Opinion ID: 783388
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Claim Dismissed Under Rooker-Feldman

Text: 21 The district court dismissed Noel's fiduciary duty claim (claim 7) against the Halls under the Rooker-Feldman doctrine based on the pendency of Sandra Hall's suit in Skamania County Superior Court, in which essentially the same issue of fiduciary duty was being litigated between Hall and Noel. We disagree with the district court that Rooker-Feldman required dismissal.
22 The Rooker-Feldman doctrine takes its name from Rooker v. Fidelity Trust Co., 263 U.S. 413, 44 S.Ct. 149, 68 L.Ed. 362 (1923), and District of Columbia Court of Appeals v. Feldman, 460 U.S. 462, 103 S.Ct. 1303, 75 L.Ed.2d 206 (1983). Under Rooker-Feldman, a federal district court does not have subject matter jurisdiction to hear a direct appeal from the final judgment of a state court. The United States Supreme Court is the only federal court with jurisdiction to hear such an appeal. Rooker-Feldman is a statute-based doctrine, based on the structure and negative inferences of the relevant statutes rather than on any direct command of those statutes. See, e.g., In re Gruntz, 202 F.3d 1074, 1078 (9th Cir.2000) (en banc) ( Rooker-Feldman is not a constitutional doctrine. Rather, the doctrine arises out of a pair of negative inferences drawn from two statutes: 28 U.S.C. § 1331 ... and 28 U.S.C. § 1257....). 23 The principle that federal trial courts should not hear appeals from the state courts was incorporated into the original Judiciary Act of 1789. Under §§ 9 and 11 of the Act, federal district courts were courts of original jurisdiction, sitting in admiralty, and federal circuit courts were courts of original jurisdiction, sitting in diversity. See An Act To Establish the Judicial Courts of the United States, ch. 20, §§ 9, 11, 1 Stat. 73, 76-77, 78 (1789). They had no appellate jurisdiction over appeals from decisions of the state courts. 3 Only the Supreme Court had jurisdiction over direct appeals from state court decisions, conferred in § 25 of the Act. See id. § 25, 1 Stat. at 85-87. 24 The modern-day successors to these early statutes are, for the district court, 28 U.S.C. §§ 1331 (federal question), 1332 (diversity), and 1333 (admiralty), and, for the Supreme Court, 28 U.S.C. § 1257 (review of state court decisions). Under the modern statutory structure, the principle that there should be no appellate review of state court judgments by federal trial courts has two particularly notable statutory exceptions: First, a federal district court has original jurisdiction to entertain petitions for habeas corpus brought by state prisoners who claim that the state court has made an error of federal law. 28 U.S.C. § 2254. Second, a federal bankruptcy court has original jurisdiction under which it is empowered to avoid state judgments, see, e.g., 11 U.S.C. §§ 544, 547, 548, 549; to modify them, see, e.g., 11 U.S.C. §§ 1129, 1325; and to discharge them, see, e.g., 11 U.S.C. §§ 727, 1141, 1328. In re Gruntz, 202 F.3d at 1079. 25 In its routine application, the Rooker-Feldman doctrine is exceedingly easy. A party disappointed by a decision of a state court may seek reversal of that decision by appealing to a higher state court. A party disappointed by a decision of the highest state court in which a decision may be had may seek reversal of that decision by appealing to the United States Supreme Court. In neither case may the disappointed party appeal to a federal district court, even if a federal question is present or if there is diversity of citizenship between the parties. Rooker-Feldman becomes difficult—and, in practical reality, only comes into play as a contested issue— when a disappointed party seeks to take not a formal direct appeal, but rather its de facto equivalent, to a federal district court. 26 The Supreme Court has applied Rooker-Feldman to hold that a district court is without subject matter jurisdiction only in the two cases from which the doctrine takes its name. In Rooker, decided in 1923, the plaintiffs in federal court had lost a case in state court. The legal wrong alleged by the federal plaintiffs was that the state court had made errors in deciding their federal constitutional claims, rather than that the defendants had acted illegally. The federal plaintiffs brought a bill in equity seeking to have the state court judgment declared null and void because of the constitutional errors that the state court had allegedly made. 27 The Supreme Court in Rooker noted that it affirmatively appeared from the allegations in the bill that the state court had jurisdiction over the subject matter and the parties in the case, and that its judgment was therefore not void. Because the judgment was not void, the state court's alleged constitutional errors could be corrected only in an appropriate and timely appellate proceeding. Rooker, 263 U.S. at 415, 44 S.Ct. 149. To reverse or modify the judgment of the state court because of such errors would be an exercise of appellate jurisdiction possessed only by the Supreme Court. Id. at 416, 44 S.Ct. 149. Since the jurisdiction of the district court is strictly original, the Supreme Court affirmed the district court's jurisdictional dismissal of the bill with respect to those claims. Id. Reduced to its essence, Rooker held that when a losing plaintiff in state court brings a suit in federal district court asserting as legal wrongs the allegedly erroneous legal rulings of the state court and seeks to vacate or set aside the judgment of that court, the federal suit is a forbidden de facto appeal. 