1The district court granted the dismissal motions of two

other defendants, District Judges William McLeod and Charley

Quienalty, on the basis of judicial immunity. Alexander does not

appeal that part of the district court's ruling.

IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 94-40554

Becky H. Alexander,

Plaintiff-Appellant,

versus

Richard Ieyoub, et al.

Defendants-Appellees.

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Western District of Louisiana 

August 22, 1995

Before WISDOM, WIENER, and PARKER, Circuit Judges.

WIENER, Circuit Judge:

The Court withdraws the original opinion issued in this case

dated May 19, 1995, and appearing at 52 F.3d 554 (5th Cir. 1995),

and substitutes the following opinion. 

Plaintiff-Appellant Becky H. Alexander (Alexander) appeals

the district court's dismissal of her 42 U.S.C. §1983 suit

against the Defendants-Appellees, the former and current district

attorneys (DAs) of Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana, and two parish

assistant district attorneys (ADAs)(collectively Defendants)1,
 

2In reversing and remanding on the basis of the district

court's erroneous application of the Parratt/Hudson doctrine and

the Younger abstention doctrine, we are not expressing any

opinion on the merits of Alexander's §1983 suit or on any

possible defenses to her suit.

2

stemming from the 1988 seizure of Alexander's car by officials of

the Calcasieu Parish Sheriff's Department. Concluding that

neither the Parratt/Hudson doctrine nor the Younger abstention

doctrine justifies dismissal of Alexander's §1983 suit, we

reverse and remand.2

I

FACTS AND PROCEEDINGS

In September 1988, police officers from the Calcasieu Parish

Sheriff's Department, acting pursuant to an investigation of

suspected drug activity, seized Alexander's automobile after its

driver attempted to elude arrest. The officers arrested the

driver of the car, Winston Joseph Fruge, and the car's passenger,

David Lee Anthony Charney. A search of the car did not uncover

any drugs or other contraband. The DA's office charged Fruge,

Charney, and Alexander (who was not present at the time of the

car's seizure) with various drug counts. In exchange for

Charney's guilty pleas to the counts, however, the DA's office in

October 1989 dismissed the charges against Alexander. 

Although Alexander repeatedly requested the return of her

car through a certified letter and several phone calls, the

Defendants refused to release Alexander's car from custody. The

Defendants told Alexander that the DA's office was holding her

car on the belief that she was a consenting party to the drug
 

3La. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 32:1550(C)(1)-(3)(West 1989) provides

that the property seized:

 "shall be forfeited in a hearing instituted by the district

attorney upon . . . a showing by the district attorney that

the seizure was constitutional or that the seizure was made

upon reasonable grounds to believe the seizure was

constitutional [,]. . . that the owner of the conveyance was

knowingly and intentionally a consenting part or privy to a

[drug] violation . . . [and] that the value of the

contraband was in excess of five hundred dollars or that the

contraband was intended for commercial sale."

 

4See La. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 32:1550(C)(4)(West 1989).

3

violations. Under Louisiana law, property seized incident to an

arrest is forfeited only after the DA institutes a hearing and

shows that essential factors for forfeiture have been met.3 In a

forfeiture proceeding, dismissal of the charges against the owner

of the seized property creates a rebuttable presumption that the

property will not be forfeited, unless the DA shows a compelling

reason for such forfeiture by clear and convincing evidence.4 

In October 1990, more than two years after the Defendants

seized Alexander's car, she filed suit in state court seeking

damages and the return of her car. In August 1991, one month

before the state suit was set for trial and nearly three years

after the car's seizure, the DA's office finally filed a motion

to forfeit the car - - instituting the forfeiture hearing

necessary for determining the proper final disposition of the

car. In October 1991, however, after the parties had submitted

evidence and presented testimony in the forfeiture proceeding,

the presiding judge suspended the forfeiture proceeding and

transferred it to the judge presiding over Alexander's state tort

action. 
 

5See Alexander v. Ieyoub [Alexander I], No. 92-4278 (5th

Cir. Jul. 2, 1993)(unpublished opinion).

 

6101 S.Ct. 1908 (1981), overruled in part not relevant here,

Daniels v. Williams, 106 U.S. 662 (1986).

 

7104 S.Ct. 3194 (1984).

 

891 S.Ct. 746 (1971).

4

Approximately two weeks after the forfeiture proceeding was

suspended, Alexander filed a §1983 suit against the Defendants in

district court, alleging that the Defendants had conspired to

deprive Alexander of her constitutional right to due process. 

