NOT PRECEDENTIAL

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT

___________

No. 16-4335

___________

RONALD BASS, SR.,

 Appellant

v.

THE STATE OF NEW JERSEY; DEPARTMENT OF CHILDREN 

AND FAMILIES; THE DIVISION OF CHILD PROTECTION 

AND PERMANENCY; LAURA DAVIS, HEAD SUPERVISOR OF DYFS; 

ANNDRIA CALWELL, SUPERVISOR, FAMILY SPECIALIST II; 

LASHONDA DRAKE, CASE WORKER, FAMILY SERVICES SPECIALIST II; 

ERIC KIRSCHNER, FORENSIC PSYCHOLOGISTS; 

GWENDOLYN O. AUSTIN; DONALD O. EGBUCHULAM; 

CHILDREN AID FAMILY SERVICES, ET AL.; 

ERIC MEEHAN, DAG, FOR THE STATE OF NEW JERSEY; 

ALLISON BLAKE; MARY P. DUGUID; DEIRDRE M. O'REILLY; 

MAIN ST. COUNSELING CENTER; JEENA KRZASTEK

____________________________________

On Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of New Jersey

(D.C. Civil Action No. 2-14-cv-05006)

District Judge: Honorable Jose L. Linares

____________________________________

Submitted Pursuant to Third Circuit LAR 34.1(a)

May 3, 2017

Before: RESTREPO, SCIRICA and FISHER, Circuit Judges

(Opinion filed: May 9, 2017)
2

___________

OPINION*

___________

PER CURIAM

Ronald Bass, Sr., appeals from the order of the District Court dismissing his 

complaint. We will affirm.

I.

We previously set forth the background of this matter in Bass v. New Jersey, 649 

F. App’x 255 (3d Cir. 2016) (per curiam). In brief, Bass filed and then amended a federal 

complaint asserting claims relating to the termination of his parental rights following a 

New Jersey family court hearing. The District Court dismissed Bass’s amended 

complaint in its entirety for lack of subject matter jurisdiction under the Rooker-Feldman

doctrine. See Rooker v. Fid. Trust Co., 263 U.S. 413 (1923); D.C. Ct. App. v. Feldman, 

460 U.S. 462 (1983). We affirmed in part but vacated in part and remanded for further 

proceedings on Bass’s claims regarding “defendants’ alleged misconduct preceding and 

allegedly resulting in the state-court judgment.” Id. at 258.

On remand, the District Court directed Bass to file another amended complaint. 

Bass then filed what he captioned as a third amended complaint (it actually was his 

second, and we will refer to it hereafter simply as his “complaint”). As relevant here, he 

 

* This disposition is not an opinion of the full Court and pursuant to I.O.P. 5.7 does not 

constitute binding precedent.
3

asserted claims against three categories of defendants: (1) Eric Kirschner, a psychologist 

who testified about Bass’s ability to raise his son; (2) the State of New Jersey and several 

of its agencies and employees involved in the proceeding (collectively, the “State 

defendants”); and (3) Gwendolyn Austin, a lawyer who represented him in the 

proceeding, and another lawyer whose precise involvement Bass did not make clear.1

As was the case before, Bass’s complaint is difficult to follow. Bass claimed, 

however, that: (1) Kirschner lied at the hearing about Bass’s psychological profile and 

ability to care for his son; (2) the State defendants failed to properly investigate his 

background and submitted allegedly falsified reports; and (3) Austin failed to properly 

represent him. On the basis of these allegations, Bass purported to assert claims under 

numerous federal statutes, including the Americans With Disabilities Act, and claims 

under state law for discrimination and malpractice. Bass also filed a motion for 

appointment of counsel, which a Magistrate Judge denied.

Kirschner and the State defendants filed motions to dismiss Bass’s complaint. 

Bass both responded to those motions and filed a motion for reconsideration of the denial 

of counsel. While that motion was pending, the District Court granted defendants’ 

motions and dismissed Bass’s complaint with prejudice in its entirety. The Magistrate 

 

1 Bass previously named all of these defendants in his amended complaint. Bass named 

several new defendants in his second amended complaint, but he never served them with 

process and he mentions them only in passing in his brief, so we need not address them.
4

Judge then denied Bass’s motion for reconsideration. Bass appeals.2

II.

Bass appeals both the dismissal of his complaint and the denial of his motions for 

counsel. The only ruling to which he raises any specific challenge, however, is to the 

denial of counsel. To the extent that his challenge is properly before us, we perceive no 

abuse of discretion for the reasons that the Magistrate Judge explained. See Tabron, 6 

F.3d at 155-57.3 Bass does not raise any specific challenge to any of the reasons that the 

District Court gave for dismissing his complaint. To the contrary, his brief largely 

 

2 We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291 except as noted below. We review de 

novo both matters of subject matter jurisdiction, see Great W. Mining & Mineral Co. v. 

Fox Rothschild LLP, 615 F.3d 159, 163 (3d Cir. 2010), and the dismissal of a complaint 

under Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6), see Williams v. BASF Catalysts LLC, 765 F.3d 306, 315 

(3d Cir. 2014). “To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient 

factual matter, accepted as true, to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.” Id.

(quotation marks omitted). We review the denial of a motion for appointment of counsel 

for abuse of discretion. See Tabron v. Grace, 6 F.3d 147, 157 (3d Cir. 1993).