28 In Feldman, decided in 1983, the two federal plaintiffs, Feldman and Hickey, were graduates of unaccredited law schools who had petitioned to the local District of Columbia court for waivers from a court rule that, if applied, prevented them from sitting for the bar examination in the District. The rule had been promulgated by the same local court from which Feldman and Hickey sought the waivers. The federal plaintiffs petitioned the local court for waivers based on grounds of general fairness, federal antitrust law, and the Fifth Amendment. After the local court denied their petitions, they filed suit in federal district court. 29 In his federal suit, Feldman named the local court and its officers as defendants; sought a declaratory judgment that the local rule violated the Fifth Amendment 4 ; and sought an injunction that would require the defendants to admit him to the bar, to permit him to take the examination, or to determine whether his training and qualifications provided him the same competence as graduates of approved law schools. 5 Feldman, 460 U.S. at 468-69 & nn. 2-3, 103 S.Ct. 1303. The Supreme Court noted that the D.C. local court had acted both judicially and legislatively. In applying its rule to deny the individual petitions for waiver, it had acted judicially. Id. at 479, 103 S.Ct. 1303. In promulgating its rule, on the other hand, it had acted legislatively. Id. at 485-86, 103 S.Ct. 1303. 30 Corresponding to these two kinds of actions, the Court divided its analysis into two parts. First, the Court held that part of the federal plaintiff's suit was a forbidden de facto appeal of the judicial decision of the D.C. local court. [T]o the extent that Hickey and Feldman sought review in the District Court of the District of Columbia Court of Appeals' denials of their petitions for waiver, the District Court lacked subject matter jurisdiction over their complaints. Id. at 482, 103 S.Ct. 1303. The Court does not explain precisely why this part of the federal plaintiffs' suit is a forbidden appeal. We may infer its reason, however, from its having (1) told us that the decision of the D.C. local court in denying the petitions for waiver was a judicial act, and (2) described the structure of the federal suit ( i.e., naming the local court and its officials as defendants, alleging error by the local court, and seeking a remedy directly against the local court and its officers). 31 Second, the Court permitted the federal plaintiffs' challenge to the local court's legislative act of promulgating its rule regulating the bar examination. Id. at 487, 103 S.Ct. 1303. This was a challenge to the validity of the rule rather than a challenge to an application of the rule. The structure of the permitted challenge was the same as the structure of the forbidden de facto appeal (naming the local court and its officers as defendants, alleging error by the local court, and seeking a remedy directly against the local court and its officers). But because the federal plaintiffs were challenging a legislative rather than a judicial decision by the local court—and needed relief against that legislative act— it was appropriate that they structure this part of their suit in this way. 32 The federal plaintiffs had challenged the decisions of the local court as invalid under the Fifth Amendment, both as applied and on its face. Id. at 469 n. 3, 103 S.Ct. 1303. Once the Supreme Court decided that part of plaintiffs' suit was forbidden (the de facto appeal of the local court's judicial decision) and that part of their suit was permitted (the direct challenge to the local court's legislative decision), the Court had to decide what parts of the Fifth Amendment challenge were forbidden and permitted in federal court. 33 The Court's answer was fairly straightforward. To the extent that a Fifth Amendment issue was inextricably intertwined with an issue resolved by the local court in its judicial decision, the federal district court could not address that issue, for the district court would be, in effect, hearing a forbidden appeal from the judicial decision of the local court. In the words of the Court, [i]f the constitutional claims presented to a United States district court are inextricably intertwined with the state court's denial in a judicial proceeding of a particular plaintiff's application for admission to the state bar, then the district court is in essence being called upon to review the state-court decision. This the district court may not do. Id. at 483 n. 16, 103 S.Ct. 1303. On the other hand, to the extent that a Fifth Amendment issue was not inextricably intertwined with a decision of the local court in a judicial proceeding, and did not require review of a judicial decision in a particular case, the federal court had subject matter jurisdiction to address that issue. Id. at 486-87, 103 S.Ct. 1303. 