[DO NOT PUBLISH]

IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT

________________________ No. 13

- 14748 Non

- Argument Calendar

________________________ D.C. Docket No. 1:11

- cv - 23492

- MGC

YOUNES KABBAJ, individually and as “Next Friend,” Plaintiff

- Appellant, OMAR ABDEL RAHMAN, Plaintiff,

versus BARACK H. OBAMA, GEORGE W. BUSH, Presid ents, United States of America, DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, DEPARTMENT OF STATE, CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY, et al., Defendants

- Appellees,

Case: 13-14748 Date Filed: 06/13/2014 Page: 1 of 132 METROPOLITAN POLICE DEPARTMENT, et al., Defendants.

________________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida

________________________ ( J une 13, 2014) Before HULL , PRYOR and MARTIN , Circuit Judges. PER CURIAM: Younes Kabbaj pro se ap peals the district court’s dismissal of his fourth amended complaint alleging constitutional violations and an unlawful conspiracy under 42 U.S.C. §§ 1983, 1985, 1986, and Bivens , 1 and claims under the Federal Torts Claim Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1346 , and the Pri vacy Act, 5 U.S.C. § 552a

. After review, we : (1) affirm the dismissal with prejudice as to Defendants the United States, the Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”) , the Department of State, the six state defendants, Anthony Scalia, Jim Bruinsma, Steven Berger, David Forteza, Amanda Curet, Jose Martin, as well as the federal d efendants , Perry Cuocci, Matthew Foster, Thomas T. Riley, Robert P. Jackson, Donald E. Gonneville, Donald Baily, Jimmy Arroyo, Ken Bradley, Shamu s Skelly, Scott Mclellun, Lanny A. Breuer and Michael Reigle, sued in their official

1 Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Fed

. Bureau of Narcotics , 403 U.S. 388, 91 S. Ct. 1999 (1971).

Case: 13-14748 Date Filed: 06/13/2014 Page: 2 of 133 capacities; and (2) vacate in part and remand so the district court can amend the judgment to dismiss without prejudice the claims against Defendants Cuocci, Foster, Riley , Jackson, Gonneville, Baily, Arroyo, Bradley, Skelly, Mclellun,
Breuer , and Reigle, sued in their individual capacities, whom Kabbaj never served

. I. BACKGROUND FACTS A. Dismissal of Original Complaint Without Prejudice
I n this civil rights action , Kabba j filed a total of five complaints , all of which
i n essence allege that federal and state officials: (1) conspired for almost two decades to thwart him from solving innumerable crimes, preventing terrorist attacks, and revealing the location of Osama Bin L aden years before his capture; and (2) prosecuted him, provided confidential information about him to state and foreign governments to facilitate his prosecution and to hospitals in order to have him involuntarily committed, and constantly watched and hara ssed him. Kabbaj contend s that the defendants’ conspiratorial actions violated his equal pr otection and due process rights; his rights under the First, Fourth, Fifth, Eight h, and Fourteenth Amendments and the Privacy Act ; and constituted malicious
prosecu tion, unlawful imprisonment, negligence, and fraud

. Kabbaj’s original complaint was 177 pages long, n amed 156 defendants, and had 122 pages of attached exhibits . The district court dismissed the original complaint without prejudice because, inter alia , it did not comply with Federal

Case: 13-14748 Date Filed: 06/13/2014 Page: 3 of 134 Rule of Civil Procedure 8’s requirement for a short and plain statement of his claims. T he district court explained that Kabbaj’s complaint was repetitive, provided a lot of irrelevant information, contained conclusory all egations, “lumped together” conspiracy allegations “so that the individual defendants [did] not have adequate notice of what [were] the specific allegations against each of them,” and was so large that it was “a daunting task for each defendant to comprehe nd exactly what factual allegations relate[d] to each of [Kabbaj’s] causes of action.” The district court gave Kabbaj leave to file an amended complaint.
B. Dismissal of Second Amended Complaint Without Prejudice Kabbaj filed an amended complaint that was 126 pages long and named 15 0 defendants . S hortly thereafter, Kabbaj filed a nearly identical, second amended complaint with the court’s permission

. The second amended complaint was 131 pages long and named 152 defendants. The district court dismissed t he second amended complaint without prejudice, again for failure to comply with Rule 8. The district court noted that the second amended complaint contained 372 paragraphs, was repetitive, and contained irre levant information. The court explained that th e second amended complaint was a classic “shotgun” co m plaint, in which Kabbaj had “lump[ed] his allegations against the defendants together, even though it [was] clear that they could not all have committed the same acts.”

