Court Opinion

ID: 9392972
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-05-08 19:00:43.899128+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:18:50.140234
License: Public Domain

USCA11 Case: 22-13796     Document: 30-1      Date Filed: 05/08/2023      Page: 1 of 13

                                                     [DO NOT PUBLISH]
                                     In the
                 United States Court of Appeals
                          For the Eleventh Circuit

                            ____________________

                                  No. 22-13796
                            Non-Argument Calendar
                            ____________________

        HENRI N. BEAULIEU, JR.,
                                                          Plaintiff-Appellant,
        versus
        SAMUEL POWELL,
        individually, and in his official capacity as a
        State Trooper for the State of Alabama,
        CALERA, CITY OF,
        a municipality located in and a political
        subdivision of Shelby County, Alabama,
        CALERA POLICE DEPARTMENT, CITY OF,
        a department of the City of Calera in Shelby
        County, Alabama,
        ANDREW BELL,
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        2                       Opinion of the Court               22-13796

        individually and in his official as a law
        enforcement officer/former law enforcement
        officer for the City of Calera, Alabama,
        JORDAN MATTHEW LAWLEY,
        an individual, et al.,

                                                       Defendants-Appellees,

        JESSICA SELF, et al.,

                                                                Defendants.

                            ____________________

                  Appeal from the United States District Court
                     for the Northern District of Alabama
                     D.C. Docket No. 2:22-cv-00878-ACA
                           ____________________

        Before ROSENBAUM, LAGOA, and BRASHER, Circuit Judges.
        PER CURIAM:
              Henri Beaulieu appeals the district court’s order dismissing
        his amended 42 U.S.C. § 1983 civil-rights complaint on “shotgun
        pleading” grounds and denying further amendment. After careful
        review, we affirm.
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        22-13796               Opinion of the Court                       3

                                         I.
                According to the amended complaint, Beaulieu and his fam-
        ily live on property adjacent to a public swimming pool in a nearby
        subdivision. They have repeatedly complained to the Calera Police
        Department about excessive noise at the pool during the summer
        months, but officers have done little and the noise continues una-
        bated. Beaulieu’s wife—an attorney who represents Beaulieu in
        this case—and parents also filed a nuisance lawsuit in Alabama state
        court relating to the pool noise, for which Beaulieu has attempted
        to conduct surveillance and gather evidence.
                Beaulieu asserts constitutional claims under § 1983 stem-
        ming from this noise dispute. His claims largely relate to an en-
        counter on July 16, 2020, when he drove to the subdivision to try
        to confirm the identities of pool users for the lawsuit, as he had
        done several times before. While Beaulieu was stopped in his ve-
        hicle on a public street in the subdivision, Officer Andrew Bell ap-
        proached and said he had received a couple of calls about Beaulieu.
        Bell was aware of Beaulieu and the nuisance lawsuit, and he said
        that the surveillance conduct was legal but that Beaulieu “had to
        keep moving,” despite the presence of other parked vehicles on the
        street.
                Beaulieu kept moving through the subdivision and then “cir-
        cled back around” to the same area, where Bell was speaking with
        Samuel Powell, a state trooper and former Calera police officer
        who lived in the subdivision, as well as a “Third Responding Of-
        ficer” and Jordan Lawley, a subdivision resident. While working as
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        4                       Opinion of the Court                 22-13796

        a Calera officer, Powell had responded to a noise complaint at
        Beaulieu’s residence and had become confrontational with Beau-
        lieu and his wife, whom Powell had accused in Facebook posts of
        lying about the pool noise. Powell was also named as a defendant
        in the nuisance lawsuit.
                When Beaulieu stopped to check with the officers, Powell
        said he had received a call about a suspicious vehicle outside his
        house, and he accused Beaulieu of “disorderly conduct.” He took
        no further action, though, and Beaulieu left the subdivision. Before
        Beaulieu left, Bell told Beaulieu he was free to be in the area so long
        as he complied with the traffic code. The Third Responding Of-
        ficer, for his part, “pace[d] nervously.” As this happened, Rachel
        Lawley, who was married to Jordan Lawley, made disparaging
        comments about Beaulieu on Facebook.
               The next day, July 17, 2018, Beaulieu observed Powell and
        Jordan Lawley speaking together at the pool and pointing out
        Beaulieu’s surveillance cameras. Beaulieu called out “smile” so
        they would look towards the camera and he could identify them.
        Not long after that, an attorney for the subdivision’s homeowners’
        association called Beaulieu’s wife based on a complaint that Beau-
        lieu had been taking pictures of children at the pool.
              After these events, Powell and Jordan Lawley filed harass-
        ment complaints with the police department, and Powell obtained
        a no-contact order against Beaulieu. This “quasi-civil matter” was
        dismissed when Beaulieu agreed to stay out of the subdivision for
        nine months.
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        22-13796                Opinion of the Court                         5