34 Based on this answer, the plaintiffs' Fifth Amendment challenge broke neatly into two parts. The plaintiffs' as-applied challenge was, in effect, a request that the district court decide an issue that was inextricably intertwined with a judicial decision of a local court. The local court had applied the rule to the plaintiffs over their objection that the application violated the Fifth Amendment. The plaintiffs now brought essentially the same challenge in the district court. On the other hand, the plaintiffs' facial challenge was not inextricably intertwined with the judicial decision of the local court. Instead, it was a general challenge to the constitutionality of the rule, unrelated to any particular application. 6 35 So understood, the operation and purpose of the inextricably intertwined test in Feldman is fairly clear. A federal district court dealing with a suit that is, in part, a forbidden de facto appeal from a judicial decision of a state court must refuse to hear the forbidden appeal. As part of that refusal, it must also refuse to decide any issue raised in the suit that is inextricably intertwined with an issue resolved by the state court in its judicial decision. 36 The premise for the operation of the inextricably intertwined test in Feldman is that the federal plaintiff is seeking to bring a forbidden de facto appeal. The federal suit is not a forbidden de facto appeal because it is inextricably intertwined with something. Rather, it is simply a forbidden de facto appeal. Only when there is already a forbidden de facto appeal in federal court does the inextricably intertwined test come into play: Once a federal plaintiff seeks to bring a forbidden de facto appeal, as in Feldman, that federal plaintiff may not seek to litigate an issue that is inextricably intertwined with the state court judicial decision from which the forbidden de facto appeal is brought. As Judge Ebel held in Facio v. Jones, 929 F.2d 541, 543 (10th Cir.1991), a federal district court plaintiff was barred by Rooker-Feldman from seeking to vacate and to set aside a previously-entered state court judgment because his federal suit was a forbidden de facto appeal. The federal plaintiff was also forbidden to seek a declaratory judgment invalidating the state court rule on which the state court decision relied, 7 for the plaintiff's request for declaratory relief [was] inextricably intertwined with his request to vacate and to set aside the [state court] judgment. Id. 37 As a practical matter, the inextricably intertwined test of Feldman is likely to apply primarily in cases in which the state court both promulgates and applies the rule at issue — that is, to the category of cases in which the local court has acted in both legislative and a judicial capacity— and in which the loser in state court later challenges in federal court both the rule and its application. Cases involving bar admission rules, such as Feldman itself, fall in this category. See, e.g., Tofano v. Supreme Court of Nevada, 718 F.2d 313 (9th Cir.1983) (involving a Nevada rule establishing a passing grade on the state bar examination). Cases involving litigation and attorney disciplinary rules also fall into this category. See, e.g., Partington v. Gedan, 961 F.2d 852 (9th Cir.1992) (involving a litigation rule). 38 The Supreme Court has never, outside of Rooker and Feldman themselves, employed the doctrine to hold that a federal district court is without subject matter jurisdiction. The Court has barely discussed the doctrine since its decision in Feldman, although in three later cases it has held that the doctrine does not apply. In Verizon Maryland Inc. v. Public Service Commission, 535 U.S. 635, 644 n. 3, 122 S.Ct. 1753, 152 L.Ed.2d 871 (2002), it held that Rooker-Feldman does not apply to a suit in which review is sought in federal district court of executive action, including determinations made by a state administrative agency. In Johnson v. De Grandy, 512 U.S. 997, 1006, 114 S.Ct. 2647, 129 L.Ed.2d 775 (1994), it held that Rooker-Feldman does not apply to a federal court suit brought by a non-party to the state court suit. And in Pennzoil Co. v. Texaco, Inc., 481 U.S. 1, 107 S.Ct. 1519, 95 L.Ed.2d 1 (1987), it did not dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, but rather abstained under Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37, 91 S.Ct. 746, 27 L.Ed.2d 669 (1971). See also Pennzoil, 481 U.S. at 18, 107 S.Ct. 1519 (Scalia, J., concurring) (I do not believe that the so-called Rooker-Feldman doctrine deprives the Court of jurisdiction....). 