Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-azd-2_10-cv-02124/USCOURTS-azd-2_10-cv-02124-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 440
Nature of Suit: Other Civil Rights
Cause of Action: 28:1331 Fed. Question

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WO 

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF ARIZONA 

Lawrence Monroe Morris, 

Plaintiff, 

vs. 

Dennis K. Burke, et al., 

Defendants.

No. CV-10-02124-PHX-NVW

ORDER 

Before the Court is “Defendant United States’ Motion to Dismiss” (Doc. 24). As 

explained below, the Court will grant the motion. 

I. LEGAL STANDARD 

Dismissal under Rule 12(b)(6) can be based on “the lack of a cognizable legal 

theory” or “the absence of sufficient facts alleged under a cognizable legal theory.” 

Balistreri v. Pacifica Police Dep’t, 901 F.2d 696, 699 (9th Cir. 1990). The principle that 

a court accepts as true all of the allegations in a complaint does not apply to legal 

conclusions or conclusory factual allegations. Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 129 S. Ct. 1937, 1951 

(2009). “Threadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere 

conclusory statements, do not suffice.” Id. However, plausible factual allegations are 

accepted as true and the pleadings are construed in a light most favorable to the plaintiff. 

Knievel v. ESPN, 393 F.3d 1068, 1072 (9th Cir. 2005). Further, pro se filings are 

construed liberally, and the Court will give pro se plaintiffs “the benefit of any doubt.” 

Hebbe v. Pliler, 627 F.3d 338, 342 (9th Cir. 2010). 

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II. BACKGROUND 

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Morris was a letter carrier for the U.S. Postal 

Service. An accident while on duty disabled him and he eventually began collecting 

workers compensation under the Federal Employees Compensation Act (FECA). 

Between 1989 and 1991, Morris was informally employed as a handyman at an apartment 

complex, with a “salary” of $200 per month. Morris had a duty to disclose such income 

to the Labor Department office administering FECA payments, but he did not do so on 

the forms he was periodically required to fill out regarding his financial status. The 

Government somehow learned of his handyman income, and indicted Morris in March 

1993 under 18 U.S.C. § 1001, the general federal false statement prohibition, on grounds 

that Morris had sworn to having no income beyond his FECA benefits. 

In October 1993, the Ninth Circuit handed down United States v. Richardson, 

8 F.3d 15 (9th Cir. 1993), a case about a person, like Morris, charged with violating 

18 U.S.C. § 1001 for failure to disclose other income while receiving FECA benefits. 

The Ninth Circuit held that such a person must be prosecuted under 18 U.S.C. § 1920, a 

statute specific FECA-related false statements, rather than 18 U.S.C. § 1001. 

Richardson, 8 F.3d at 17. 

In light of Richardson, the Government voluntarily dismissed the indictment 

without prejudice in January 1994. Later that year, Congress amended a federal 

administrative statute, 5 U.S.C. § 8148, to specify that persons convicted under 18 U.S.C. 

§ 1920 forfeit their entitlement to FECA benefits. In January 1995, the Government reindicted Morris, this time under 18 U.S.C. § 1920. In February 1995, Morris pled guilty 

to the charge and was sentenced to one year of unsupervised probation and a $250 fine. 

Sometime later in 1995, the Labor Department revoked Morris’s FECA income as 

required by 5 U.S.C. § 8148. Documents attached to Morris’s complaint suggest that 

Morris unsuccessfully appealed this decision through Labor Department administrative 

channels. Those appeals apparently concluded no later than 2001. Sometime in 2010 

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(according to Morris’s complaint) or perhaps in July 2008 (according to documents 

attached to Morris’s complaint), the Labor Department discontinued Morris’s health 

insurance benefits, apparently as part of Morris’s forfeiture of FECA benefits under 

5 U.S.C. § 8148. It is not clear why the Labor Department took so long to terminate 

health insurance benefits. 

III. ANALYSIS 

A. Claims in the Nature of a § 2255 Petition 

The first legal claim the Court can discern from Morris’s complaint is an attack on 

the validity of his conviction. Such an attack is in the nature of a habeas petition under 

28 U.S.C. § 2255, and the Court will therefore treat it as a § 2255 petition. Under § 2255, 

Morris’s claim is time-barred: 

A 1-year period of limitation shall apply to a motion under 

this section. The limitation period shall run from the latest 

of— (1) the date on which the judgment of conviction 

becomes final . . . [or] (4) the date on which the facts 

supporting the claim or claims presented could have been 

discovered through the exercise of due diligence. 

28 U.S.C. § 2255(f)(1), (4). Morris’s judgment of conviction became final in 1995, and 

obviously more than one year has passed since then, so his challenge would be timebarred under that standard. To the extent that Morris’s claims about not discovering 

relevant information until September 2008 are relevant, Morris is still time-barred 

because he did not file until November 2010, which is more than one year after 

September 2008. Thus, under either calculation, the limitation period has expired, and 

Morris can no longer challenge the validity of his conviction. 