The district court granted summary judgment in favor of the

Defendants on the basis of absolute immunity. On appeal, we

reversed the district court's ruling that the Defendants were

entitled to absolute immunity and remanded the case to the

district court.5

The Defendants then filed a motion in the district court to

dismiss Alexander's complaint for failure to state a claim, or

alternatively, for summary judgment, which the court granted. In

its opinion granting the motion, the district court dismissed

Alexander's suit based on Parratt v. Taylor6 and Hudson v.

Palmer7 (the Parratt/Hudson doctrine). In the alternative, the

district court held that abstention based on Younger v. Harris8

(the Younger abstention doctrine) also provided a basis for

granting the Defendants' motion. As the court considered the

Parratt/Hudson doctrine and the Younger abstention doctrine to be

dispositive of the case, it did not address further the legal

sufficiency of Alexander's complaint. Alexander timely appealed
 

9See Blackburn v. City of Marshall, 42 F.3d 925, 931 (5th

Cir. 1995)(reviewing de novo district court's dismissal for

failure to state claim upon which relief may be granted); Shabazz

v. Van Benschoten, 996 F.2d 1217 (table), No. 92-2380, 1993 WL

225324, at *2 (6th Cir. 1993)(unpublished opinion)(analyzing

Parratt/Hudson doctrine); Hall v. Arizona State Dep't of

Corrections, 977 F.2d 588 (table), No. 92-15641, 1992 WL 246984,

at *1 (9th Cir. 1992)(unpublished opinion)(examining

Parratt/Hudson doctrine). 

 

10See American Bank and Trust Co. v. Dent, 982 F.2d 917, 922

n.6 (5th Cir. 1993)(holding that abstention decisions are

generally reviewed under abuse-of-discretion standard).

 

11See id.

 

12See id.

5

the district court's ruling pro se. 

II

ANALYSIS

A. STANDARD OF REVIEW

Our review of the issue whether the district court properly

applied the Parratt/Hudson doctrine is de novo, as it is a

question of law.9 We review the district court's decision to

dismiss on Younger abstention grounds under an abuse-ofdiscretion standard.10 Our application of the abuse-ofdiscretion standard in reviewing a district court's decision to

abstain, however, is more stringent than in reviewing a district

court's evidentiary ruling.11 To abstain properly, the district

court must exercise its discretion strictly within the limits

imposed by the particular doctrine of abstention on which the

court relies.12
 

13See Hudson v. Palmer, 104 S.Ct. 3194, 3202-05 (1984);

Parratt v. Taylor, 101 S.Ct. 1908, 1913-17 (1981), overruled in

part on other grounds, Daniels v. Williams, 474 U.S. 327 (1986). 

See also Zinermon v. Burch, 110 S.Ct. 975, 985-86 (observing that

Supreme Court in Hudson and Parratt concluded that, as States

could not predict and therefore could not safeguard against

random and unauthorized deprivations through predeprivation

process, adequate postdeprivation remedies were sufficient

process).

 

14110 S.Ct. 975 (1990).

 

15Id. at 990.

6

B. PARRATT/HUDSON DOCTRINE

Under the Parratt/Hudson doctrine, a state actor's random

and unauthorized deprivation of a plaintiff's property does not

result in a violation of procedural due process rights if the

state provides an adequate postdeprivation remedy.13 The Supreme

Court observed in Zinermon v. Burch14 that, in the context of the

Parratt/Hudson doctrine, state officials could not characterize

their conduct as random and unauthorized if the state had

"delegated to them the power and authority to effect the very

deprivation complained of."15 Our examination of Alexander's

allegations leads us to conclude that the Parratt/Hudson doctrine

does not foreclose adjudication of her §1983 suit because the

"random and unauthorized" element necessary for its application

is absent.

We disagree with the Defendants' contention that their

actions in failing timely to institute a forfeiture proceeding

were unpredictable, intentional violations of state law that fell

within the ambit of the Parratt/Hudson doctrine and therefore

precluded Alexander from asserting a procedural due process claim
 

16See La. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 32:1550(C)(West 1989).

 

17Although the district court did not expressly state that

it had looked beyond the pleadings in dismissing Alexander's

suit, it ordered that the "Motion for Summary [J]udgment by

7

in her §1983 suit. Although the Louisiana statute providing for

a forfeiture proceeding gives the DA the authority to institute

the proceeding, it does not specify a time period within which

the DA should act.16 The Defendants therefore had the discretion

to institute the proceeding whenever they wanted, and their

actions in delaying for nearly three years, although

unreasonable, were not in conflict with their authority under

state law. 