39 The Court's caution in cases after Rooker and Feldman is understandable in light of two well-established rules that would be in tension with an overly broad reading of the Rooker-Feldman doctrine. They are, first, the rule that overlapping or even identical federal and state court litigation may proceed simultaneously, limited only by doctrines of abstention and comity; and, second, the rule of 28 U.S.C. § 1738, under which a federal court must give the same preclusive effect to a state court judgment as the state courts of that state would themselves give to that judgment. 40 The rule that permits simultaneous litigation in state and federal court of overlapping and even identical cases is deeply rooted in our system. As the Court wrote in Atlantic Coast Line Railroad v. Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers, 398 U.S. 281, 90 S.Ct. 1739, 26 L.Ed.2d 234 (1970): [T]he state and federal courts had concurrent jurisdiction in this case, and neither court was free to prevent either party from simultaneously pursuing claims in both courts. Id. at 295, 90 S.Ct. 1739 (citing Kline v. Burke Constr. Co., 260 U.S. 226, 43 S.Ct. 79, 67 L.Ed. 226 (1922)). The Court has recognized that this rule can produce inefficient simultaneous litigation in state and federal courts on the same issue.... But this is one of the costs of our dual court system.... Parsons Steel, Inc. v. First Ala. Bank, 474 U.S. 518, 524-25, 106 S.Ct. 768, 88 L.Ed.2d 877 (1986); see also Doran v. Salem Inn, Inc., 422 U.S. 922, 928, 95 S.Ct. 2561, 45 L.Ed.2d 648 (1975) ([T]he very existence of one system of federal courts and 50 systems of state courts, all charged with the responsibility for interpreting the United States Constitution, suggests that on occasion there will be duplicating and overlapping adjudication of cases which are sufficiently similar in content, time, and location to justify being heard before a single judge had they arisen within a unitary system.); Green v. City of Tucson, 255 F.3d 1086, 1097-98 (9th Cir.2001) (en banc) (holding that parallel state and federal litigation is inherent in our legal system, and that the possibility of duplicative litigation is a price of federalism). 41 The inefficiencies produced by the rule permitting simultaneous litigation in state and federal court are mitigated by a number of abstention doctrines that permit, and often require, a federal court to abstain in favor of state court litigation. They include Younger abstention, after Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37, 91 S.Ct. 746, 27 L.Ed.2d 669 (1971); Pullman abstention, after Railroad Commission of Texas v. Pullman Co., 312 U.S. 496, 61 S.Ct. 643, 85 L.Ed. 971 (1941); Burford abstention, after Burford v. Sun Oil Co., 319 U.S. 315, 63 S.Ct. 1098, 87 L.Ed. 1424 (1943); and Colorado River abstention, after Colorado River Water Conservation District v. United States, 424 U.S. 800, 96 S.Ct. 1236, 47 L.Ed.2d 483 (1976). In addition, a federal court may stay its proceedings based on comity even when none of the abstention doctrines requires that it do so. See Deakins v. Monaghan, 484 U.S. 193, 202-03, 108 S.Ct. 523, 98 L.Ed.2d 529 (1988). These federalism-based abstention and comity doctrines are complex and subtle, ensuring that a decision by a federal court to proceed, abstain, or stay in the face of parallel state court litigation will be made only after considering a number of case- and doctrine-specific factors. 42 The rule of interjurisdictional preclusion embodied in 28 U.S.C. § 1738, the Full Faith and Credit Act, is equally deeply rooted. The Act was first passed in 1790, a year after the first Judiciary Act, see Act of May 26, 1790, ch. 11, 1 Stat. 122, and has not been significantly changed since its original enactment. Section 1738 tells a federal court what to do when there has been parallel litigation in state and federal court (as permitted under the first rule), and the state court suit has gone to judgment before the federal suit. It provides that the state judicial proceedings... shall have the same full faith and credit in every court within the United States ... as they have by law or usage in the courts of such State ... from which they are taken. As repeatedly construed by the Supreme Court, in decisions both before and after Feldman, § 1738 requires a federal district court to give the same— not more and not less—preclusive effect to a state court judgment as that judgment would have in the state courts of the state in which it was rendered. As the Court wrote in Kremer v. Chemical Construction Corp., 456 U.S. 461, 102 S.Ct. 1883, 72 L.Ed.2d 262 (1982): Section 1738 requires federal courts to give the same preclusive effect to state court judgments that those judgments would be given in the courts of the State from which the judgments emerged. Id. at 466, 102 S.Ct. 1883 (emphasis added); see also Matsushita Elec. Indus. Co. v. Epstein, 516 U.S. 367, 369, 116 S.Ct. 873, 134 L.Ed.2d 6 (1996) (Absent a partial repeal of the Full Faith and Credit Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1738, by another federal statute, a federal court must give the judgment the same effect that it would have in the courts of the State in which it was rendered. (emphasis added)); Parsons Steel, 474 U.S. at 523, 106 S.Ct. 768 ([U]nder the Full Faith and Credit Act a federal court must give the same preclusive effect to a state-court judgment as another court of that State would give. (emphasis added)); Migra v. Warren City Sch. Dist. Bd. of Educ., 465 U.S. 75, 82-85, 104 S.Ct. 892, 79 L.Ed.2d 56 (1984) (same); Allen v. McCurry, 449 U.S. 90, 96, 101 S.Ct. 411, 66 L.Ed.2d 308 (1980) (same). 