Case: 13-14748 Date Filed: 06/13/2014 Page: 4 of 135 T he district court granted Kabba j leave to file a third amended complaint to cure the noted deficiencies. C. Kabbaj’s Fourth Amended Complaint Kabbaj filed a third amended complaint and then an identical fourth amended complaint. Kabbaj’s fourth amended complaint , which is the focus of this appeal, contained the same, albeit condensed, allegations as the preceding four complaints

. Kabbaj’s fourth amended complaint was 7 8 pages long, contained 213

n umbered paragraphs, and named 28 defendants, including four fed eral entities

— the United States, the Department of Justice, the FBI , and the Department of State ; twelve agents and officers of those federal agencies and six state officials in their individual and official capacities ; and six “John Doe” defendants

. Throughout, t he fourth amende d complaint refers to the defendants collectively, such as “the Defendants,” the “Named Defendants,” the “Federal Defendants,” or “[e]ach Defendant named in this Complaint,” but does not identify what allegedly unlawful action each defendant took with resp ect to each claim. Instead, in the portion of the complaint addressing Kabbaj’s “ CAUSES OF ACTION ,” the fourth amended complaint “incorporates all the above stated paragraphs” containing factual allegations replete with collective averments

. Kabbaj failed to perfect service upon the twelve federal employees sued in their individual capacities and never identif ied or serve d the “John Doe” Case: 13-14748 Date Filed: 06/13/2014 Page: 5 of 136 defendants

. Affidavits reflect that a process server delivered a copy of the summons and complaint to the authorized ag ent for each of the twelve federal employees’ respective agencies. Kabbaj moved for an extension of time to serve the individual federal defendants. Kabbaj stated that he had served the twelve defendants at their respective places of business, but he ack nowledged that this service was inadequate because he was suing those defendants in their individual capacities. Kabbaj requested more time to discover the home add ress of the twelve defendants. The served defendants moved to strike or dismiss Kabbaj’s fo urth amended complaint because, inter alia , Kabbaj had failed to comply with the district court’s
pr ior orders to cure the deficiencies in his complaint, which still violated Rule 8’s requirement of a short, plain statement of his claims

. I n his respons es to the defendants’ motions to dismiss, Kabbaj continued to refer to the defendants collectively , such as the “O riginal D efendants,” the “pre

- 911 D efendants,” and the “post

- 911 D efendants,” without identifying each defendant’s allegedly wrongful conduct related to each specific claim.
D. Dismissal of Fourth Amended Complaint With Prejudice
T he district court dismissed Kabbaj’s fourth amended complaint with prejudice, citing Kabbaj’s failure to cure the specifically identified pleading deficiencies noted i n its prior two dismissal orders. In particular , the district court

Case: 13-14748 Date Filed: 06/13/2014 Page: 6 of 137 determined that the complaint “continue[d] to run afoul of” Rule 8, was repetitive, and contained “largely irrelevant factual assertions ” that were asserted against the defendants “lump [ e d ] . . . together, even though it is clear that they could not all have committed the same acts.” The district court noted that t he counts, although labeled, incorporated by reference all the previous factual allegations, and made conclusory allegations w ithout “a factual basis or information needed to state a claim against each Defendant.” The district court concluded that Kabbaj’s fourth amended complaint was

“ still a shotgun pleading” that “d [ id ] not permit any of the Defendants to adequately answer the allegations charged against them.” The district court further found that Kabbaj’s allegations of a decades

- long conspiracy to prevent Kabbaj from thwarting terrorist attacks or disclosing Bin Laden’s location, without more, were implausible. The distric t court explained that it was dismissing the fourth amended complaint with prejudice because Kabbaj had “filed five Complaints over two years and there is no indication that a sixth complaint could state a valid cause of action and cure the deficiencies id entified in the dismissal orders entered in this
case.” 2 In granting the motions to dismiss, the district court denied as moot all

2 Alternatively, t he district court granted the defendants’ motion to dismiss Kabbaj’s fourth amended complaint, pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), because it failed to state viable claims . Because we affirm the dismissal on Rule 8 ground s, we do not address this Rule 12(b)(6) ruling.

