf of her co-Defendants. Dkt. 50

at 1–2, 24–27. The Court held oral argument on Plaintiffs’ motion, and after hearing from the

parties, the Court concluded, with Plaintiffs’ consent, that the amended complaint should be

dismissed without prejudice pursuant to Rule 8. As the Court explained at the hearing,

Plaintiffs’ prior complaint was not only prolix and incoherent, but it failed to “connect[] each

individual defendant in the case to some act[].” Dkt. 59 at 35–36. Without such allegations, the

Court was unable to determine whether it had jurisdiction, let alone whether Plaintiffs had stated

a claim consistent with Rule 12 or satisfied their obligations under Rule 11. Id. at 24.

3 The Court, however, provided Plaintiffs with another opportunity “to file an amended

more streamlined and focused complaint.” Id. at 36. The Court cautioned Plaintiffs to “be as

careful as you can with respect to identifying specific acts [and] specific defendants that you are

able to connect.” Id. at 37. Plaintiffs requested (and received) over three months to revise their

complaint. Id. at 36–37. The result of that effort is not encouraging.

2.

Plaintiffs filed the second amended complaint on January 9, 2024. Dkt. 61 (SAC). The

second amended complaint is almost as long as its predecessor—spanning 396 pages and nearly

1,000 paragraphs—and it is equally opaque and unmoored. To make matters worse, Plaintiffs

concurrently filed a motion to proceed pseudonymously for the “1-5000” John Doe Plaintiffs but

failed to provide the Court, even in a sealed filing, with any idea who these individuals are and

whether they have retained counsel in this matter to represent them in this litigation. The Court

denied that motion, explaining that, given the strong constitutional interest in open court

proceedings, a party must make an appropriate showing to proceed pseudonymously, and

Plaintiffs had failed to provide the Court with sufficient information to determine whether any of

these “1-5000” unnamed Plaintiffs met the governing standard. Min. Order (Jan. 9, 2025). The

Court noted that “[i]f Plaintiffs, instead, seek to bring a class action, they must follow the

required procedures for doing so” under Rule 23. Id. Notwithstanding these deficiencies, the

Court permitted Plaintiffs to file a renewed motion, but only on the condition that it be

“accompanied by a list of the names and addresses of plaintiffs who wish to proceed under a

pseudonym, filed under seal.” Id.

Two months passed. Plaintiffs still had not renewed their motion, nor was there any

evidence that Plaintiffs were making efforts to effect service or otherwise to prosecute this case.

4 The Court’s review of Plaintiffs’ second amended complaint, moreover, revealed that Plaintiffs

had failed to take to heart the Court’s prior direction that their second amended complaint needed

to include specific factual allegations tying specific defendants to specific wrongs committed

against specific plaintiffs. The Court, accordingly, ordered Plaintiffs to show cause “why the

Court should not dismiss the second amended complaint for failure to comply with Rule 8 and

Rule 12(b)(6) or for failure to identify the 5000 John Doe plaintiffs,” and the Court also allowed

those Defendants who had been served to file a statement addressing these (or any other)

problems with Plaintiff’s second amended complaint. Min. Order (Feb. 27, 2025).

Several Defendants filed a response, observing that the second amended complaint’s

“diffuse, hopelessly generalized allegations of wrongdoing” violate Rules 8 and 12. Dkt. 68 at 5.

Those Defendants further noted that Plaintiffs had not cured the complaint’s anonymity-related

deficiencies, nor had Plaintiffs served all Defendants, even though the case was already fourteen

months old. Id. at 6. In response, Plaintiffs insisted, with no apparent sense of irony, that their

396-page, 921-paragraph second amended complaint represents a “clear and concise” version of

their earlier pleadings, but they also stated that the “Second Amended Complaint remains

inescapably complex and sine qua non.” Dkt. 69 at 4, 11–12 (capitalization altered). Plaintiffs

concurrently renewed their motion to effect service by publication, Dkt. 70, and instead of

renewing their motion for “John Does 1-5000” to proceed pseudonymously, Plaintiffs filed a

motion for “joinder” under Rule 20, Dkt. 71. According to that motion, John Doe Plaintiffs seek

to “join” Kurdistan Victims Fund, an organizational Plaintiff. Dkt. 71 at 21. Plaintiffs reason

that this procedure will allow them to “preserve[] John Doe Plaintiffs’ anonymity.” Id. at 22

(capitalization altered).

5 3.

Plaintiffs’ second amended complaint fails to cure the deficiencies in their original and

first amended complaints.1 Plaintiffs have now filed three complaints over the course of sixteen

months, none of which have complied with Rule 8. The most recent complaint is nearly devoid

of allegations relating to any specific Defendant’s specific conduct, and to the extent the

complaint contains any such allegations, they are buried within hundreds of pages of irrelevant

material and are, in any event, too conclusory to satisfy Rules 8 and 12(b)(6), see Ashcroft v.

Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009). The following example is representative:

Defendants Masoud Barzani, Masrour Barzani, Waysi Barzani, and their agents and representatives, operating under their command, did knowingly and willfully, directly and indirectly, and with the intent to harass, intimidate, and place under surveillance with the intent to harass and intimidate one or more persons, conspire to use one or more interactive computer services and electronic communication systems of interstate commerce, and transmitted through interstate and foreign commerce in one or more communications containing one or more implicit and expressed threats to injure the person of another . . . .

Dkt. 61 at 236 (SAC ¶ 465).

The gravamen of Plaintiffs’ complaint appears to be that a foreign government has

engaged in a variety of unlawful and violent acts. This Court’s jurisdiction does not extend to

evaluating whether a foreign regime has—in general—complied with the dictates of human

rights and decency, and, unfortunately, Plaintiffs have yet to set forth “a short and plain

statement,” Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a), that focuses on the only question that is properly before this

1 Plaintiffs’ second amended complaint also reprises Plaintiffs’ “defamation per se” claim against Defendant Joe R. Reeder for his litigation advocacy in this case—specifically, for statements Reeder made in a motion for an extension of time. Dkt. 61 at 101–03, 187–94, 375 (SAC ¶¶ 276–78, 534–49, 903). Because there is an “absolute” privilege for statements made in the course of judicial proceedings, Messina v. Krakower, 439 F.3d 755, 760 (D.C. Cir. 2006), the Court will dismiss this claim with prejudice. 6 Court: that is, whether any specific Defendant (who is subject to the jurisdiction of this Court

and who is not immune from suit) committed any specific act in violation of U.S. law that caused

a specific injury to an identified Plaintiff. One of the purposes of Rule 8 is to ensure that

defendants have “fair notice of the claims raised and their basis.” Jiggetts v. District of

Columbia, 319 F.R.D. 408, 414 (D.D.C. 2017). The second amended complaint fails this critical

test.

Perhaps the closest the second amended complaint comes are the allegations pertaining to

the individual Plaintiffs. At one point, Plaintiffs allege, for example, that “agents” of Defendants

Masrour Barzani and Waysi Barzani tortured and executed Jihan Taha Abdulrahman (whose

estate is allegedly represented by her brother, Plaintiff Shakhwan Abdulrahman) by

“orchestrat[ing]” a car accident in Kurdistan. See, e.g., Dkt. 61 at 156–57 (SAC ¶¶ 453–56).

Plaintiffs further allege that Plaintiff Shakhwan Abdulrahman attempted to protest his sister’s

alleged murder outside “the U.S. Chamber of Commerce” headquarters in the District of

Columbia, but Defendant Masrour Barzani’s “agents” “violently and aggressively attacked”

Abdulrahman, in violation of “his First Amendment right.” Id. at 204–208 (SAC ¶¶ 567, 571,

575). And, finally, Plaintiffs allege that Plaintiff Maki Revend, a resident of Germany and a

“critic” of the Barzani government, “has on at least five distinct occasions . . . been the target of

assassination attempts and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon by the Defendants’ agents

and representatives.” Id. at 179–180 (SAC ¶¶ 518–24).

The Court expresses no opinion as to whether these allegations would suffice to state a

plausible claim for relief, were Plaintiffs to extract them from the morass of extensive,

extraneous material included in the second amended complaint and were Plaintiffs to offer

specifics about who allegedly did what. Nor does the Court express a view on whether the

7 various immunities applicable to foreign officials and to acts of state would have any purchase

here. But the Court sees at least some potential that, if extracted from the extraneous material

and properly explicated, these alleged events might—at least arguably—support a claim. As

currently pled, however, the Court cannot assess whether the named Plaintiffs might be able to

craft a plausible claim involving these alleged events, nor should Defendants be put to the task of

attempting to distill a plausible claim from the sprawling mass of allegations, when Plaintiffs

have failed to do that work themselves.

Not only does the operative complaint fail to comply with Rules 8 and 12(b)(6), but

Plaintiffs proposal as to the “1-5000” John Doe Plaintiffs is untenable. As an initial matter, Rule

20 is not a means to join multiple plaintiffs who are already joined as parties in the same lawsuit.

