Myles v. United States

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
• Decided: January 13, 2022
• Docket: 21-1758
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

Case: 21-1758 Document: 24 Page: 1 Filed: 01/13/2022

NOTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.

United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ______________________

RONALD R. MYLES, JR., Plaintiff-Appellant

v.

UNITED STATES, Defendant-Appellee ______________________

2021-1758 ______________________

Appeal from the United States Court of Federal Claims in No. 1:20-cv-00875-MMS, Senior Judge Margaret M. Sweeney. ______________________

Decided: January 13, 2022 ______________________

RONALD R. MYLES, JR., Glenville, WV, pro se.

CATHARINE PARNELL, Civil Division, Commercial Liti- gation Branch, United States Department of Justice, Washington, DC, for defendant-appellee. Also represented by REGINALD THOMAS BLADES, JR., BRIAN M. BOYNTON, MARTIN F. HOCKEY, JR. ______________________ Case: 21-1758 Document: 24 Page: 2 Filed: 01/13/2022

PER CURIAM. Ronald R. Myles, Jr. appeals the final decision of the United States Court of Federal Claims dismissing his com- plaint for lack of jurisdiction and failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted. For the below reasons, we affirm. BACKGROUND In 2016, Mr. Myles was arrested for and found guilty of two bank robberies. Mr. Myles is currently serving his sen- tence. When the authorities arrested Mr. Myles, they con- fiscated more than $137,000 in cash and other personal property. As part of his original criminal proceedings in federal district court, Mr. Myles moved for the return of his confiscated cash and personal property. That request was rejected by the district court and the Sixth Circuit. Four years later, on July 13, 2020, Mr. Myles filed a complaint pro se at the Court of Federal Claims. The com- plaint sought the return of his confiscated cash and an award for various alleged damages, including “music & ca- reer damages,” “pain and suffering,” “punitive damages,” and “Pro Se Legal Fees,” together totaling over $450 mil- lion. In addition to the damages sought, the complaint al- leged that the district court engaged in “illegal Appellate Review” of a state court’s “warrant Ruling” and that Mr. Myles’s conviction was “invalid” and the result of a “mali- cious prosecution.” Appx. D 1 at 2. The Government moved to dismiss Mr. Myles’s complaint. The Court of Federal Claims agreed with the Govern- ment and dismissed the entirety of Mr. Myles’s complaint.

1 Appx. D refers to the Court of Federal Claims deci- sion on appeal, attached to Appellant’s brief as Appen- dix D. We use the pagination provided in the header of Appendix D. Case: 21-1758 Document: 24 Page: 3 Filed: 01/13/2022

MYLES v. US 3

The court interpreted Mr. Myles’s complaint as alleging three claims: (1) a collateral attack on his criminal convic- tion, i.e., an attempt to overturn the criminal judgment against him; (2) a claim under the Takings Clause related to the cash seized during his arrest; and (3) a breach of con- tract claim. Appx. D at 4–7. Regarding the first claim, the trial court explained that it does not have jurisdiction to review a criminal conviction by a district court. Id. at 4–6. Rather, as the court ex- plained, it only has jurisdiction under the Tucker Act to re- view a “money-mandating constitutional provision, statute or regulation . . . , or an express or implied contract with the United States.” Id. at 3 (citing Loveladies Harbor, Inc. v. United States, 27 F.3d 1545, 1554 (Fed. Cir. 1994) (en banc)). The court acknowledged Mr. Myles had identified several sources of law he alleged supported his claims, in- cluding the Full Faith and Credit Clause and the Fourth, Eighth, Tenth, and Fourteenth Amendments. The court explained that none of these are money-mandating provi- sions supporting a claim against the United States under the Tucker Act, and thus the court had no jurisdiction to hear these claims. Id. at 4–6. The court further found that to the extent Mr. Myles’s malicious prosecution claim could be considered separately from his collateral attack on his conviction, that claim sounded in tort, a type of claim the Tucker Act expressly excludes from the court’s jurisdiction. Id. at 5 (citing 28 U.S.C. § 1491(a)(1)). The court thus dis- missed this first claim for lack of subject matter jurisdic- tion. Id. at 6. Regarding the takings claim, the court cited our prior case holding that a seizure of personal property during a criminal investigation is not a taking under the Fifth Amendment. Id. at 6 (citing Acadia Tech., Inc. v. United States, 458 F.3d 1327, 1331 (Fed. Cir. 2006)). And regard- ing the breach of contract claim, the court found that Mr. Myles had not identified a valid contract between himself and the United States. Id. at 6–7. The court thus Case: 21-1758 Document: 24 Page: 4 Filed: 01/13/2022

dismissed these claims for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted. Id. at 7. Accordingly, the court dismissed the entirety of Mr. Myles’s complaint, either for lack of jurisdiction over the claim or failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted. 2 Mr. Myles appeals. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1295(a)(3). DISCUSSION On appeal, Mr. Myles again argues that the search warrant under which his money was confiscated was inva- lid, as well as his conviction; that the Government has com- mitted an unlawful taking; and that the Government has breached a “5th Amendment Takings Clause contract.” Appellant’s Br. 8. We start with Mr. Myles’s collateral attack on his con- viction, which the Court of Federal Claims dismissed for lack of jurisdiction. We review de novo a Court of Federal Claims decision to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction. Creative