Case: 13-14748 Date Filed: 06/13/2014 Page: 7 of 138 pending motions, including Kabbaj’s motion for an extension of time to effect service. II. DISCUSSION A. Rule 8 Under Rule 8 (a)(2) , a complaint “ must contain

. . . a short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief

. ” Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2). Rule 8(a) (2) ’s purpose is to “give the defendant fair notice of what the claim is and the gro unds upon which it rests.” Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly , 550 U.S. 544, 555, 127 S. Ct. 1955, 1964 (2007) (quotation marks and ellipsis omitted). Therefore, “a complaint’s factual allegations must be enough to raise a right to relief above the speculative l evel.” Davis v. Coca

- Cola Bottling Co. Consol. , 516 F.3d 955, 974 (11th Cir. 2008) (internal quotation marks and alterations omitted)

. Further , the allegations in the complaint “ must be simple, concise, and direct , ” Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(d)(1) , and the compla int must “state its claims . . . in numbered paragraphs, each limited as far as practicable to a single set of circumstances.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 10(b). A “shotgun pleading”

— one in which “it is virtually impossible to know which allegations of fact are inte nded to support which claim(s) for relief”

— does not comply with the standards of Rules 8(a) and 10(b). Anderson v. Dist. Bd. of Trs. of Ctr. Fla. Cmty. Coll. , 77 F.3d 364, 366

- 67 (11th Cir. 1996) ; see also Magluta v. Samples , 256 F.3d 1282, 1284 (11th Cir.

Case: 13-14748 Date Filed: 06/13/2014 Page: 8 of 139 2001)

. This Court has repeatedly condemned shotgun pleadings. See PVC Windoors, Inc. v. Babbitbay Beach Const r ., N.V. , 598 F.3d 802, 806 n.4 (11th Cir. 2010); Davis , 516 F.3d at 97 9. Where a more carefully drafted complaint might state a claim, a pro se plaintiff “must be given at least one chance to amend the complaint before the district court dismisses the action with prejudice.” Bryant v. Dupree , 252 F.3d 1161, 1163 (11th Cir. 2001) (quotation marks omitted) ; see also Bank v. Pitt , 92 8 F.2d 1108, 1112 (11th Cir. 1991), overruled in part by Wagner v. Daewoo Heavy Indus. Am. Corp. , 314 F.3d 54 1 , 54 2 & n. 1 (11th Cir. 2002) (en banc) (concluding that the district court is not require to sua sponte grant leave to counseled plaintiffs, but noting that its holding does not disturb a pro se litigant’s opportunity to amend under Bank v. Pitt ). A district court , however, is not required to permit amendment if, inter alia , “there has been . . . repeated failure to cure deficiencies by amendments previously allowed

. ” Bryant , 252 F.3d at 1163 (citing Foman v. Davis , 371 U. S . 178, 182, 83 S. Ct. 227, 230 (1962)). 3
B. Served Defendants Here, as to the defendants who were served and filed responsive pleadings , the district court’s dismissal with prejudice was not an abuse of discretion. Kabbaj’s fourth amended complaint is 7 8 pages long and contains 213 numbered

3 We review a district court’s decision whether to grant leave to amend for abuse of discretion

. Troville v. Venz , 303 F.3d 1256, 12 59 (11th Cir. 2002).

Case: 13-14748 Date Filed: 06/13/2014 Page: 9 of 1310 paragraphs. The first 66 pages of the complaint consist of 179 paragraphs of factual allegations. In the portion of the complaint labeled “causes of action,” the complaint incorporates by reference all of those 179 paragraphs of factual allegations , without identifying which factual allegations relate to which claims

. Moreover, the complaint refer s to the defendants collectively, making it impossible to identify which particular defendant engaged in what allegedly wrongful conduct. In other words, Kabbaj’s fourth amended complaint is a classic shot gun pleading.
See Anderson , 77 F.3d at 366. As such, it does not comply with Rule 8(a), and the distric t court properly dismissed it. Kabbaj argues that, due to his pro se status and the seriousness of his allegations, he should have been allowed to amend his fourth amended complain t to cure any pleading deficiencies. Although “ pro se pleadings are held to a less strict standard than pleadings filed by lawyers and thus are construed liberally , ” Alba v. Montford , 517 F.3d 1249, 1252 (11th Cir. 2008 ), this liberal construction “does not give a court license to serve as de facto counsel for a party, or to rewrite an otherwise deficient pleading in order to sustain an action.” GJR Invs., Inc. v. C nty. of Escambia , 132 F.3d 1359, 1369 (11th Cir. 1998) ( citation omitted), overruled on other grounds by Ashcroft v. Iqbal , 556 U.S. 662, 129 S. Ct. 1937 (2009) . Even a pro se litigant is required to comply with the rules of procedure,

