Opinion ID: 608806
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Dismissal of the RICO Claim

Text: 14 Appellants' argument on appeal that the District Court erred in dismissing the RICO claim with prejudice is unusual. Normally, litigants whose claims have been dismissed under Rule 12(b)(6) come to us asserting that the District Court erred in determining that they stated no claim upon which relief could be granted. Here, the argument before us is couched in terms of the Court's having erred in dismissing with prejudice without affording appellants an opportunity to amend. At no point do appellants, either in the District Court or before us, mount any serious attempt to defend the sufficiency of the RICO complaint. Although appellants do not in terms admit that their RICO complaint fails to state a claim, we take it as a given for purposes of this appeal. 1 See Carducci v. Regan, 714 F.2d 171, 177 (D.C.Cir.1983) (holding that where counsel has made no attempt to address [an] issue, we will not remedy the defect). 15 Nonetheless, in an exercise of excessive caution, we have reviewed the complaint to see if the District Court committed plain error in its determination. It did not. 16 In Danielsen v. Burnside Ott Aviation Training Center, 941 F.2d 1220, 1229-30 (D.C.Cir.1991), we set forth the elements necessary for recovery under 18 U.S.C. § 1964(c) (1988), which makes violations of 18 U.S.C. § 1962 (1988) civilly actionable. We will not rehash those elements here, but simply note that appellants failed at a fundamental level to plead the elements of a violation of either 18 U.S.C. § 1962(a), (b), or (c). 2 We further note that for a violation of § 1962 to [301 U.S.App.D.C. 399] be civilly actionable under § 1964, it must result in an injury to plaintiff's business or property. 18 U.S.C. § 1964(c); see also Yellow Bus Lines, Inc. v. Drivers, Chauffeurs & Helpers Local Union 639, 913 F.2d 948, 950 (D.C.Cir.1990) (en banc), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 111 S.Ct. 2839, 115 L.Ed.2d 1007 (1991). Appellants, while generically alleging injury, do not allege injury of the sort required by RICO, let alone the specific investment-based injury required for a claim under § 1962(a) or the acquisition-based injury required under § 1962(b). Danielsen, 941 F.2d at 1229-31. Perhaps the most egregious shortcoming is the failure properly to identify a RICO enterprise, a defect which we will discuss a bit more fully below. 17 We return, then, to the proposition with which we began discussion of the RICO claim, that is, that appellants assert error, not in the District Court's determination that they had stated no claim, but only in the court's dismissal of their claim with prejudice without entertaining any amendment. 18 Appellants argue that if allowed to proceed with their RICO claim, they would allege and prove facts entitling them to recovery under RICO. But we are not told what those facts might be. Appellees, by contrast, assert that the complaint was fatally defective in that it failed to allege an enterprise, the elements of any predicate act, or legally cognizable injury to appellants; because each of these is required under RICO, and because appellants could not possibly make allegations to satisfy all of them, they argue, dismissal with prejudice under Rule 12(b)(6) was proper. We agree. 19 It is true, as we have often stated, that [l]eave to amend should ordinarily be freely granted to afford a plaintiff an opportunity to test his claim on the merits. Gaubert v. Federal Home Loan Bank Bd., 863 F.2d 59, 69 (D.C.Cir.1988) (internal quotation marks omitted). Nonetheless, that decision in a particular case is left to the discretion of the district court, reviewable only for abuse of that discretion. Id. Here, not only do we see no abuse of discretion in the first instance, it appears that appellants never properly requested an opportunity to amend in the District Court. 20 Rule 15(a) allows a party to amend the party's pleadings once as a matter of course at any time before a responsive pleading is filed. FED.R.CIV.P. 15(a). As a motion to dismiss is not ordinarily considered a responsive pleading under Rule 15(a), see Glenn v. First Nat'l Bank in Grand Junction, 868 F.2d 368, 370 (10th Cir.1989), appellants could have amended their complaint as of right prior to the court's decision on the motions. Appellants did not exercise that right. Once the District Court granted appellees' motions to dismiss, appellants could amend the complaint only by leave of court or by written consent of the adverse party, FED.R.CIV.P. 15(a), coupled with a motion under Rule 59(e) to alter or amend the judgment. We agree with several of our sister circuits that a bare request in an opposition to a motion to dismiss--without any indication of the particular grounds on which amendment is sought, cf. FED.R.CIV.P. 7(b)--does not constitute a motion within the contemplation of Rule 15(a). See Glenn, 868 F.2d at 370; Wayne Inv. Inc. v. Gulf Oil Corp., 739 F.2d 11, 15 (1st Cir.1984). As appellants did not properly request leave to amend the RICO claim, it could hardly have been an abuse of discretion for the District Court not to have afforded them such leave sua sponte. 21 We offer two further observations in support of our conclusion that the District Court did not abuse its discretion here. First, appellants effectively have had multiple bites at the apple already. The purported RICO claim was, in effect, a restatement of their previous state court attempt. Second, the law does not require the doing of vain things. As noted above, appellants have yet to demonstrate that they can offer an amendment effective of a valid claim for relief. In particular, the existence of an enterprise is the very first step to a RICO action. Although appellants claim that appellees had an enterprise, the complaint never identifies one. Nowhere in the District Court proceedings did appellants ever identify the enterprise. Nowhere in their briefs did they identify their enterprise. When asked at oral argument, appellants' counsel stated first that Jefferson Davis Camp No. 305, Sons of Confederate Veterans, was the enterprise. He [301 U.S.App.D.C. 400] then seemed surprised when informed by the court that the same entity cannot be the RICO enterprise and a RICO defendant. See Yellow Bus Lines, Inc. v. Drivers, Chauffeurs & Helpers Local Union 639, 839 F.2d 782, 790 (D.C.Cir.1988) (holding that one entity may not serve as the enterprise and the person associated with it), vacated in part on other grounds, 913 F.2d 948 (D.C.Cir.1990) (en banc), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 111 S.Ct. 2839, 115 L.Ed.2d 1007 (1991). Next, appellants' counsel asserted that all the defendants together were the enterprise, a substitution that hardly solved the inconsistency with Yellow Bus. 22 Also, because the complaint fails to allege that appellants suffered injury from violations of § 1962, as analyzed by this court in Danielsen, 941 F.2d at 1230-31, the complaint necessarily fails to state a civil RICO claim as to CMA. 23 In short, we find no abuse of discretion in the remedy chosen by the District Court upon the granting of the Rule 12(b)(6) motion.