43 The Court has emphasized that § 1738 is a critical part of the architecture of federalism. [It] not only reduce[s] unnecessary litigation and foster[s] reliance on adjudication, but also promote[s] the comity between state and federal courts that has been recognized as a bulwark of the federal system. Allen, 449 U.S. at 95-96, 101 S.Ct. 411, 66 L.Ed.2d 308. Section 1738, designed to take into account concerns of both finality and federalism, requires a federal court to give precisely the preclusive effect to a state court judgment that the state prescribes for its own courts. If a state court judgment is not entitled to preclusive effect under the law of that state, subsequent litigation in federal court is no more precluded by that judgment than subsequent litigation in state court. The Supreme Court has never construed the Rooker-Feldman doctrine to give greater preclusive effect to a state court judgment in federal court than the judgment would have under § 1738. Indeed, such a construction of Rooker-Feldman would directly conflict with § 1738 as that statute has been construed by the Court.
44 We have never in this circuit applied the Rooker-Feldman doctrine so broadly as to conflict with either the rule permitting parallel state and federal litigation or the rule of § 1738 requiring federal courts to follow state preclusion rules. In seven cases in this circuit, we have held that Rooker-Feldman barred forbidden de facto appeals from state court decisions. To the extent there is a lead case, it is Worldwide Church of God v. McNair, 805 F.2d 888 (9th Cir.1986), in which disappointed state court defendants brought suit in federal district court. They named as a federal defendant the state superior court, alleged as a legal wrong that the state court jury verdict was unconstitutional, and sought an injunction against the enforcement of the state court judgment based on the verdict. We held that the federal suit was barred by Rooker-Feldman. To the extent the federal plaintiffs sought to bring a direct challenge to the correctness of the decision of the state court, this was a forbidden de facto appeal. To the extent they sought in the same suit to bring a more general constitutional challenge, that challenge was inextricably intertwined with (to the degree that it could be separated at all from) the forbidden direct appeal. Id. at 892-93. 45 In Bianchi v. Rylaarsdam, 334 F.3d 895 (9th Cir.2003), Bianchi had lost an appeal in front of a three-judge panel of the California Court of Appeal. He then brought a motion in that court alleging that his federal and state constitutional rights to due process had been violated because a justice whom Bianchi had disqualified when he was a judge on the California Superior Court, and who had subsequently been elevated to the Court of Appeal, sat on the appellate panel. The Court of Appeal denied the motion, and the California Supreme Court denied a Writ of Mandate asserting the same constitutional claims. Id. at 897. Bianchi then filed suit in federal district court against the three appellate justices who had decided his appeal claiming that his federal due process right had been violated and seeking to have the appellate court's opinion vacated and the case reassigned to a different panel. We held that the district court lacked jurisdiction because Bianchi essentially asked the federal court to review the `state court's denial in a judicial proceeding' of his constitutional claim. Id. at 898 (quoting Feldman, 460 U.S. at 483 n. 16, 103 S.Ct. 1303). 46 In Olson Farms v. Barbosa, 134 F.3d 933 (9th Cir.1998), the California Agricultural Labor Relations Board (ALRB) had held that Olson Farms (Olson) was subject to its jurisdiction, and then held that Olson had failed to bargain in good faith with its employees. Olson sought review of that decision in the California Supreme Court, which denied review. In a separate case, the ALRB made the same jurisdictional determination for the same period. Olson appealed that decision to the California Court of Appeal, which affirmed. Olson filed suit in federal district court against the members of the ALRB, asserting as a legal wrong the allegedly incorrect jurisdictional determinations of the ALRB and the state courts. Relying on Worldwide Church of God, we held that Olson sought to have the district court... review the past jurisdictional decisions of the ALRB and the state courts, and that this was a forbidden de facto direct appeal. Id. at 936. 