Moreover, Alexander averred in her §1983 suit that the

Defendants were following their common practice for dealing with

seized property when they kept her car in custody without timely

instituting a forfeiture proceeding, and she supported her

assertion with corroborating evidence. As Alexander alleged that

the Defendants' failure timely to institute a forfeiture

proceeding was in accordance with their customary procedures, the

"random and unauthorized" element required for the application of

the Parratt/Hudson doctrine is not met. Alexander has also

submitted sufficient discrete evidence in support of her position

that the Defendants' conduct was not random and unauthorized to

demonstrate a genuine issue of material fact, immunizing her case

from summary judgment disposition based on the Parratt/Hudson

doctrine. The district court therefore erred in dismissing

Alexander's suit on the basis of the Parratt/Hudson doctrine.17
defendants should be GRANTED." In addition, the magistrate

judge's memorandum ruling considered evidence submitted outside

of the pleadings. Therefore, even though the district court

based its dismissal of Alexander's suit on the Parratt/Hudson

doctrine, which results in a failure to state a claim upon which

relief may be granted, and on abstention grounds, we find that it

also implicitly considered record evidence outside of the

pleadings in making its ruling.

 

18See Younger v. Harris, 91 S.Ct. 746, 751 (1971).

 

1995 S.Ct. 1200 (1975).

 

20See id. at 1208.

 

21See State v. Manuel, 426 So.2d 140, 143 (La. 1983)(object

of forfeiture proceeding is "to penalize for the commission of an

offense against the law" and "forfeiture is clearly a penalty for

the criminal offense and can result in even greater punishment

than the prosecution").

8

C. YOUNGER ABSTENTION DOCTRINE

The Younger abstention doctrine provides that federal

equitable relief is generally unavailable against pending state

criminal prosecutions except in narrowly defined and unusual

circumstances.18 The Supreme Court in Huffman v. Pursue19

extended the doctrine to state civil proceedings that were "both

in aid of and closely related to criminal statutes," as those

cases involved the same concerns of comity and federalism present

in state criminal proceedings.20

In the instant case, two state court proceedings are

pending: Alexander's tort claim seeking the car's release and

damages, and the state's forfeiture proceeding for which no date

has yet been fixed. Although the Louisiana Supreme Court has

recognized that a forfeiture proceeding is quasi-criminal21,

Younger abstention is not appropriate in the instant case. We
 

22See Lewis v. Beddingfield, 20 F.3d 123, 125 (5th Cir.

1994)(Younger not applicable to §1983 claim for damages); Allen

v. Louisiana State Bd. of Dentistry, 835 F.2d 100, 104 (5th Cir.

1988)("requests for monetary damages do not fall within the

purview of the Younger abstention doctrine"); Bishop v. State Bar

of Texas, 736 F.2d 292, 295 (5th Cir. 1984)(a §1983 claim for

damages is a "species of relief wholly unaffected by Younger").

9

have previously observed that the Younger abstention doctrine

does not apply to a suit seeking only damages.22 Even though

Alexander seeks both damages and the return of her car in the

pending state tort action, her federal §1983 suit seeks only

monetary relief for the Defendants' delay in instituting a

forfeiture proceeding. Thus, we conclude that the district court

abused its discretion by refusing, based on its unwarranted

reliance on Younger, to exercise its jurisdiction over

Alexander's §1983 suit.

III

CONCLUSION

 Alexander's allegation that the Defendants were acting in

their customary manner of failing timely to institute a

forfeiture proceeding negates the "random and unauthorized

conduct" element needed for application of the Parratt/Hudson

doctrine. We therefore conclude that the Parratt/Hudson doctrine

does not provide a proper basis for the district court's

dismissal of Alexander's §1983 suit alleging that the Defendants

violated her procedural due process rights.

In addition, as Alexander's §1983 suit seeks only monetary

damages for the Defendants' delay in instituting a forfeiture

proceeding, the district court's adjudication of her federal suit
10

would not impinge on the state's interest of determining its

asserted forfeiture rights in the pending quasi-criminal

forfeiture proceeding. Thus, the narrowly-defined Younger

abstention doctrine is inapplicable and the district court abused

its discretion in abstaining on that ground. Based on the

foregoing, the district court's ruling dismissing Alexander's

§1983 suit is reversed and the case is remanded to that court for

further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

REVERSED and REMANDED.