Opinion
5:22-cv-03613-EJD 5:22-cv-03928-EJD
09-25-2023
MARTIN MALBERG, Plaintiff, v. JOANNE MCCRACKEN, et al., Defendants. MARTIN MALBERG, Plaintiff, v. JOANNE MCCRACKEN, et al., Defendants.
ORDER GRANTING MOTIONS TO DISMISS
Re: ECF Nos. 12, 14, 18, 23, 26, 31
Re: ECF Nos. 10, 11, 21, 26
EDWARD J. DAVILA, UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE
Pro se Plaintiff Martin Malberg has brought the above-named actions alleging constitutional violations against Defendants Judge Joanne McCracken, Judge Christine Garcia-Sen (with Judge McCracken, the “Judicial Defendants”), the California Attorney General Rob Bonta, and the State of California (with Attorney General Bonta, the “State Defendants”). Plaintiff's grievances arise from a restraining order issued against him by his ex-wife pursuant to the California Domestic Violence Prevention Act (“DVPA”). The case numbered 5:22-cv-3613 (“3613 Case”) asserts violation of Plaintiff's Fifth Amendment Due Process right to be provided with a charging document, and the case numbered 5:22-cv-3928 (“3928 Case”) implicates Plaintiff's Second Amendment rights. Both actions otherwise involve the same Defendants and allege the same substantive facts.
The Judicial Defendants and the State Defendants have each filed separate motions to dismiss in both cases. See 3613 ECF Nos. 12 (“3613 State Mot.”), 14 (“3613 Judge Mot.”); 3928 ECF Nos. 10 (“3928 Judge Mot.”), 11 (“3928 State Mot.”). Plaintiff filed identical oppositions to both motions to dismiss in both cases, entitled “Response in Oppostion [sic] to All Motions to Dismiss; Declaration.” 3613 ECF No. 24; 3927 ECF No. 19.
The Court will use “3613 ECF No.” to refer to docket entries in the 3613 Case and “3928 ECF No.” to refer to the same in the 3928 Case.
I. FACTUAL BACKGROUND AND RELATED CASE
The 3613 and 3928 Cases are two cases in a salvo of lawsuits Plaintiff filed against nearly all individuals-including the judges and opposing counsel-involved in the state court proceedings that resulted in a domestic restraining order entered against him.
On January 11, 2021, Plaintiff's wife filed a petition for dissolution and a request for a domestic violence restraining order against Plaintiff in the Superior Court of California, County of Santa Clara (the “State Proceeding”). Judge McCracken granted the temporary restraining order ex parte subject to a subsequent hearing, and Judge Garcia-Sen subsequently issued the full restraining order against Plaintiff (“Restraining Order”). On March 11, 2022, the Superior Court entered a final judgment of dissolution.
On March 14, 2022, Plaintiff mailed a letter to Attorney General Rob Bonta, requesting that the Attorney General “take appropriate legal action to enforce compliance with the U.S. Constitution or remove judges who refuse to uphold it in violation of their Oaths of Office.” The Attorney General's office responded that his office is prohibited from representing private individuals or providing legal advice or analysis.
On June 21 and July 5, 2022, Plaintiff filed the 3613 Complaint and 3928 Complaint, respectively, naming as defendants the two Superior Court judges that presided over the State Proceedings, Attorney General Bonta, and the State of California. Plaintiff seeks several types of injunctive relief, including an “emergency injunction” of the State Proceedings, the Restraining Order, vacatur of all judgments and rulings in the State Proceedings, and a “strike down” of the allegedly unconstitutional California Domestic Violence Prevention Act (“DVPA”), at Cal. Family Code §§ 6200, et seq. Plaintiff seeks damages in “606 oz delivered silver bullion” and “55.5 ounces total of U.S. Gold Eagles” in his 3613 and 3928 Complaints, respectively. Id. Plaintiff also demands prison time and criminal referrals for all individual Defendants. Id.
On March 15, 2023, the Court related the instant 3613 and 3928 Cases above with Case No. 22-cv-1713 (“1713 Case”), which is the lowest numbered case Plaintiff filed. Plaintiff's complaint in the 1713 Case invokes his rights under the First Amendment, but otherwise names the exact same Defendants and alleges nearly identical facts to the 3613 and 3928 Cases.
II. DISCUSSION
The State Defendants and Judicial Defendants moves for dismissal in the 3613 and 3928 Cases on the same grounds as in the earlier filed 1713 Case, with the additional threshold argument that the 3613 and 3928 Cases should be dismissed as duplicative of the 1713 Case. See 3613 ECF Nos. 10, at 5; 12, at 7 n.2; 3928 ECF No. 11, at 6 n.2; 14, at 5.
