Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca13-16-01605/USCOURTS-ca13-16-01605-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 516
Nature of Suit: 
Cause of Action: 

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NOTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.

United States Court of Appeals 

for the Federal Circuit ______________________ 

TERESITA A. CANUTO,

Plaintiff-Appellant

v.

UNITED STATES,

Defendant-Appellee

______________________ 

2016-1605

______________________ 

Appeal from the United States Court of Federal 

Claims in No. 1:15-cv-00821-EDK, Judge Elaine Kaplan.

______________________ 

Decided: June 9, 2016

______________________ 

 TERESITA A. CANUTO, Panorama City, CA, pro se.

 DANIEL S. HERZFELD, Commercial Litigation Branch, 

Civil Division, United States Department of Justice, 

Washington, DC, for defendant-appellee. Also represented 

by ELIZABETH M. HOSFORD, ROBERT E. KIRSCHMAN, JR.,

BENJAMIN C. MIZER. 

______________________ 

Before PROST, Chief Judge, TARANTO, and CHEN, Circuit Judges.

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2 CANUTO v. US

PER CURIAM. 

The Court of Federal Claims dismissed Teresita Canuto’s complaint, partly for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, and partly for failure to state a claim. We affirm the 

dismissal. We likewise affirm the Court of Federal 

Claims’ dismissal of Ms. Canuto’s motions to supplement 

and to amend her complaint.

BACKGROUND

In this suit against the United States, Ms. Canuto alleges that on several occasions, members of the United 

States military broke into her home. She alleges that 

they used sleeping gas to render her and her family 

unconscious, then sexually assaulted her. She also alleges that they took “her genetic material or DNA (blood)” 

and various articles that belonged to her, including papers identifying “scientific discoveries” about HIV/AIDS, 

cancer, and Alzheimer’s disease. J.A. 134. 

Ms. Canuto filed an earlier suit in the Court of Federal Claims making similar allegations. Canuto v. United 

States, No. 15-410C, 2015 WL 1926375, at *1 (Fed. Cl. 

Apr. 27, 2015). The Court of Federal Claims dismissed 

that complaint for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, and 

this court affirmed. Canuto v. United States, 615 F. App’x 

951, 952 (Fed. Cir. 2015). 

The Court of Federal Claims thereafter dismissed the 

present case. The court also denied a motion to supplement the complaint and two motions to amend the complaint. Ms. Canuto appeals. We have jurisdiction under 

28 U.S.C. § 1295(a)(3) to review the appealed rulings. 

DISCUSSION

A 

The only jurisdictional grant to the United States 

Court of Federal Claims that is at issue here is the Tucker 

Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1491(a)(1). That grant is limited to 

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CANUTO v. US 3

certain cases seeking damages from the United States. A 

claim, to qualify, must not sound in tort and must be 

based, as relevant here, on a statute, regulation, or constitutional provision that defines the alleged wrong and 

mandates monetary relief for its violation. See United 

States v. Navajo Nation, 556 U.S. 287, 289–90 (2009); 

Jan’s Helicopter Serv., Inc. v. FAA, 525 F.3d 1299, 1306 

(Fed. Cir. 2008).

In the Court of Federal Claims, Ms. Canuto alleged 

that the soldiers’ conduct violated 18 U.S.C. § 242, and on 

appeal she mentions two more criminal statutes, 18 

U.S.C. §§ 1039 and 1385. It suffices to say that none of 

those statutes is a money-mandating statute. We have 

previously explained the general rule that the Tucker Act 

does not grant the Court of Federal Claims jurisdiction to 

enforce the federal criminal code. Joshua v. United 

States, 17 F.3d 378, 379 (Fed. Cir. 1994) (holding that the 

Court of Federal Claims has no jurisdiction to adjudicate 

claims under the criminal code).

