Opinion ID: 747825
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Fundamental Fairness in the Civil Forfeiture

Text: 42 Dunmore asserts that the United States' conduct in prosecuting this civil forfeiture was fundamentally unfair and thus violated the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause. Dunmore lists the following alleged due process violations: (1) the sealing of the Affidavit occasioned a prejudicial delay in these forfeiture proceedings; (2) the Complaint was not sufficiently particular to meet the requirements of Supplemental Federal Rule of Civil Procedure E(2)(a); (3) the United States sought and obtained a protective order which prevented him from discovering the basis of this forfeiture action; (4) his real property was sold pursuant to an interlocutory order before he had a chance to challenge this forfeiture action on the merits; and (5) the United States used the pendency of the civil forfeiture action to deny him his right to due process in his criminal proceedings. These Fifth Amendment claims are reviewed de novo. See Thody, 978 F.2d at 628. 43 Dunmore's contention of delay caused by the sealing of the Affidavit is ill-conceived; it was Dunmore, not the United States or the district court, who delayed this action by asking that the proceedings be stayed. After the United States informed him that he was also the subject of an ongoing criminal investigation, Dunmore sought a stay of the forfeiture proceedings on the grounds that 44 it would be unfair to require ... Dunmore to undergo discovery proceedings including interrogatories and depositions in this action, and perhaps requiring him to exercise his Constitutional Rights under the Fifth Amendment of the United States Constitution to refuse to answer questions that might tend to incriminate him in order to protect himself from the proposed and anticipated criminal charge. 45 Accordingly, the significant delay in this proceeding was occasioned by Dunmore's actions, not the actions of the United States. 46 Dunmore argues that he was forced to request a stay by the United States' decision to proceed contemporaneously against him civilly and criminally. He has not cited, however, and this court has not found any case holding that the United States is precluded from exercising its rights under § 881 contemporaneous with a criminal investigation. This court affirmatively rejects Dunmore's call to create such a blanket rule. A thorough review of the record, especially when viewed in light of Dunmore's request to stay the civil proceeding during the pendency of the criminal investigation and prosecution, reveals that Dunmore's due process rights were not violated by the actions of the United States in this case. 47 Dunmore contends that the Complaint was not sufficiently particular to meet the requirements of Supplemental Federal Rule of Civil Procedure E(2)(a). Tenth Circuit precedent appropriately admonishes that in order to comport with Rule E(2)(a)'s requirement of particularity, the complaint in a civil forfeiture action under section 881 must allege specific facts sufficient to support an inference that the property is subject to forfeiture under the statue. United States v. $39,000 in Canadian Currency, 801 F.2d 1210, 1219 (10th Cir.1986). Although the Complaint in this case was not sufficiently particular upon filing, under the particular facts of this case, the United States' motion for partial summary judgment and its attachments satisfied the requirements of Rule E(2)(a). 48 Shortly after the filing of the Complaint, Dunmore filed a motion for disclosure of the Affidavit. In response to that motion, the United States informed Dunmore that it wished to keep the Affidavit sealed because it contained information relevant to an ongoing criminal investigation of Dunmore. In light of this disclosure, Dunmore moved to stay the civil forfeiture proceeding during the pendency of any further criminal investigation. The district court granted the stay and ordered the United States to inform the court when the criminal investigation was complete. Accordingly, during the pendency of the stay requested by Dunmore, the United States was under no duty to file a more particularized complaint and Dunmore was not disadvantaged because he was not obligated to actively defend the action. 49 After Dunmore's conviction in Missouri on federal drug charges, the United States filed a motion to lift the stay. That same day, the United States filed a motion for partial summary judgment with attachments which clearly and particularly informed Dunmore of the basis of the United States' claim for forfeiture of the personal property. Accordingly, at the very moment the stay was lifted, Dunmore had all of the information which a more particularized complaint would have provided. Thus, under the particular facts of this case, the United States' summary judgment motion satisfied the requirements of Rule E(2)(a) and negated the need for a more particularized complaint. 50 As to Dunmore's allegation that the United States violated his due process rights by seeking a stay of discovery, we note only that the United States does not deny a litigant's due process rights by seeking a court order to protect itself from burdensome and/or frivolous discovery requests. The discovery requests at issue here included a large number of interrogatories directed to non-parties in apparent violation of Fed.R.Civ.P. 33, 10 as well as a request for the production of documents that the United States contends relate to matters that were fully and fairly litigated in Dunmore's criminal trial. In light of the nature of Dunmore's requests, the United States asserts that the district court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to allow the discovery. See GWN Petroleum Corp. v. Ok-Tex Oil & Gas, Inc., 998 F.2d 853, 858 (10th Cir.1993) (noting that a district court's discovery rulings are reviewed for abuse of discretion). 51 Based on the record before this court, Dunmore has not met his burden of demonstrating that the district court abused its discretion in refusing to grant his discovery requests. The interrogatories propounded by Dunmore were apparently directed to persons not parties to this litigation in violation of Fed.R.Civ.P. 33. See University of Texas v. Vratil, 96 F.3d 1337, 1340 (10th Cir.1996) (Under Fed.R.Civ.P. 33(a), interrogatories may only be directed to a party to an action.). More importantly, it is clear from the record before this court that Dunmore was fully apprised of the basis for the United States' forfeiture action through the United States' motion for partial summary judgment, which included as attachments the Affidavit and both testimony and exhibits from Dunmore's criminal trial. Dunmore's contention that the discovery limitations impeded his ability to learn the most basic information concerning the Government's justification for its claims is clearly without merit. The district court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to grant Dunmore's discovery requests. 52 This court can resolve Dunmore's two remaining due process contentions in relatively short order. For the reasons set out in III.B.1, all claims that implicate the validity of the forfeiture of Dunmore's real property should have been brought in the Western District of Missouri as a defense to the criminal forfeiture of that property. As to Dunmore's contention that the United States used this civil proceeding to deny him his right to due process in his criminal trial, we note only that those issues should have been raised by Dunmore in his criminal trial in the Western District of Missouri and his appeal to the Eighth Circuit.