A. Claim Splitting
It is a well-established premise of our justice system that a plaintiff is “not at liberty to split up his demand, and prosecute it by piecemeal, or present only a portion of the grounds upon which special relief is sought, and leave the rest to be presented in a second suit, if the first fail. There would be no end to litigation if such a practice were permissible.” United States v. Haytian Republic, 154 U.S. 118, 125 (1894)). This means that plaintiffs “generally have no right to maintain two separate actions involving the same subject matter at the same time in the same court and against the same defendant.” Mendoza v. Amalgamated Transit Union Int'l, 30 F.4th 879, 886 (9th Cir. 2022) (internal quotation marks omitted) (quoting Adams v. Cal. Dep't of Health Servs., 487 F.3d 684, 688 (9th Cir. 2007) (citations omitted), abrogated on other grounds by Taylor v. Sturgell, 553 U.S. 880 (2008)). District courts have “broad discretion to control their dockets [and] may exercise [their] discretion to dismiss a duplicative later-filed action, to stay that action pending resolution of the previously filed action, to enjoin the parties from proceeding with it, or to consolidate both actions.” Adams, 487 F.3d at 688.
To determine whether a suit is duplicative, the Ninth Circuit “use[s] the transaction test, developed in the context of claim preclusion.” Id. at 689. “Whether two events are part of the same transaction or series depends on whether they are related to the same set of facts and whether they could conveniently be tried together.” Id. The Ninth Circuit has identified four criteria for courts to consider in evaluating whether two actions are duplicative, as follows:
(1) whether rights or interests established in the prior judgment would be destroyed or impaired by prosecution of the second action;
(2) whether substantially the same evidence is presented in the two actions;
(3) whether the two suits involve infringement of the same right; and
(4) whether the two suits arise out of the same transactional nucleus of facts.Adams, 487 F.3d at 689 (quoting Costantini v. Trans World Airlines, 681 F.2d 1199, 1201-02 (9th Cir. 1982)). The “most important factor is whether the two suits arise out of the same transactional nucleus of facts.” Mendoza, 30 F.4th at 887 (internal quotation marks omitted).
B. Analysis
Here, the Court finds that the 3613 and 3928 Cases are duplicative of the related 1713 Case. Turning first to the fourth and most important factor, the Court notes that all three suits arise from the same factual nucleuses, namely the Judicial Defendants' imposition of a DVPA restraining order and the State Defendants' response to Plaintiff. This is evidenced by the near identical factual allegations set forth against the same four Defendants in all three complaints, as well as Plaintiff's self-styled identical oppositions to “to All Motions to Dismiss,” all filed on October 27, 2022. 3613 ECF No. 24; 3927 ECF No. 19 (emphasis added); see also 1713 ECF No. 47. Plaintiff's identical oppositions also establish the second Adams factor as to whether the “same evidence is presented in the two actions,” 487 F.3d at 689; indeed, it is. Likewise, because of this substantial overlap, it is also readily apparent that the first Adams factor is satisfied. Permitting continued litigation of near-identical suits would impair the rights and finality established by the 1713 Case, especially given that the Court had dismissed the complaint in the 1713 Case on grounds that would apply with equal force to both the 3613 and 3928 Cases.
Finally, the Court recognizes that the 3613 and 3928 Cases invoke different constitutional rights from the 1713 Case-the 1713 Case alleges the DVPA Restraining Order violated Plaintiff's First Amendment rights, whereas the 3613 and 3928 Cases claim the same Restraining Order also violated his Fifth and Second Amendment rights, respectively. However, this distinction alone does not permit Plaintiff to “maintain two separate actions involving the same subject matter at the same time in the same court and against the same defendant.” Mendoza, 30 F.4th at 886. To do so otherwise would run afoul of the Ninth Circuit's guidance that the “most important factor is whether the two suits arise out of the same transactional nucleus of facts,” id. at 887 (internal quotation marks omitted), which the Court finds in the affirmative here. Indeed, the Ninth Circuit in Mendoza had found two cases to be duplicative despite more substantial distinctions, holding that the “fact that [the later filed case] involves somewhat different legal theories and a somewhat broader range of related conduct and damages does not alter the underlying fundamental identity of the suits.” Id. at 887 (emphasis added); see also Wathan v. Pazin, 2007 WL 4181716, at *7 (E.D. Cal. Nov. 21, 2007) (“The issue is not settled . . . by the cosmetics of how the claims for relief are framed.”). In short, Plaintiff's tactical decision to split up his claims based upon the underlying rights alleged does not permit him to maintain three different actions for the same grievance in federal court.