Even if Morris’s challenge was not time-barred, the Court would still dismiss it 

because Morris’s complaint does not explain why his conviction is invalid. Morris 

repeatedly states that his conviction is void because it fails to comply with the Ninth 

Circuit’s Richardson decision. But if anything, Richardson proves the opposite. In 

Richardson, the Ninth Circuit held that a person accused of making false statements to 

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obtain FECA disability benefits must be prosecuted under 18 U.S.C. § 1920, a statute 

specific FECA-related false statements, rather than 18 U.S.C. § 1001, the general federal 

false statements statute. Richardson, 8 F.3d at 17. Morris was convicted of making a 

FECA-related false statement under 18 U.S.C. § 1920, just as Richardson requires. 

Accordingly, no basis exists to avoid Morris’s conviction. 

B. Ex Post Facto Challenge 

Morris claims that the Labor Department’s decision to revoke his FECA benefits 

violates the ex post facto clause of the Constitution because the statute directing the 

Labor Department to revoke benefits, 5 U.S.C. § 1848, was not enacted until after Morris 

committed the conduct that led to his conviction. A Fifth Circuit case, Garner v. U.S. 

Dep’t of Labor, 221 F.3d 822 (5th Cir. 2000), is both instructive and persuasive on two 

important issues involved in Morris’s argument: first, whether Morris must complain to 

the Labor Department about the alleged ex post facto violation before filing suit; and 

second, whether any ex post facto violation occurred. Regarding the first question, the 

Fifth Circuit notes that the Labor Department’s decision to revoke benefits is something 

that the aggrieved party (such as Morris) must usually challenge through the Labor 

Department’s internal procedures. Id. at 825. Morris’s complaint, and the documents he 

attaches, suggests that Morris did appeal through Labor’s internal procedures. However, 

if he did not, an exception exists for constitutional challenges such as this one, which the 

Labor Department itself cannot decide. Id. Therefore, Morris need not have exhausted 

this argument through the Labor Department before bringing this suit. 

Nonetheless, Morris needed to file his ex post facto challenge to “within six years 

after the right of action first accrue[d].” 28 U.S.C. § 2401(a). Documents attached to the 

complaint show that the Labor Department cut off Morris’s income benefits in 1995. 

Accordingly, Morris has filed his challenge too late, at least with respect to the income 

benefits. 

Morris’s health insurance benefits, on the other hand, were terminated sometime 

in 2008 or 2010. Assuming for argument’s sake that this termination was a separate 

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agency decision (rather than an extension of the 1995 decision to terminate income 

benefits), Morris timely filed suit with respect to his health insurance, but the Court 

nonetheless agrees with the Fifth Circuit’s reasoning in Garner that no ex post facto

violation occurred. 

There is no question that the statute which stripped Morris of his FECA benefits, 

5 U.S.C. § 8148, did not exist in that form until 1994 — after Morris had failed to report 

income to FECA. Accordingly, the Labor Department’s application of 5 U.S.C. § 8148 

to Morris is certainly an application of that statute to previous conduct. However, such 

application does not violate the ex post facto clause unless 5 U.S.C. § 8148 imposes 

“punishment.” Garner, 221 F.3d at 826. Applying the Supreme Court’s three-part test 

for determining whether a statute imposes “punishment,” the Fifth Circuit in Garner

concluded that 5 U.S.C. § 8148 primarily addresses “the remedial goal of saving the 

federal government, and therefore the taxpayers, from expending large sums of FECA 

funds, funds which are limited in amount, on those who have been convicted of 

defrauding the program. This obviously is protective of the integrity of the program.” Id. 

In addition, “the Supreme Court has made abundantly clear[ that] the denial of a 

noncontractual governmental benefit does not fall within the historical meaning of 

legislative punishment.” Id. Thus, 5 U.S.C. § 8148 does not impose “punishment,” as 

that word is used in connection with the ex post facto clause. Id. at 827–28; accord 

Slugocki v. Department of Labor, 988 F. Supp. 1443 (S.D. Fla. 1997). Accordingly, 

Morris’s ex post facto challenge fails. 

C. Leave to Amend 

Leave to amend should be freely granted “when justice so requires.” Fed. R. Civ. 

P. 15(a)(2). However, “leave may be denied if amendment of the complaint would be 

futile.” Gordon v. City of Oakland, 627 F.3d 1092, 1094 (9th Cir. 2010). Because 

Morris’s claims fail as a matter of law, leave to amend would be futile in this case. 

IT IS THEREFORE ORDERED that “Defendant United States’ Motion to 

Dismiss” (Doc. 24) is GRANTED. 

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IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that the Clerk enter judgment in favor of all 

Defendants and that Plaintiff take nothing. The Clerk shall terminate this action. 

Dated this 10th day of May, 2011. 

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