Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca13-15-05030/USCOURTS-ca13-15-05030-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Douglas L. Prestidge
Appellant
United States
Appellee

Document Text:

NOTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.

United States Court of Appeals 

for the Federal Circuit ______________________ 

DOUGLAS L. PRESTIDGE,

Plaintiff-Appellant

v.

UNITED STATES,

Defendant-Appellee

______________________ 

2015-5030

______________________ 

Appeal from the United States Court of Federal 

Claims in No. 1:14-cv-00267-MCW, Judge Mary Ellen 

Coster Williams.

______________________ 

Decided: May 8, 2015 

______________________ 

DOUGLAS L. PRESTIDGE, Douglas, AZ, pro se.

SETH W. GREENE, Commercial Litigation Branch, Civil Division, United States Department of Justice, Washington, DC, for defendant-appellee. Also represented by 

JOYCE R. BRANDA, ROBERT E. KIRSCHMAN, JR., CLAUDIA 

BURKE. 

______________________ 

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2 PRESTIDGE v. US

Before PROST, Chief Judge, LOURIE and TARANTO, Circuit 

Judges.

PER CURIAM.

Douglas Prestidge brought this action in the United 

States Court of Federal Claims. The court dismissed the 

action for lack of jurisdiction. We affirm. 

BACKGROUND

Mr. Prestidge served in the United States Air Force 

from December 1974 until he was honorably discharged in 

December 1978. During his service Mr. Prestidge was 

wounded by enemy fire and also was injured in a motorcycle accident.

Mr. Prestidge filed an application for disability benefits with the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) in 

January 1979, and he was examined by a VA doctor in 

March of that year. See Prestidge v. United States, No. 

14-267C, slip. op. at 1 (Fed. Cl. Oct. 15, 2014). The VA 

found that he had a service-connected disability and rated 

him 30% disabled. Mr. Prestidge’s brief to this court

suggests that he had additional interactions with VA 

doctors in later years. 

On April 7, 2014, Mr. Prestidge filed a complaint in 

the Court of Federal Claims. The complaint alleges that 

his medical condition has deteriorated because he received inadequate medical care from the VA, that the VA 

was negligent in processing his claims and providing

needed medical services, that he has not been appropriately compensated for disabilities incurred in service, that 

the VA committed “[c]lear [and] [u]nmistakable [e]rror 

(CUE)” in processing his disability-benefit claims, and 

that the government breached his enlistment contract by 

failing to provide appropriate care and disability compensation. The complaint lists as defendants the United 

States, the VA, and several individual VA employees, and

it seeks $30,000,000 in damages. It also requests transfer 

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PRESTIDGE v. US 3

of the case to the United States District Court for the 

District of Arizona, stating that related actions are underway there. 

The Court of Federal Claims dismissed Mr. Prestidge’s case for lack of jurisdiction. Prestidge, No. 14-

267C, slip op. at 5. First, the court held that it could not 

adjudicate the claims against individual VA employees 

because its jurisdiction is limited to claims against the 

United States. Id. at 3. The court likewise held that it

lacked jurisdiction over claims relating to the VA’s denial 

of veterans’ benefits, because those claims must be presented through the Title 38 process, involving the Board 

of Veterans Appeals and Court of Appeals for Veterans 

Claims, not the Court of Federal Claims. Id. The court 

dismissed Mr. Prestidge’s claims for breach of contract, 

concluding that a veteran’s entitlement to medical services arises from statute, not contract, and in any event 

Mr. Prestidge’s enlistment contract does not mention

medical care. Id. at 3–4. The court also dismissed Mr. 

Prestidge’s claims for negligence and malpractice because 

those claims sound in tort and therefore fall outside the 

statutory limits on the jurisdiction of the Court of Federal 

Claims. Id. at 4. Finally, the court denied Mr. Prestidge’s 

transfer request, because he had “already filed an action 

in the District . . . of Arizona which encompasses his 

claims in this suit,” making transfer unnecessary. Id. 

On appeal, Mr. Prestidge emphasizes that his claim is 

based on breach of his enlistment contract. See Appellant’s Br. 1. He reiterates that the VA failed to provide 

adequate medical care or destroyed medical records, 

couching his claims in terms of “abandonment,” “fraud,” 

“misrepresentation,” “lying,” and “deceit.” Id. at Continuation pp. 5, 7. This court has jurisdiction to hear this 

appeal under 28 U.S.C. § 1295(a)(3). 

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4 PRESTIDGE v. US

DISCUSSION

We review de novo the dismissal of Mr. Prestidge’s

complaint for lack of jurisdiction. Frazer v. United States, 

288 F.3d 1347, 1351 (Fed. Cir. 2002). 

Under the Tucker Act, the Court of Federal Claims 

has “jurisdiction to render judgment upon any claim 

against the United States founded either upon the Constitution, or any Act of Congress or any regulation of an 

executive department, or upon any express or implied 

contract with the United States, or for liquidated or 

unliquidated damages in cases not sounding in tort.” 28 

U.S.C. § 1491(a)(1). The Court of Federal Claims correctly determined that none of Mr. Prestidge’s claims fall 

within its limited jurisdiction. 