3 Bass addressed his motion for reconsideration of the denial of counsel to the Magistrate 

Judge, but he also copied the District Judge. The District Judge dismissed Bass’s 

complaint without treating Bass’s motion as an objection under 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1) 

and Fed. R. Civ. P. 72(a), and the Magistrate Judge later denied reconsideration. Bass 

challenges both the Magistrate Judge’s initial denial of counsel and his denial of 

reconsideration. We construe Bass’s motion for reconsideration as an objection to the 

initial denial of counsel that the District Court overruled sub silentio when it dismissed 

his complaint. We have reviewed the initial denial of counsel on that basis. We do not 

have jurisdiction to review the Magistrate Judge’s denial of reconsideration, however, 

because it is not an order of the District Court. See Siers v. Morash, 700 F.2d 113, 114-

15 (3d Cir. 1983). Nevertheless, there would appear to be even less of a basis to 

challenge the denial of counsel after the District Court already had dismissed Bass’s 

complaint.
5

reiterates his allegations and is otherwise devoted to extraneous matters. Nevertheless, 

we will address three points that we liberally construe Bass’s brief to raise.

First, the District Court again dismissed Bass’s claims against the State defendants 

for lack of jurisdiction to the extent that they are barred by the Rooker-Feldman doctrine. 

We agree that Bass’s complaint can be read to assert claims that are subject to dismissal 

on that basis. Even on appeal, Bass requests that we order the “exclusion” of evidence 

presented to the family court and remand this matter to the District Court for “family 

unification.” (Appellant’s Br. at 11.) As we previously explained, the Rooker-Feldman

doctrine bars Bass’s claims to the extent that he seeks to appeal the family court’s 

termination of his parental rights in federal court. See Bass, 649 F. App’x at 258; see 

also Great W. Mining & Mineral Co., 615 F.3d at 166-67.

Second, the District Court dismissed Bass’s claims against Kirschner and his 

remaining claims against the State defendants on various grounds, including New 

Jersey’s litigation privilege as to Kirschner and the statute of limitations as to the State

defendants. We question whether certain of these issues can be resolved from the face of 

Bass’s complaint or even apply to it. See, e.g., Williams, 765 F.3d at 317-20 (holding 

that New Jersey’s litigation privilege did not bar certain claims of fraud on a court). We 

need not resolve them, however, because the dismissal of Bass’s remaining claims was 

appropriate on the alternative ground that Bass failed to state a plausible claim to relief. 

Bass refers throughout his complaint to “discrimination,” but his allegations are 

conclusory and he pleaded no actual facts in that regard. He also claimed that evidence 
6

introduced at the family court hearing was falsified and misleading, and we could 

liberally construe those allegations as a claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 that defendants 

conspired to deprive him of due process. Once again, however, Bass pleaded nothing 

suggesting any actual conspiracy, or even that any evidence was false. The closest he 

came was by alleging that a State defendant submitted a report opining that Bass was an 

“abusive parent” and that the report was false because it “conflicted with the . . . photos 

. . . of my son and I bonding.” (ECF No. 64 at 6.) That allegation does not raise the 

reasonable inference that the opinion was “false,” let alone that defendants intentionally 

conspired to produce it. Thus, we will affirm the dismissal of Bass’s remaining claims 

against Kirschner and the State defendants on the ground that Bass failed to state any 

plausible federal claim.4

Finally, the District Court dismissed Bass’s complaint in its entirety without 

explicitly addressing his claims against his former counsel Austin. Bass does not argue 

that the District Court erred in that regard, but he mentions his claims against Austin in 

his brief (Appellant’s Br. at 4, 6), so we will address them. Bass’s complaint cannot be 

read to assert any federal claim against Austin, who was not a state actor and whom Bass 

 

4 We are satisfied that leave to amend would be futile. In our previous opinion, we 

acknowledged that Bass’s remaining claims were “largely conclusory,” but we remanded 

for the District Court to consider them and the possibility of amendment. Bass, 649 F. 

App’x at 259. On remand, the District Court directed Bass to file a second amended 

complaint and gave him specific guidance on how to allege a plausible claim. (ECF No. 

62.) Bass failed to do so, however, and none of his filings suggests that he could do so if 

given another opportunity.
7

did not plausibly allege conspired with any state actor. Bass, however, did make 

allegations regarding insufficient investigation and failure to obtain an expert that could 

be construed as a state-law claim for professional negligence. The District Court did not 

expressly address the issue but, in the absence of any plausible federal claim, we 

understand the District Court’s opinion to have declined to exercise supplemental 

jurisdiction over any potential state-law claims. See 28 U.S.C. § 1367(c)(3).5 Thus, the 

dismissal of Bass’s claim for professional negligence is without prejudice to Bass’s 

ability to assert it in state court. We express no opinion on the merits of that claim.

III.

For these reasons, we will affirm the judgment of the District Court. Bass’s 

motion for appointment of counsel on appeal is denied. Bass’s letters docketed as 

“documents in support of the appeal,” to the extent that they can be construed as motions 

to expand the record, are denied. To the extent that Bass’s filings request any other form 

of relief, they are denied as well.

 

5 Bass did not allege Austin’s citizenship or otherwise invoke the District Court’s 

diversity jurisdiction, and it appears that both Bass and Austin may be citizens of New 

Jersey.