Case ID: f-appx_596/html/0519-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Richard S. DENIS, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. RIVERWALK HOLDINGS, LTD., and Circuit Court of Brown County, Wisconsin, Defendants-Appellees.
    No. 14-3637.
    United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.
    Submitted March 19, 2015.
    
    Decided March 20, 2015.
    Before DANIEL A. MANION, Circuit Judge, ILANA DIAMOND ROVNER, Circuit Judge, DIANE S. SYKES, Circuit Judge.
    
      
       The defendants were not served in the district court and are not participating in this appeal. After examining the appellant’s brief and the record, we have concluded that this appeal is appropriate for summary disposition. See Fed. R.App. P. 34(a)(2)(C).
    
   ORDER

Richard Denis appeals the dismissal of his civil-rights suit asserting that he was denied due process in a state-court debt-collection proceeding brought against him. We affirm.

As set forth in Denis’s complaint, a Wisconsin state court violated his due process rights in a debt-collection suit by entering summary judgment against him rather than acceding to his request to have the case be decided by a jury. After the summary judgment was affirmed by a state appellate court, Riverwalk Holdings, Ltd. v. Denis, 847 N.W.2d 426 (Wis.Ct.App.2014), and his petition for review de-. nied by the Wisconsin Supreme Court, Riverwalk Holdings, Ltd. v. Denis, 855 N.W.2d 695 (Wis.2014), Denis brought this suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against Riverwalk Holdings, the creditor, and the state trial court. At screening, 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2), the district court pointed out that federal courts lack jurisdiction to review cases that attack state-court judgments, and it dismissed Denis’s complaint under the Rooker-Feldman doctrine. See D.C. Ct. of App. v. Feldman, 460 U.S. 462, 486, 103 S.Ct. 1303, 75 L.Ed.2d 206 (1983); Rooker v. Fid. Trust Co., 263 U.S. 413, 416, 44 S.Ct. 149, 68 L.Ed. 362 (1923).

On appeal Denis asserts that the district court overlooked his due-process claim that he was denied his right to a jury trial. But this injury of which he complains was caused by the state court’s grant of summary judgment. The district court correctly concluded that Rooker-Feldman blocks federal courts from entertaining suits seeking to redress injuries caused by state-court judgments. See Exxon Mobil Corp. v. Saudi Basic Indus. Corp., 544 U.S. 280, 284, 125 S.Ct. 1517, 161 L.Ed.2d 454 (2005); Harold v. Steel, 773 F.3d 884, 885 (7th Cir.2014).

AFFIRMED.