It is long-settled law that, for a plaintiff’s claim to 

come within the Tucker Act, the “plaintiff must identify a 

separate source of substantive law that creates the right 

to money damages.” Fisher v. United States, 402 F.3d 

1167, 1172 (Fed. Cir. 2005) (en banc in relevant part); see 

United States v. Navajo Nation, 556 U.S. 287, 291 (2009). 

Mr. Prestidge here points to his enlistment contract as 

that source for his claims regarding denial of adequate 

medical care. 

Governing precedents have long established a broad 

general rule that rights to military pay and benefits are 

established only by statutes and regulations, not by 

enlistment contracts enforceable through damages remedies. See, e.g., Bell v. United States, 366 U.S. 393, 401 

(1961) (“[C]ommon-law rules governing private contracts 

have no place in the area of military pay.”); Schism v. 

United States, 316 F.3d 1259, 1268–76 (Fed. Cir. 2002) 

(en banc) (“Congress’ authority and the various courts’ 

(i.e., the Supreme Court, our court, and our predecessor 

court) consistent interpretation thereof demonstrate that 

military health care benefits as a form of compensation 

have long been exclusively a creature of statute, not 

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PRESTIDGE v. US 5

contract.”); id. at 1275–76 (distinguishing cases “involv[ing] military pay or retirement benefits” from “claims 

based on enlistment agreements specifying non-pay 

benefits [i.e., specific training or duty assignments] promised in writing to recruits”); Jablon v. United States, 657 

F.2d 1064, 1066 (9th Cir. 1981) (“We have examined the 

cases and underlying policy considerations and have 

concluded that money damages are not an available 

remedy for the government’s breach of an enlistment 

contract.”). 

In this case, moreover, Mr. Prestidge failed to demonstrate that his enlistment contract creates an entitlement

to medical care. Prestidge, No. 14-267C, slip op. at 4. The 

contract refers to the extension of enlistments in times of 

national emergency and the rights of enlisted members of 

the Navy upon expiration of their service terms, but 

nowhere mentions medical care. Gov’t’s Appendix at 36. 

And although Armed Forces advertisements touted “excellent care,” id. at 10, they “d[id] not impose a contractual 

obligation on the United States,” Prestidge, No. 14-267C, 

slip op. at 4. In Schism, the government admitted that its 

recruiters made good-faith representations of the availability of free lifetime healthcare to encourage enlistment, 

but we held that those promises “could not have formed 

binding contracts.” 316 F.3d at 1262, 1272. 

Mr. Prestidge thus cannot found his complaint about 

substandard care from VA doctors on a contract. Nor is 

there any other Tucker Act basis for those allegations. To 

the extent they sound in tort, the Tucker Act does not 

cover them. See 28 U.S.C. § 1491(a)(1) (limiting the Court 

of Federal Claims’ “jurisdiction to render judgment . . . 

[to] cases not sounding in tort”); United States v. Wong, 

Nos. 13-1074, -1075, 2015 WL 1808750, at *7 & n.5 (U.S. 

Apr. 22, 2015); Keene Corp. v. United States, 508 U.S. 200, 

214 (1993); U.S. Marine, Inc. v. United States, 722 F.3d 

1360, 1372 (Fed. Cir. 2013); Eastport S.S. Corp. v. United 

States, 372 F.2d 1002, 1010 (Ct. Cl. 1967). For the same 

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6 PRESTIDGE v. US

reason, the Court of Federal Claims lacked jurisdiction 

over Mr. Prestidge’s allegations of abandonment, fraud, 

misrepresentation, lying, and deceit. 

Mr. Prestidge’s assertion that the VA mishandled his 

disability-benefit claims also lies outside the Court of 

Federal Claims’ jurisdiction. Congress created an elaborate, special remedial scheme to handle claims regarding 

veterans benefits. See Veterans’ Judicial Review Act 

(VJRA), 38 U.S.C. §§ 7251–7299; see also 38 U.S.C. 

§§ 511, 7104. That scheme displaces the Tucker Act to 

whatever extent the Tucker Act might otherwise have 

applied to Mr. Prestidge’s claims to statutory benefits. 

See United States v. Bormes, 133 S. Ct. 12, 18–20 (2012) 

(detailed remedial scheme can displace Tucker Act);

Sindram v. United States, 130 F. App’x 456, 458 (Fed. Cir. 

2005) (“[A]n appeal to the Veterans Court is the exclusive 

judicial remedy for the denial of a veteran’s benefits, 

thereby preempting Tucker Act jurisdiction over [such]

claims.”); Addington v. United States, 94 Fed. Cl. 779, 782 

(2010). 

Further, the Court of Federal Claims correctly dismissed Mr. Prestidge’s claims against individual VA 

employees. Prestidge, No. 14-267C, slip op. at 3. “The 

Tucker Act grants the Court of Federal Claims jurisdiction over suits against the United States, not against 

individual federal officials.” Brown v. United States, 105 

F.3d 621, 624 (Fed. Cir. 1997). 

Mr. Prestidge does not renew his request for transfer 

to the District of Arizona, and so we decline to address it 

here. We also conclude that Mr. Prestidge’s submission 

received May 1, 2015, which is untimely, makes no showing that the Court of Federal Claims erred in dismissing 

the case for lack of jurisdiction. 

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PRESTIDGE v. US 7

CONCLUSION

For the foregoing reasons, the decision of the Court of 

Federal Claims is affirmed. 

AFFIRMED

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