47 In Partington v. Gedan, 961 F.2d 852 (9th Cir.1992), the Hawaii Supreme Court found that Partington had violated a state court rule and assessed a $50 fine, payable to the discretionary fund of the dean of the Hawaii Law School. Partington then brought suit in federal district court. He named as defendants the justices of the state supreme court, alleged that the Hawaii Supreme Court justices and the dean of the law school had violated several of his constitutional rights by levying and collecting the fine, and sought a return of the $50. Id. at 857. Relying on Feldman, we wrote that Partington asked the district court to review a specific state court decision interpreting a state court rule, and held that the district court had no subject matter jurisdiction under Rooker-Feldman. Id. at 865. 48 In Allah v. Superior Court, 871 F.2d 887 (9th Cir.1989), the Los Angeles Superior Court had dismissed Allah's suit for failure to comply with a discovery order. Allah then brought a pro se suit in federal district court, alleging that the dismissal by the state court violated his constitutional rights. We held that this was a forbidden de facto appeal under Rooker-Feldman : To the extent that Allah requested the district court to conduct a direct review of the state court's judgment and to scrutinize the state court's application of various rules and procedures pertaining to his case, the district court lacked subject matter jurisdiction over his complaint. Id. at 891. 49 In MacKay v. Pfeil, 827 F.2d 540 (9th Cir.1987), the Alaska Superior Court had entered judgment against MacKay for his deceased ex-wife's expenses in enforcing a custody decree. The state court later entered a default judgment against MacKay in an action to enforce the earlier judgment. MacKay appealed neither judgment within the state court system, but instead filed suit in federal district court. He alleged that the state court had erred in finding that it had personal jurisdiction over him and in holding that the damage award was consistent with the consent decree. He sought from the district court `a declaration that the Purported Judgment is void,' and `orders restraining and enjoining the Defendants from seeking to enforce the Purported Judgment.' Id. at 543 (internal quotation marks omitted). We held the federal suit barred under Rooker-Feldman. 50 Finally, in Tofano v. Supreme Court of Nevada, 718 F.2d 313 (9th Cir.1983), the Nevada Supreme Court had denied Tofano admission to the state bar because of his low score on the Nevada Bar Examination. Tofano filed suit against the state supreme court in federal district court, specifically challenging the decision in his own individual case and generally challenging the procedures used to grade the examination. We held that Tofano's challenge to the denial of admission by the court in his individual case was barred as a forbidden de facto direct appeal under Feldman. However, we upheld the district court's jurisdiction over the general challenge to the grading procedures, holding that this challenge did not require review of [the] final state court judgment in[his] particular case. Id. at 314 (quoting Feldman, 460 U.S. at 486, 103 S.Ct. 1303). 51 It is commonplace for the lower federal courts to complain that the Rooker-Feldman doctrine is difficult to apply. See, e.g., Brokaw v. Weaver, 305 F.3d 660, 664-65 (7th Cir.2002) (complaining of the difficulty); Gottfried v. Med. Planning Servs., Inc., 142 F.3d 326, 330 (6th Cir.1998) ( Rooker-Feldman stands for the simple (yet nonetheless confusing) proposition that lower federal courts do not have jurisdiction to review a case litigated and decided in state court....); Bates v. Jones, 131 F.3d 843, 863 (9th Cir.1997) (It is difficult to articulate a general rule for identifying the circumstances under which the applicability of Rooker-Feldman and of res judicata are not essentially coextensive. This may be what inspired a leading commentator in the field of Civil Procedure to describe the Rooker-Feldman doctrine as `some-what peculiar.'); Harris v. N.Y. State Dep't of Health, 202 F.Supp.2d 143, 159 n. 2 (S.D.N.Y.2002) ([C]onfusion continues in the federal courts on the relation between preclusion and the Rooker-Feldman doctrine. (internal quotation marks omitted)); Zealy v. City of Waukesha, 153 F.Supp.2d 970, 980 (E.D.Wis. 2001) ([T]he distinction between Rooker-Feldman and claim preclusion is difficult to draw.). 52 But the Supreme Court's decisions in Rooker and Feldman, and our seven decisions applying the Rooker-Feldman doctrine to deny jurisdiction, fall into a relatively clear pattern: It is a forbidden de facto appeal under Rooker-Feldman when the plaintiff in federal district court complains of a legal wrong allegedly committed by the state court, and seeks relief from the judgment of that court. There are two kinds of cases in which such a forbidden de facto appeal might be brought. 