See Fed. R. Civ. P. 20(a) (permitting plaintiffs to “join in one action”) (emphasis added). More

fundamentally, however, even if 1-5000 John Does were permitted to “join” Kurdistan Victims

Fund, the Court concludes that Plaintiffs have not plausibly alleged that Kurdistan Victims Fund

has standing to bring thousands of claims for damages on behalf of its putative members. See

Humane Soc'y of the U.S. v. Vilsack, 797 F.3d 4, 8 (D.C. Cir. 2015) (plaintiffs must plead facts

that, taken as true, “ma[ke] out a plausible claim to Article III standing”).

As an organization, Kurdistan Victims Fund “can assert standing on its own behalf, on

behalf of its members[,] or both.” Equal Rights Ctr. v. Post Props., Inc., 633 F.3d 1136, 1138

(D.C. Cir. 2011). Here, Kurdistan Victims Fund relies on the latter theory, known as

“associational standing.” Dkt. 61 at 80–81 (SAC ¶¶ 212–15). Under this theory, Kurdistan

Victims Fund has standing “only if (1) at least one of its members would have standing to sue in

his own right; (2) the interest it seeks to protect is germane to its purpose; and (3) neither the

claim asserted nor the relief requested requires the member to participate in the lawsuit.” Ctr. for

8 Biological Diversity v. EPA, 861 F.3d 174, 182 (D.C. Cir. 2017) (internal quotation marks and

citation omitted). Even assuming these first two requirements are met, Plaintiffs have not

pleaded any facts indicating that their damages claims can be adjudicated absent the participation

of individual members. Plaintiffs seek $9 billion in compensatory and punitive damages for

personal injuries, but such claims turn on individualized assessments of harm. Because the relief

Plaintiffs seek “can[not] be awarded without ‘individualized proof,’” Kurdistan Victims Fund

lacks associational standing. Air Transp. Ass’n of Am. v. Reno, 80 F.3d 477, 484 (D.C. Cir.

1996); see also Travelers United, Inc. v. Hyatt Hotels Corp., 2025 WL 27162, at *14 (D.D.C.

Jan. 3, 2025) (“The need for this kind of ‘detailed and individualized proof’ from individual

members of Travelers United bars the recognition of associational standing over the actual

damages claims in this case.”).2

* * *

In light of Plaintiffs’ repeated failures to file a complaint that complies with the Federal

Rules of Civil Procedure, and their repeated failure to comply with the Court’s directions, the

Court concludes that the second complaint should be dismissed. See Chennareddy v. Dodaro,

697 F. App’x 704, 706 (D.C. Cir. 2017) (affirming Rule 8 dismissal with prejudice where

complaint remained “disjointed, voluminous, and unspecific” following multiple amendments).

Notwithstanding the complaint’s broader deficiencies, however, the Court will provide the three

individual named Plaintiffs one final opportunity to replead their claims. This third amended

2 In addition to Plaintiffs’ request for “Nine Billion Dollars,” they also ask the Court to “[e]n[t]er a declaratory judgement holding the Defendants’ conduct was in violation of the law of nations.” Dkt. 61 at 380 (Prayer for Relief). But Plaintiffs do not plausibly allege that such a declaration would redress any Kurdistan Victims Fund member’s injuries, and so Kurdistan Victims Fund also lacks standing to pursue this form of relief. See Ctr. for Biological Diversity v. EPA, 861 F.3d 174, 182 (D.C. Cir. 2017). 9 complaint (and fourth overall complaint) must not exceed 30 pages in length, and it must include

concrete factual allegations that tie specific Defendants to specific violations of U.S. law that has

caused specific, cognizable harm to those Plaintiffs. Plaintiffs are advised that they may not

name any individual or entity as a Defendant absent a good faith basis, see Fed. R. Civ. P. 11(b),

to believe that existing evidence or discovery will establish that the specific, named Defendant

violated U.S. law, resulting in a concrete injury to one of the remaining, named Plaintiffs.

Plaintiffs are cautioned that failure to comply with this directive may result in dismissal with

prejudice and other appropriate action by the Court. The Court has provided similar directions to

Plaintiffs’ counsel in the past, without evident effect. Lest there be any doubt, the Court expects

counsel to heed this direction for purposes of this fourth and final bite at the apple.

CONCLUSION

For the foregoing reasons, it is hereby ORDERED that Plaintiffs’ second amended

complaint, Dkt. 61, is DISMISSED, and Defendant Joe Reeder’s motion to dismiss, Dkt. 65, is

GRANTED in part and DENIED in part as moot. Plaintiffs’ defamation claim against Reeder is

DISMISSED with prejudice. The three individual named Plaintiffs may file a third amended

complaint (subject to the directions set forth above) not to exceed 30 pages on or before June 6,

2025.

SO ORDERED.

/s/ Randolph D. Moss RANDOLPH D. MOSS United States District Judge

Date: May 9, 2025