Court Opinion

ID: 9950261
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-03-13 17:01:29.080994+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:36:17.871620
License: Public Domain

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

TYRONE WILLIAMS,
Plaintiff,
V.

Civil Case No. 22-753 (RJL)

ROBERT A. DIXON, et al.,

Defendants.

ff

MEMORANDUM ORDER
(March /“- 2024) [Dkt. # 44]

In March 2022, plaintiff Tyrone Williams filed suit against Robert A. Dixon in his
official capacity as United States Marshal for the Superior Court of the District of
Columbia. Compl. [Dkt. #1] { 7. In the original complaint, Williams sought declaratory
and injunctive relief with respect to the United States Marshal Service’s policy for
conducting searches of men arriving at D.C. Superior Court from detention at the D.C. Jail.
Id. at J] 2-3. While the litigation was pending, Williams submitted tort claims to the
United States Marshal Service alleging that he was searched pursuant to the policy on
multiple occasions and those searches constituted battery and intentional infliction of
emotional distress. P1.’s Unopposed Mot. to Amend the Compl. [Dkt. #40] at 1-2. After
six months passed without a final disposition of his claims, Williams filed an amended
complaint in this action which sought to add the United States as a defendant and pursue
tort claims for damages against the United States pursuant to the Federal Tort Claims Act

(“FTCA”). Am. Compl. [Dkt. #41] 9] 6-9; 66-81.
In response to the amended complaint, the United States filed a motion to dismiss
the claims against it pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1) for lack of subject
matter jurisdiction. U.S.’s Mot. to Dismiss [Dkt. #44]. The FTCA waives the
Government’s sovereign immunity with respect to liability for money damages for certain
tort claims asserted against the United States, but it provides that “[a]n action shall not be
instituted upon a claim against the United States for money damages. . . unless the claimant
shall have first presented the claim to the appropriate Federal agency.” 28 U.S.C. §
2675(a). The Government does not dispute that this exhaustion requirement was met at
the time the amended complaint was filed in August 2023, but it argues that the FTCA
requires administrative exhaustion to occur before a lawsuit is “‘instituted” and therefore
the Court lacks subject matter jurisdiction over Williams’s FTCA claim because he did not
administratively exhaust before filing suit in March 2022. U.S.’s Mot. to Dismiss at 5-6.
In response, Williams argues that the FTCA only requires exhaustion to occur before a
claim is brought “against the United States for money damages,” which Williams did for
the first tme in August 2023 when he filed his amended complaint after administrative
exhaustion was complete. PI.’s Opp. to the U.S.’s Mot. to Dismiss [Dkt. #45] at 1-2.

The Court agrees with Williams’s reading of the FTCA’s exhaustion requirement.
The Government is of course correct that a plaintiff must exhaust administrative remedies
before filing an FTCA action against the United States. See McNeil v. United States, 508
U.S. 106, 113 (1993). However, an important distinction between McNeil and this case is
that in McNeil, the plaintiff's initial complaint brought “a claim against the United States

for money damages,” as contemplated by § 2675(a). Jd. at 107-08. Here, in contrast,
Williams’s initial complaint did not include a claim against the United States for money
damages, but rather only included claims for declaratory and injunctive relief against Mr.
Dixon in his official capacity. As the Ninth Circuit explained in Valadez-Lopez v. Chertoff,
“[t]here is nothing in the statute or our case law that would prevent a plaintiff from
amending an existing complaint asserting non-FTCA claims to name the United States as
a defendant and include FTCA claims once those claims have been administratively
exhausted.” 656 F.3d 851, 856 (9th Cir. 2011). The contrary cases cited by the
Government are inapposite because they all included a premature FTCA claim in the
original complaint. See, e.g., Edwards v. Dist. of Columbia, 616 F. Supp. 2d 112, 116
(D.D.C. 2009) (“[T]here is no dispute that Plaintiff did not administratively exhaust her
remedies under the FTCA prior to filing her suit alleging tort claims . . . and this Court
therefore lacks subject matter jurisdiction over Plaintiff's FTCA claims.’’); see also Lamb
v. Millennium Challenge Corp., 573 F. Supp. 3d 346, 357 (D.D.C. 2021) (construing the
pro se petitioner’s original complaint to be alleging a tort claim under the FTCA). Because
Williams satisfied the administrative exhaustion requirement in § 2675(a) before pursuing
a claim for money damages against the United States, this Court has subject matter
jurisdiction over his FTCA claims. Accordingly, it is hereby
ORDERED that the Government’s Motion to Dismiss is DENIED.

SO ORDERED.

—— \

C) ;
IC At Mt L AV\, Ay J
RICHARD J. LEON
United States District Judge