Plaintiff has advanced a series of arguments and theories, none of which address the Defendants' threshold argument of duplicative actions. In addition to the uniform opposition that he had filed in response to all motions to dismiss, Plaintiff has also filed several “logic briefs” claiming that the State of California “had its sovereignty usurped by the STATE OF CALIFORNIA CORPORATION,” which created a “CORPORATE LAW jurisdiction that is currently known as the Uniform Commercial Code (UCC).” 3613 ECF No. 27; 3928 ECF No. 22. He has also filed multiple “logic briefs” decrying the general doctrine of judicial immunity, based solely upon the U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence and which do not engage with the judicial immunity analysis at all. 3613 ECF No. 32; 3928 ECF No. 27. The identical nature of these filings in all his cases further supports the finding that Plaintiff's actions are duplicative and may not be maintained as individual separate actions.
In addition to his various “logic briefs,” Plaintiff has also filed a document in both the 3613 and 3928 Cases entitled, “Petition for a Redress of Grievances; Claim for Relief; Declaration, Petition for Injunction, Motion for Summary Judgment in Favor of Plaintiff.” 3613 ECF No. 23; 3928 ECF No. 18. This filing, however, is not accompanied by any brief supporting the relief requested or addressing the deficiencies identified by Defendants' motions to dismiss. Rather, Plaintiff only attaches (1) the Bill of Rights, (2) an affidavit wherein he states that he is “presently alive” and “terminate[s] any and all contracts unknowingly entered into using any form of [his] name,” (3) another affidavit re-stating the facts in the State Proceeding and enumerating the Amendments he is invoking, and (4) a copy of the Restraining Order entered against him. Id. Having reviewed these filings, the Court cannot identify any contention or evidence that pertains to-much less rebuts-the “claim splitting” duplication argument advanced by Defendants.
In summary, the Court finds that the 3613 and 3928 Cases are duplicative of the earlier filed related 1713 Case. Although these cases involve different constitutional rights, all three cases arise out of the same restraining order and interaction with the Attorney General, all present identical evidence in support, and all potentially impair the 1713 judgment if allowed to proceed. Accordingly, the Court may exercise its discretion to dismiss, stay, enjoin, or consolidate the duplicative 3613 and 3928 Cases, see Adams, 487 F.3d at 688, which it proceeds to consider next.
C. Resolution of Duplicative Actions
The Court begins by recounting the bases upon which it previously dismissed the 1713 Case. On March 31, 2023, the Court dismissed all defendants in the 1713 Case complaint without leave to amend except for the claim against Attorney General Bonta, which the Court dismissed with leave to amend. 1713 ECF No. 61 (“1713 Order”). Specifically, the Court found most of Plaintiff's complaint to be barred by the Rooker-Feldman doctrine, which prohibits federal district courts from exercising de facto appellate jurisdiction over state court judgments. Id. at 5-9. The Court also found that the Judicial Defendants' conduct was shielded by absolute judicial immunity, id. at 9-10, and the State Defendants' conduct was mostly protected by Eleventh Amendment immunity, id. at 10-11. However, the Court granted Plaintiff leave to amend his complaint for the limited purpose of pursuing a facial constitutional challenge to the California DVPA statute against Attorney General Bonta per Ex parte Young. Id. at 10-12. Although Plaintiff was given thirty days to amend his complaint, he took no action for over six months, and the Court ultimately entered judgment against Plaintiff. 1713 ECF No. 65.
Given that the 1713, 3613, and 3928 Cases allege violations of different constitutional rights, the Court would initially be inclined to consolidate all three actions instead of dismissing the duplicative actions outright. However, because the Court had dismissed the 1713 Case for reasons unrelated to the specific constitutional right alleged, the Court's evaluations of the present 3613 and 3928 Cases in a hypothetical consolidated action would be identical to its analysis in the 1713 Order, thereby warranting dismissal in any event. Furthermore, because the Court had dismissed the 1713 complaint with only leave to amend a constitutional challenge to the DVPA statute and Plaintiff evidently declined to do so, any action other than a full dismissal without leave to amend would impair the finality of the judgment in the 1713 Case. Accordingly, given the final judgment in the 1713 Case and Plaintiff's near identical prosecution in the instant 3613 and 3928 Cases, the Court finds that dismissal of the duplicative later-filed actions would be in the interests of finality and judicial economy.
III. CONCLUSION
Based on the foregoing, the Court GRANTS Defendants' motions to dismiss in Case No. 5:22-cv-3613 and Case No. 5:22-cv-3928. Because both cases are duplicative of the earlier filed related Case No. 5:22-cv-1713, in which final judgment was entered, Plaintiff's complaints in both the 3613 and 3928 Cases are DISMISSED WITHOUT LEAVE TO AMEND.
IT IS SO ORDERED.