Case: 13-14748 Date Filed: 06/13/2014 Page: 10 of 1311 McNeil v. United States , 508 U.S. 106, 113, 113 S. Ct. 1980, 1984 (1993),
p articularly after twice being expressly directed to do so. Kabbaj had already filed four deficient complaints . T he district court gave Kabbaj two prior opportunities to cure the Rule 8 deficiencies , but he failed to do so. Under these circumstances , th e district court did not abuse its discretion in dismissing Kabbaj’s fourth amended complaint with prejudice. C. Unserved Defendants On appeal, Kabbaj argues that he should be given an opportunity to seek an entry of default against the twelve federal defendants sued in their individual capacities. Kabbaj’s argument is based on the faulty premise that he properly served them. Kabbaj attempted to serve the se twelve individual federal defendants by serving the registered agent s for their respective federal agencies. 4 However, neither Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 4(e) nor the law of Florida or the District of Columbia ( where the district court is located and where service was made, respectively) allows for personal service v ia delivery of the summons and complaint to the registered agent of the defendant’s place of business. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 4(e), (i)(3); Fla. Stat. § 48.031; D.C.R.C.P. 4(e)(1), (2 )

. Consequently , as

4 These twelve defendants included one federal prosecutor, three FBI agents, three agents of the Drug Enforcement Administration, two Secret Service agents, and three State Department employees. Case: 13-14748 Date Filed: 06/13/2014 Page: 11 of 1312 Kabbaj acknowledged in the district court, he failed t o perfect personal service on these defendants to the extent they were sued in their individual capacities

. Furthermore, while the United States filed a motion to dismiss the fourth amended complaint, it did so representing only itself , the three named fed eral agencies , and the individual federal defendants sued in their official capacities

. The motion to dismiss the fourth amended complaint explicitly stated that , to the
extent the twelve individual federal defendants were sued in their individual capacit ies , they had not been properly served and did not “respond to the Complaint at this time.” Thus, the twelve federal defendants sued in their individual capacities never entered a n appearance or filed a motion or other responsive pleading that waive d insufficient service of process

. See In re Worldwide Web Sys., Inc. , 328 F.3d 1291, 1299

- 1300 (11th Cir. 2003) (explaining that where service of process is insufficient, the court lacks personal jurisdiction over the defendant and has no power to render a judgment against that defendant unless the objection to personal jurisdiction was waived in a pre - answer motion or other responsive pleading or by general appearance). 5 Because Kabbaj did not properly serve these twelve individual federal defendants, th e district court lacked jurisdiction to dismiss the individual

- capacity

5 On appeal, Kabbaj does not refer to the unserved “John Doe” de fendants or challenge their dismissal and thus has abandoned any claim as to these defendants. See Timson v. Sampson , 518 F.3d 870, 874 (11th Cir. 2008).

Case: 13-14748 Date Filed: 06/13/2014 Page: 12 of 1313 claims against them with prejudice. See Pardazi v. Cullman Med. Ctr. , 896 F.2d 1313, 1317 (11th Cir. 1990) (explaining that service of process is a jurisdictional requirement); Fed. R . Civ. P. 4(m) (providing that where the plaintiff fails to

execu te service, the district court “must dismiss the action without prejudice

a gainst that defendant or order that service be made within a specified time ”). Further, because on appeal Kabbaj do es not challenge the district court’s denial of his motion for an extension of time to effect service, he has abandoned this issue. III. CONCLUSION Accordingly, we affirm the district court’s dismissal with prejudice as to the served defendants . We vacat e the judgment with respect to the twelve unserved federal defendants and remand for the purpose of amend ing the judgment to show that the dismissal of th e individual

- capacity claims against th ose twelve defendants
i s without prejudice.
AFFIRMED IN PART, VACATED IN PART , AND REMANDED . Case: 13-14748 Date Filed: 06/13/2014 Page: 13 of 13