               Neither Beaulieu nor his family has returned to the subdivi-
        sion, making it “virtually impossible” to identify pool users for the
        lawsuit. Nor has Beaulieu been able to obtain body-camera foot-
        age from the City related to the July 16 encounter or other inci-
        dents.
                                          II.
                Beaulieu filed his initial complaint in July 2022 against eight
        named defendants, two described-but-unnamed defendants, and
        other John Doe defendants. The complaint was thirty-one pages
        and eighty-four numbered paragraphs long, with various lettered
        subparagraphs. It included causes of action under both federal and
        state law, organized into two sections titled simply, “Constitutional
        Claims” and “State Law Claim(s).” Under Constitutional Claims,
        Beaulieu alleged not only myriad due-process violations, but also
        an unlawful seizure, First Amendment retaliation, defamation,
        false light, and conspiracy.
                The district court sua sponte reviewed and struck the com-
        plaint as an improper “shotgun pleading.” In the court’s view, the
        complaint was deficient under Rules 8 and 10, Fed. R. Civ. P., be-
        cause the causes of action were not separated into counts or claims
        but were instead grouped together into two broad sections. Plus,
        those sections both “incorporate[d] by reference every preceding
        paragraph,” further muddying the claims and their supporting fac-
        tual allegations.
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        6                      Opinion of the Court                 22-13796

                The district court ordered Beaulieu to file an amended com-
        plaint that “contained a separate count for each claim that contains
        a factual basis for that claim only,” with a heading for each count
        that identified “the specific [d]efendant(s) against whom the claim
        is asserted” and “the statute or law under which the claim is
        brought.”
               In an amended complaint, Beaulieu reduced the length of
        the pleading to twenty-three pages and seventy-two numbered par-
        agraphs, and he dropped two named defendants and a described-
        but-unnamed defendant. The causes of action remained split into
        two sections: “Section 1983 Action for Violations of the Fourteenth
        Amendment Due Process Clause Under Color of Law” and “State
        Law Claim(s).” As before, both sections incorporated by reference
        all preceding paragraphs.
                The first section begins by asserting claims based on Beau-
        lieu’s July 16 encounter with Bell and Powell. It alleges, first, that
        Bell, Powell, the Third Responding Officer, and the Lawleys, indi-
        vidually and in conspiracy with each other, denied Beaulieu due
        process of law by preventing him from stopping on a public street
        to gather evidence. The alleged wrongful conduct included the fol-
        lowing: (a) Bell told Beaulieu that he could not stop on a public
        street; (b) Powell “threatened and intimidated” him with a show of
        force and a false claim of disorderly conduct; (c) the Third Respond-
        ing Officer “did nothing to intervene and appeared nervous”; and
        (d) Rachel Lawley made malicious statements about him on Face-
        book. Second, and relatedly, the amended complaint asserts that
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        22-13796               Opinion of the Court                        7

        Bell, Powell, and the Third Responding Officer conspired with
        each other and the City to destroy or not preserve body-camera
        footage from the July 16 encounter.
                The first section also reaches more broadly. One paragraph
        asserts that, after the encounter, Powell and Jordan Lawley filed
        false reports of harassment with the police department, that Beau-
        lieu had to “surrender his liberty without cause” to resolve Powell’s
        false complaint, and that the “Defendants’ actions” were motivated
        by evil intent or reckless indifference to Beaulieu’s “federally pro-
        tected rights.” Another paragraph charges the City with failing to
        enforce its police-camera policies and failing to properly train and
        instruct its officers in the use and preservation of camera footage,
        not just in relation to the July 16 encounter but to other prior en-
        counters and the civil nuisance lawsuit.
                The defendants moved to dismiss the amended complaint
        on several grounds, including that the amended complaint re-
        mained a shotgun pleading. Beaulieu responded in opposition and
        also filed two additional amended complaints, which prompted ad-
        ditional motions to dismiss.
               The district court dismissed the amended complaint as a
        shotgun pleading and rejected Beaulieu’s attempts at further
        amendment. In the court’s view, the amended complaint suffered
        from the “same deficiencies” as the original complaint, which the
        court had instructed Beaulieu to cure when it sua sponte dismissed
        that complaint as a shotgun pleading. The court further found that
        Beaulieu’s second and third amended complaints were
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        8                      Opinion of the Court                 22-13796