53 First, the federal plaintiff may complain of harm caused by a state court judgment that directly withholds a benefit from (or imposes a detriment on) the federal plaintiff, based on an allegedly erroneous ruling by that court. This was the case in Feldman, where the local court had refused to grant to the federal plaintiffs a waiver of the local bar admission rule. This was also the case in Partington, where the Hawaii Supreme Court had assessed a fine against the federal plaintiff, and in Tofano, where the Nevada Supreme Court had refused to admit the federal plaintiff to the state bar. 54 Second, the federal plaintiff may complain of a legal injury caused by a state court judgment, based on an allegedly erroneous legal ruling, in a case in which the federal plaintiff was one of the litigants. This was the case in Rooker, where the state court had already decided a case between two sets of private litigants. The disappointed state court litigants then brought suit in federal court asserting as their legal injury the state court judgment based on an alleged legal error committed by that court. This was also the case in Worldwide Church of God, where the federal plaintiff complained of legal injury caused by a judgment based on an allegedly unconstitutional jury verdict; in Bianchi where the federal plaintiff complained of legal injury caused by the state Court of Appeal judgment refusing to set aside the earlier judgment despite the failure of an appellate justice to recuse himself; in Olson Farms, where the federal plaintiff complained of legal injury caused by state court decisions based on an allegedly incorrect holding that the ALRB had jurisdiction over Olson; in Allah, where the federal plaintiff complained of legal injury caused by the state court judgment allegedly wrongly dismissing his case; and in MacKay, where the federal plaintiff complained of legal injury caused by the state court judgment based on its allegedly incorrect holdings that it had personal jurisdiction over him and that his actions violated the consent decree. 55 On the other hand, where the federal plaintiff does not complain of a legal injury caused by a state court judgment, but rather of a legal injury caused by an adverse party, Rooker-Feldman does not bar jurisdiction. If the federal plaintiff and the adverse party are simultaneously litigating the same or a similar dispute in state court, the federal suit may proceed under the long-standing rule permitting parallel state and federal litigation. See, e.g., Atl. Coast Line, 398 U.S. at 295, 90 S.Ct. 1739 ([T]he state and federal courts had concurrent jurisdiction in this case, and the parties could simultaneously pursu[e] claims in both courts.). Or if the federal plaintiff and the adverse party have already litigated the state court suit to judgment, the federal plaintiff may be precluded from relitigating that dispute under the interjurisdictional preclusion rule of 28 U.S.C. § 1738. See, e.g., Kremer, 456 U.S. at 466, 102 S.Ct. 1883 (Section 1738 requires federal courts to give the same preclusive effect to state court judgments that those judgments would be given in the courts of the State from which the judgments emerged.). In neither situation does Rooker-Feldman bar subject matter jurisdiction in federal district court, for in neither situation is the federal plaintiff complaining of legal injury caused by a state court judgment because of a legal error committed by the state court. Rather, in both situations, the plaintiff is complaining of legal injury caused by the adverse party. 56 We believe that the following general formulation describes the distinctive role of the Rooker-Feldman doctrine in our federal system: If a federal plaintiff asserts as a legal wrong an allegedly erroneous decision by a state court, and seeks relief from a state court judgment based on that decision, Rooker-Feldman bars subject matter jurisdiction in federal district court. If, on the other hand, a federal plaintiff asserts as a legal wrong an allegedly illegal act or omission by an adverse party, Rooker-Feldman does not bar jurisdiction. If there is simultaneously pending federal and state court litigation between the two parties dealing with the same or related issues, the federal district court in some circumstances may abstain or stay proceedings; or if there has been state court litigation that has already gone to judgment, the federal suit may be claim-precluded under § 1738. But in neither of these circumstances does Rooker-Feldman bar jurisdiction. This formulation of the Rooker-Feldman doctrine is consistent with the two cases themselves; with all our cases holding that Rooker-Feldman bars jurisdiction; with the two long-established rules permitting simultaneous state and federal litigation, and requiring federal courts to apply the preclusion rules of the states under § 1738; and with many (though not all) of the formulations of the Rooker-Feldman doctrine in other circuits. 