Ms. Canuto has alleged that the soldiers’ actions violated the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments. We have 

held that neither provision is a money-mandating source 

of rights, and therefore neither is a basis for jurisdiction 

under the Tucker Act. Brown v. United States, 105 F.3d 

621, 623 (Fed. Cir. 1997); LeBlanc v. United States, 50 

F.3d 1025, 1028 (Fed. Cir. 1995). Nor is Article III language, mentioned by Ms. Canuto on appeal, that generally defines the judicial power of the United States. Such 

language is not a money-mandating source of rights, as 

required by the Tucker Act.

For those reasons, the Court of Federal Claims 

properly dismissed the foregoing claims for lack of jurisdiction. As to Ms. Canuto’s allegation that the soldiers’ 

stealing of her property constituted a taking forbidden by 

the Fifth Amendment in the absence of just compensation, the Court of Federal Claims accepted that the TakCase: 16-1605 Document: 18-2 Page: 3 Filed: 06/09/2016
4 CANUTO v. US

ings Clause is a money-mandating constitutional provision. But the court held that Ms. Canuto’s allegations fail 

to state a takings claim and so dismissed those allegations on the merits. We agree with that result.

Based on Supreme Court precedents, this court has 

long held that, in order for a plaintiff to have a takings 

claim against the government because a federal officer 

took the plaintiff’s private property, the challenged actions of the officer must have been “authorized” by federal 

law. See Del-Rio Drilling Programs, Inc. v. United States, 

146 F.3d 1358, 1362–63 (Fed. Cir. 1998). Here, Ms. 

Canuto does not allege any facts that can plausibly be 

taken to show that the government agents, members of 

the military, were acting in an authorized manner in the 

conduct she alleges. She has not, for instance, identified a 

law-enforcement initiative, an investigation, a military 

operation, or a statutory mandate that might have led 

government agents to commit the acts she alleges. She 

states only the conclusion, not facts to support a plausible 

inference, that the government agents were “acting within 

the scope of their employment.” J.A. 13. Her allegations 

therefore cannot support a takings claim. To the extent 

they suggest a tort claim, such claims are outside the 

Tucker Act. See 28 U.S.C. § 1491(a)(1).

On appeal, Ms. Canuto points to a wide variety of other sources of law in an effort to identify a basis of jurisdiction in the Court of Federal Claims. Even putting aside 

the impropriety of raising matters for the first time on 

appeal, we see no basis in these arguments for reversing 

the dismissal. The various sources of law fall into one or 

more categories: state law; federal-law provisions that 

carry no private right of action, at least not for persons in 

Ms. Canuto’s position; federal-law provisions whose 

enforcement is committed to courts other than the Court 

of Federal Claims, e.g., district courts; or federal-law 

provisions that are not money-mandating. Ms. Canuto 

has not stated a basis for a Tucker Act suit.

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CANUTO v. US 5

B 

Ms. Canuto moved to supplement her complaint and 

to amend her complaint. In her motions, she sought to 

add allegations of harassment and sexual assault in the 

same vein as those in the original complaint, and to 

incorporate the allegations from her earlier Court of 

Federal Claims case into this case. The Court of Federal 

Claims denied Ms. Canuto’s motions. 

We see no error in that denial, which we review only 

for an abuse of discretion. See Tamerlane, Ltd. v. United 

States, 550 F.3d 1135, 1147 (Fed. Cir. 2008). Motions to 

supplement or amend a complaint may be denied if the 

proposed amendment would be futile. Foman v. Davis, 

371 U.S. 178, 182 (1962). That principle supplied a sound 

basis for denial here. Ms. Canuto offered nothing to 

distinguish the proposed new allegations from the allegations of her complaint that were properly dismissed. And 

as to the claims that Ms. Canuto raised in her prior 

complaint, the doctrine of collateral estoppel prevents 

their relitigation in this case, because she had a fair 

opportunity to litigate them earlier, they were actually 

litigated, and their rejection was necessary to the judgment in the earlier suit. See Shell Petroleum, Inc. v. 

United States, 319 F.3d 1334, 1338 (Fed. Cir. 2003). 

CONCLUSION

The decision of the Court of Federal Claims dismissing Ms. Canuto’s complaint and denying the motions to 

supplement and amend the complaint is therefore affirmed.

AFFIRMED

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