        procedurally improper, and that, in any case, the amendments
        were futile because they failed to remedy the deficiencies of the
        prior complaints. Because Beaulieu “made no meaningful effort to
        correct” those deficiencies despite receiving notice and specific in-
        structions on how to cure them, the court dismissed Beaulieu’s fed-
        eral claims with prejudice and the supplemental state-law claims
        without prejudice. Beaulieu now appeals.
                                         III.
               We first consider Beaulieu’s challenge to the dismissal of his
        amended complaint as a shotgun pleading. We review for abuse
        of discretion a district court’s decision to dismiss a complaint as an
        impermissible shotgun pleading. Vibe Micro, Inc. v. Shabanets,
        878 F.3d 1291, 1294 (11th Cir. 2018).
               “Shotgun pleadings” are complaints that violate federal
        pleading rules by “fail[ing] to one degree or another, and in one
        way or another, to give the defendants adequate notice of the
        claims against them and the grounds upon which each claim rests.”
        Weiland v. Palm Beach Cnty. Sheriff’s Office, 792 F.3d 1313, 1320
        (11th Cir. 2015); see Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2) & 10(b). We have “little
        tolerance for shotgun pleadings” because they “waste judicial re-
        sources, inexorably broaden the scope of discovery, wreak havoc
        on appellate court dockets, and undermine the public’s respect for
        the courts.” Vibe Micro, 878 F.3d at 1295 (cleaned up).
              We have identified four rough types of shotgun pleadings.
        Weiland, 792 F.3d at 1321–24. A complaint may qualify as a
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        22-13796               Opinion of the Court                         9

        shotgun pleading if it (1) “contain[s] multiple counts where each
        count adopts the allegations of all preceding counts”; (2) is “replete
        with conclusory, vague, and immaterial facts not obviously con-
        nected to any particular cause of action”; (3) does not separate
        “each cause of action or claim for relief” into a different count; or
        (4) “assert[s] multiple claims against multiple defendants without
        specifying which of the defendants are responsible for which acts
        or omissions, or which of the defendants the claim is brought
        against.” Id. At bottom, though, the issue is not one of form or
        pleading technicalities, but rather substance—that is, whether the
        complaint gives defendants fair “notice of the specific claims
        against them and the factual allegations that support those claims.”
        Id. at 1325.
               “A district court has the inherent authority to control its
        docket and ensure the prompt resolution of lawsuits, which in-
        cludes the ability to dismiss a complaint on shotgun pleading
        grounds.” Vibe Micro, 878 F.3d at 1295 (quotation marks omitted).
        Before dismissing a complaint on shotgun-pleading grounds,
        though, the court must “sua sponte allow a litigant one chance to
        remedy such deficiencies.” Id. The court should “explain how the
        offending pleading violates the shotgun pleading rule” and order
        the plaintiff to replead the case. Id. at 1295–96. “If that chance is
        afforded and the plaintiff fails to remedy the defects, the district
        court does not abuse its discretion in dismissing the case with prej-
        udice on shotgun pleading grounds.” Jackson v. Bank of America,
        N.A., 898 F.3d 1348, 1358 (11th Cir. 2018).
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        10                          Opinion of the Court                  22-13796

               Here, the district court did not abuse its discretion in dis-
        missing the amended complaint as a shotgun pleading. As the
        court observed, the amended complaint falls into the first and third
        rough types of shotgun pleadings. It “contain[s] multiple counts
        where each count adopts the allegations of all preceding counts.”
        Weiland, 792 F.3d at 1321. And it does not separate “each cause of
        action or claim for relief” into a different count, which we de-
        scribed more fully above. Id. at 1323. Beaulieu does not dispute
        that the amended complaint bears these characteristics. Because
        Beaulieu received notice of these same deficiencies and instructions
        to cure them when the court struck the original complaint and or-
        dered him to replead, it follows that the court “d[id] not abuse its
        discretion in dismissing the case with prejudice on shotgun plead-
        ing grounds.” Jackson, 898 F.3d at 1358.
                Beaulieu responds that, despite these “technical[]” deficien-
        cies, the amended complaint still provided adequate notice of the
        specific claims against the defendants. We disagree.
               To start, while Beaulieu correctly notes that Rule 10(b) does
        not require plaintiffs to state each cause of action in a separate
        count unless “doing so would promote clarity,” Fed. R. Civ. P.
        10(b), he ignores the court’s order to comply with that requirement
        after reviewing his initial complaint. 1 In other words, the court