57 Of the formulations in the other circuits, we find most notable (and most useful) the similar formulation of the Seventh Circuit, first articulated at some length by Judge Easterbrook in GASH Associates v. Village of Rosemont, 995 F.2d 726, 728-29 (7th Cir.1993): 58 [B]oth [ Rooker-Feldman and preclusion] define the respect one court owes to an earlier judgment. But the two are not coextensive. Preclusion in federal litigation following a judgment in state court depends on the Full Faith and Credit Statute, 28 U.S.C. § 1738, which requires the federal court to give the judgment the same effect as the rendering state would.... The Rooker-Feldman doctrine, by contrast, has nothing to do with § 1738. It rests on the principle that district courts have only original jurisdiction.... The Rooker-Feldman doctrine asks: is the federal plaintiff seeking to set aside a state judgment, or does he present some independent claim, albeit one that denies a legal conclusion that a state court has reached in a case to which he was a party? If the former, then the district court lacks jurisdiction; if the latter, then there is jurisdiction and state law determines whether the defendant prevails under principles of preclusion. 59 . . . . 60 ... To put this differently, the injury of which GASH complains was caused by the judgment, just as in Rooker, Feldman, and Ritter [ v. Ross, 992 F.2d 750 (7th Cir.1993)]. GASH did not suffer an injury out of court and then fail to get relief from state court; its injury came from the [state court] judgment.... 61 The GASH formulation has been repeated, with slight variations, many times in the Seventh Circuit. See, e.g., Garry v. Geils, 82 F.3d 1362, 1366-67 (7th Cir.1996) ([T]he distinction between a federal claim alleging injury caused by a state court judgment (necessarily raising the Rooker-Feldman doctrine) and a federal claim alleging a prior injury that a state court failed to remedy (raising a potential res judicata problem but not a Rooker-Feldman problem) has been recognized in this circuit at least since our decision in GASH.  (emphasis in original)); Jensen v. Foley, 295 F.3d 745, 747-48 (7th Cir.2002) (The Rooker-Feldman doctrine, generally speaking, bars a plaintiff from bringing a § 1983 suit to remedy an injury inflicted by the state court's decision.... Preclusion, on the other hand, applies when a federal plaintiff complains of an injury that was not caused by the state court, but which the state court has previously failed to rectify. (emphasis in original)); see also Lewis v. Anderson, 308 F.3d 768, 772 (7th Cir.2002) (same); Durgins v. City of E. St. Louis, 272 F.3d 841, 844 (7th Cir.2001) (same); Rizzo v. Sheahan, 266 F.3d 705, 714 (7th Cir.2001) (same); Centres, Inc. v. Town of Brookfield, 148 F.3d 699, 702 (7th Cir.1998) (same); Young v. Murphy, 90 F.3d 1225, 1231 (7th Cir.1996) (same).
62 Applying our general formulation of the Rooker-Feldman doctrine to Noel's fiduciary duty claim is straight-forward. When the district court dismissed this claim, Sandra Hall and Noel were litigating a very similar, perhaps identical, fiduciary duty claim in Hall's state court suit in Skamania County. The magistrate judge applied the inextricably intertwined analysis of Feldman to conclude that, because [the fiduciary duty claims] could have been raised in the parties' Skamania County litigation, or were already specifically addressed in that litigation, the federal claims are barred under Rooker-Feldman, and the district court adopted the magistrate judge's analysis. This was error. 63 The inextricably intertwined analysis of Feldman applies to defeat federal district court subject matter jurisdiction only when a plaintiff's suit in federal district court is at least in part a forbidden de facto appeal of a state court judgment, and an issue in that federal suit is inextricably intertwined with an issue resolved by the state court judicial decision from which the forbidden de facto appeal is taken. This was the case presented in Feldman itself, and in our decision in Worldwide Church of God. We have never held that when there are simultaneous suits in state and federal court, in which related or inextricably intertwined claims are being litigated, the federal suit must be dismissed under Rooker-Feldman. Indeed, we could not so hold without violating the rule that permits simultaneous state and federal suits involving not only inextricably intertwined, but even identical, claims. The Supreme Court has repeatedly stated that simultaneous state and federal litigation of overlapping, and even identical, issues is an important feature of our federal system, see, e.g., Parsons Steel, 474 U.S. at 524-25, 106 S.Ct. 768; Doran v. Salem Inn, 422 U.S. at 928, 95 S.Ct. 2561; Atl. Coast Line, 398 U.S. at 295, 90 S.Ct. 1739, and we will not interpret the Rooker-Feldman doctrine to destroy that feature. 64 The pending suit in Skamania County Superior Court therefore does not prevent Noel from pursuing his fiduciary duty claim simultaneously in his federal court suit, and we reverse the district court's dismissal of that claim.