Opinion ID: 787097
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Vargas's Equal Protection Claims.

Text: 11 Under the Rooker-Feldman doctrine, inferior federal courts have no subject matter jurisdiction over suits that seek direct review of judgments of state courts, or that seek to resolve issues that are inextricably intertwined with earlier state court determinations. 4 While we have noted that the Supreme Court has provided little guidance in determining when claims are `inextricably intertwined' with a prior state court judgment, we have held that `inextricably intertwined' means, at a minimum, that where a federal plaintiff had an opportunity to litigate a claim in a state proceeding..., subsequent litigation will be barred under the Rooker-Feldman doctrine if it would be barred under principles of preclusion. Phifer v. City of New York, 289 F.3d 49, 55-56 (2d Cir.2002) (quoting Moccio, 95 F.3d at 199-200); see also Pennzoil Co. v. Texaco, Inc., 481 U.S. 1, 25, 107 S.Ct. 1519, 95 L.Ed.2d 1 (1987) (Marshall, J., concurring) (The federal claim is inextricably intertwined with the state-court judgment if the federal claim succeeds only to the extent that the state court wrongly decided the issues before it.). The doctrine is generally applied coextensively with principles of res judicata (claim preclusion) and collateral estoppel (issue preclusion). If a suit or claim would be barred in state court by either, Rooker-Feldman prevents the federal court from asserting subject matter jurisdiction. Moccio, 95 F.3d at 199-200. However, where, as here, a section 1983 action is brought by an unsuccessful Article 78 plaintiff, only issue preclusion triggers the Rooker-Feldman bar. New York's claim preclusion rule does not apply because a state court entertaining an Article 78 proceeding does not have the power to award the full measure of relief available in subsequent section 1983 litigation. Davidson v. Capuano, 792 F.2d 275, 278-79 (2d Cir.1986) (citing, inter alia, Schwab v. Bowen, 41 N.Y.2d 907, 908, 394 N.Y.S.2d 616, 363 N.E.2d 341 (1977)); see also Colon v. Coughlin, 58 F.3d 865, 870 n. 3 (2d Cir.1995). Thus, to determine whether Rooker-Feldman bars Vargas's section 1983 claims, we consider whether they are subject to issue preclusion under New York's collateral estoppel rules. 12 Under New York law, issue preclusion occurs if (1) the issue in question was actually and necessarily decided in a prior proceeding, and (2) the party against whom the doctrine is asserted had a full and fair opportunity to litigate the issue in the first proceeding. Colon, 58 F.3d at 869 (footnote omitted) (citing, inter alia, Kaufman v. Eli Lilly & Co., 65 N.Y.2d 449, 455, 492 N.Y.S.2d 584, 482 N.E.2d 63 (1985)). Accordingly, we must first determine whether the issue in Vargas's federal suit, which alleges individual and department-wide racial discrimination in selectively prosecuting Hispanic and other Minority police officers more often and more severely than their White counter-parts, Compl. ¶ 1, was actually and necessarily decided by the state court when it concluded that substantial evidence supported the determination that Vargas used excessive force and that the penalty of dismissal did not shock the conscience. The District Court concluded that it was, holding that in both suits Vargas sought to litigate the propriety of his termination and that the Appellate Division's finding that the termination decision was not arbitrary and capricious but was based on substantial evidence necessarily subsumes the question of whether it was made with discriminatory intent. Vargas II, 2003 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2850, at ,  19. We disagree. 5 13 While it is true that the Article 78 court passed upon the propriety of Vargas's termination, this acknowledgment does not demonstrate that the court actually and necessarily decided an issue that was never presented to it, even if that issue touched, in a general sense, on the propriety of the termination. For example, in Phifer, 289 F.3d at 58, we held that a mother's federal claim of racial discrimination with regard to a decision to remove a child from her custody could proceed even where she had unsuccessfully asserted racial discrimination on the part of City officials to the state Family Court. Although the Family Court had held that the child was removed ... from her mother in a lawful manner, its determination dealt only with allegations of racism insofar as they concerned the defendants actually involved in Family Court proceedings as opposed to those previously involved in the initial decision to remove the child. Id. at 54. We held that [b]ecause the family court did not ... `actually and necessarily decide []' the issue of whether the decision to remove [the child] was motivated by racism, Rooker-Feldman would not bar this claim. Id. at 58. 