2 The court also certified that, under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a)(3), an appeal could not be taken in good faith be- cause the claims “are clearly beyond the subject matter ju- risdiction of this court or clearly fail as a matter of law.” Id. at 8. When a district court has so certified, a litigant may still file a motion for leave to proceed in forma pau- peris with the appellate court. Fed. R. App. P. 24(a)(5). In evaluating these requests, however, the appellate court gives “great weight” to the district court’s decision that an appeal should not be taken. See, e.g., Johnson v. United States, 352 U.S. 565, 566 (1957). Upon review, we denied Mr. Myles’s motion to proceed in forma pauperis. Myles v. United States, No. 21-1758, ECF No. 7 (Fed. Cir. July 30, 2021). Case: 21-1758 Document: 24 Page: 5 Filed: 01/13/2022

MYLES v. US 5

Mgmt. Servs., LLC v. United States, 989 F.3d 955, 961 (Fed. Cir. 2021). We construe pro se filings like Mr. Myles’s lib- erally, but that does not alleviate Mr. Myles’s burden to es- tablish jurisdiction. Henke v. United States, 60 F.3d 795, 799 (Fed. Cir. 1995); Minehan v. United States, 75 Fed. Cl. 249, 253 (2007). The Court of Federal Claims is a court of limited juris- diction; by statute, it may only resolve certain monetary claims against the United States. 28 U.S.C. § 1491. Plain- tiffs must identify a contract or a source of substantive law (such as a constitutional provision, federal statute, or agency regulation) that provides a right to money damages. § 1491(a)(1); see Todd v. United States, 386 F.3d 1091, 1093–94 (Fed. Cir. 2004). The source of substantive law must be “money-mandating,” i.e., it must mandate compen- sation by the government. Smith v. United States, 709 F.3d 1114, 1116 (Fed. Cir. 2013). The Court of Federal Claims properly determined that it lacks jurisdiction to address Mr. Myles’s claims attacking his conviction and sentencing. The Court of Federal Claims does not have jurisdiction to decide criminal claims. Joshua v. United States, 17 F.3d 378, 379 (Fed. Cir. 1994). It similarly cannot review the judgments of federal district courts. Id. at 380. We therefore affirm the trial court’s determination that it lacks jurisdiction to review Mr. Myles’s collateral attack on his conviction. To the extent Mr. Myles pleaded a malicious prosecu- tion claim, that is a tort claim. See, e.g., Hernandez v. United States, 96 Fed. Cl. 195, 203–04 (2010) (describing a malicious prosecution claim as a tort claim). Such claims are expressly excluded from the Court of Federal Claims’ jurisdiction. § 1491(a)(1) (excluding claims “sounding in tort” from Tucker Act jurisdiction); Hernandez, 96 Fed. Cl. at 203–04 (2010) (dismissing a malicious prosecution claim for lack of jurisdiction). We therefore agree with the trial court that it lacks jurisdiction to resolve this claim. Case: 21-1758 Document: 24 Page: 6 Filed: 01/13/2022

We turn next to the trial court’s dismissal of Mr. Myles’s takings and breach of contract claims for fail- ure to state a claim. These are questions of law we review de novo. Creative Mgmt. Servs, 989 F.3d at 961. We agree with the trial court that these claims were properly dis- missed. First, as the trial court explained, “[w]hen prop- erty has been seized pursuant to the criminal laws . . . , such deprivations are not ‘takings’ for which the owner is entitled to compensation.” Appx. D at 6 (quoting Acadia Tech., Inc. v. United States, 458 F.3d 1327, 1331 (Fed. Cir. 2006)). Second, Mr. Myles’s unexplained references in his appeal brief to a “5th Amendment Takings Clause con- tract” and a “due process contract” do not plausibly allege the existence of a contract between the parties, a prerequi- site for Mr. Myles to be entitled to breach of contract dam- ages. See Appellant’s Br. 10–11; see, e.g., Bell/Heery v. United States, 739 F.3d 1324, 1326, 1334 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (affirming dismissal where the elements of a breach of con- tract claim were not plausibly alleged). We therefore af- firm the court’s dismissal of these claims for failure to state a claim. CONCLUSION For these reasons, we affirm the decision of the Court of Federal Claims. AFFIRMED COSTS No costs.