        1 Fed. R. Civ. P. 10(b) states,
                A party must state its claims or defenses in numbered para-
                graphs, each limited as far as practicable to a single set of
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        22-13796                 Opinion of the Court                            11

        determined that “doing so would promote clarity” for Beaulieu’s
        claims, but Beaulieu offers no justification for his failure to follow
        the court’s instructions and separate his claims into distinct counts.
                Not only that, but Beaulieu’s amended complaint fails “to
        identify his claims with sufficient clarity to enable the defendant to
        frame a [responsive] pleading.” Sledge v. Goodyear Dunlop Tires
        N. Am., Ltd., 275 F.3d 1014, 1018 n.8 (11th Cir.2001). The pleading
        essentially presents a narrative detailing the history of the noise dis-
        pute and Beaulieu’s and his family’s grievances with the City, po-
        lice officers, and subdivision residents arising from that dispute. It
        then broadly asserts that the defendants’ conduct, both public and
        private, amounts to a violation of his due-process rights.
               Yet Beaulieu fails to identify with any clarity how the de-
        fendants denied him due process, other than to assert he had a right
        to be on a public street to gather evidence for a lawsuit. And when
        we omit the unsupported assertions of “conspiracy” and “collu-
        sion,” the connection between the denial of that purported right
        and much of the alleged wrongful conduct—including malicious
        comments on Facebook, false reports of harassment, or the failure
        to preserve evidence—is difficult to discern. “If [Beaulieu] himself
        cannot offer a coherent explanation for how [or at what point he

               circumstances. A later pleading may refer by number to a par-
               agraph in an earlier pleading. If doing so would promote clar-
               ity, each claim founded on a separate transaction or occur-
               rence—and each defense other than a denial—must be stated
               in a separate count or defense.
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        12                     Opinion of the Court                 22-13796

        was denied due process], we cannot expect the defendants” or the
        court to do it for him by digging through his scattershot allegations.
        Barmapov v. Amuial, 986 F.3d 1321, 1325 (11th Cir. 2021).
               Given the vague and expansive nature of the alleged consti-
        tutional injury, the amended complaint was likely to generate
        equally unfocused responsive pleadings and to “impose unwar-
        ranted expense” on the litigants and the court. See Jackson, 898
        F.3d at 1356–57. Because the district court provided Beaulieu—
        who is represented by counsel—notice and an opportunity to cure,
        and Beaulieu failed to remedy the deficiencies, our shotgun-plead-
        ing caselaw permitted the district court to dismiss with prejudice.
        See id. at 1358; Vibe Micro, 878 F.3d at 1295.
                                         IV.
               Finally, Beaulieu maintains that the district court abused its
        discretion by denying him the right to amend once as a matter of
        course and by concluding that the second and third amended com-
        plaints were still subject to dismissal as shotgun pleadings. For the
        reasons explained below, we need not decide whether the second
        amended complaint was filed “as a matter of course.” See Fed. R.
        Civ. P. 15(a)(1).
              Rather, we agree with the district court that, even assuming
        without deciding it was procedurally proper, the second amended
        complaint did not fix the shotgun-pleading issues the court identi-
        fied when it struck the original complaint and ordered repleading.
        Despite some changes in the presentation of the causes of action,
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        22-13796               Opinion of the Court                       13

        the second amended complaint continues to “contain[] multiple
        counts where each count adopts the allegations of all preceding
        counts” and to not separate “each cause of action or claim for re-
        lief” into a different count. See Weiland, 792 F.3d at 1321–23. Nor
        can we say that it provides the defendants with any more clarity
        about the “claims against them and the grounds upon which each
        claim rests” than the amended complaint, since it does little to nar-
        row the vague and expansive nature of the alleged constitutional
        injury. See id. at 1323. As for the third amended complaint, it vio-
        lated the court’s order not to incorporate other pleadings. And be-
        cause it purported to incorporate the whole of the second amended
        complaint, it was likewise subject to dismissal on shotgun-pleading
        grounds. The district court acted within its discretion by rejecting
        these amendments.
              For these reasons, we affirm the dismissal with prejudice of
        Beaulieu’s federal claims and the dismissal without prejudice of the
        supplemental state-law claims. See Vibe Micro, 878 F.3d at 1296–
        97 (where a complaint has been dismissed with prejudice on shot-
        gun pleading grounds, supplemental state law claims should be dis-
        missed “without prejudice as to refiling in state court”).
              AFFIRMED.