14 The mere failure to raise an issue in state court does not, however, invariably save a federal plaintiff from issue preclusion under Rooker-Feldman. This principle is illustrated by our earlier decision in Moccio, 95 F.3d at 201, where we held that even though the plaintiff's equal protection claim was never presented in state court, it was barred by Rooker-Feldman because the district court would have been forced to reconsider the precise issue on which the state court's decision rested — namely, whether a rational relationship existed between Moccio's punishment and his misconduct. Since Moccio did not allege that he was treated differently on the basis of a suspect classification, or his exercise of a fundamental right, the disparate treatment of which he complained needed only a rational basis in law to be upheld. See Heller v. Doe, 509 U.S. 312, 320, 113 S.Ct. 2637, 125 L.Ed.2d 257 (1993) (rational basis review for disparate treatment not on the basis of a suspect classification). We reasoned that this was precisely what the state court held when it found Moccio's punishment to be not so disproportionate to [his] offenses as to ... shock[] ... one's sense of fairness. Moccio, 95 F.3d at 201 (internal quotation marks omitted). Thus, to permit his equal protection claim would have require[d] the district court to decide an issue that was previously decided adversely to Moccio. Id. 15 The differences between Moccio and Vargas are significant since Vargas raises an equal protection claim based on a suspect classification for the first time in federal court. In DiBlasio v. Novello, 344 F.3d 292, 296 (2d Cir.2003), for example, we held that Rooker-Feldman did not bar DeBlasio's federal action because the only issue that had been decided in his Article 78 proceeding was whether, under the standards applicable to preliminary injunctions, he demonstrated that the summary suspension of his medical license was arbitrary and capricious. We concluded that deciding DiBlasio's due process claims in his favor in his later federal action would not necessarily contradict the Article 78 court's determination that his suspension was not arbitrary. The lower court cases that have interpreted Moccio to bar such claims — including Hernandez v. City of New York, No. 98 Civ. 7237(SAS), 2000 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1256 (S.D.N.Y. Feb. 1, 2000), on which the District Court below relied in concluding that the state court necessarily decided ... that the ... [termination] decision was not the product of disparate treatment where it held that the decision had a rational basis and was neither arbitrary nor capricious, Vargas II, 2003 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2850, at , — are therefore incorrect. 6 16 A correct application of Moccio is illustrated by Latino Officers Ass'n v. City of New York, 253 F.Supp.2d 771 (S.D.N.Y.2003), involving circumstances quite similar to those presented by this appeal. In Latino Officers, the district court considered the equal protection and First Amendment retaliation claims of three minority NYPD officers who, like Vargas, were dismissed for various infractions and brought unsuccessful Article 78 petitions challenging their dismissals. The first plaintiff neither raised nor had the Article 78 court decide whether his termination was discriminatory or retaliatory, so the court, distinguishing Moccio, held that his federal suit was not barred by Rooker-Feldman: 17 A finding that the decision to terminate was supported by substantial evidence — essentially a finding that it was rational — does not lead inexorably to the conclusion that race was not a motivating factor in the NYPD's decision to terminate him. Similarly, the court's determination that the penalty of termination did not `shock the conscience' essentially means that there was some rational basis for the termination, but does not preclude the possibility that race was a factor in determining the penalty. It is possible that race motivated defendants' decisions to terminate [the plaintiff], even though defendants had another articulated basis for the termination that the Article 78 court found to be rational. 18 Id. at 785 (footnotes omitted). The second plaintiff in Latino Officers, however, had contended in his Article 78 proceeding that his termination was retaliatory and discriminatory. The state court's conclusion that the penalty of dismissal did not shock the conscience, therefore, necessarily implied rejection of [his] claim that his termination was discriminatory and retaliatory. Id. at 787. In such circumstances, the federal claim [would] succeed[ ] only to the extent that the state court wrongly decided the issues before it, and is thus barred by Rooker-Feldman. Pennzoil, 481 U.S. at 25, 107 S.Ct. 1519 (Marshall, J., concurring). 19 In determining whether Rooker-Feldman applies, the distinction drawn in Latino Officers between the plaintiff who had raised his discrimination claim in state court and the one who did not is correct. Accordingly, we hold that the Rooker-Feldman doctrine would prevent the District Court from exercising subject matter jurisdiction over Vargas's equal protection claim only if Vargas had raised it in the state court proceedings. Since Vargas did not do so, his equal protection claim can proceed, and we vacate its dismissal by the District Court. 7 20