Court Opinion

ID: 9554323
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-08 17:12:33.128247+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:30:28.177276
License: Public Domain

Case: 22-50413         Document: 00516849572               Page: 1      Date Filed: 08/08/2023

             United States Court of Appeals
                  for the Fifth Circuit
                                                                                   United States Court of Appeals
                                                                                            Fifth Circuit

                                            FILED
                                      ____________
                                                                                        August 8, 2023
                                        No. 22-50413                                    Lyle W. Cayce
                                      ____________                                           Clerk

   Samuel San Miguel,

                                                                       Plaintiff—Appellant,

                                              versus

   Greg Abbott, Texas Governor; Marsha McLane, Texas Civil
   Commitment Center Office, Executive Director; Michael Searcy, Texas
   Civil Commitment Center Office, Operation Spec.; Jessica Marsh, Texas
   Civil Commitment Center Office, Deputy Director; Wellpath Recovery
   Solutions; Management Training Corporation,

                                               Defendants—Appellees.
                      ______________________________

                     Appeal from the United States District Court
                          for the Western District of Texas
                               USDC No. 1:21-CV-566
                     ______________________________

   Before Duncan and Wilson, Circuit Judges, and Schroeder, District
   Judge. *
   Per Curiam: †

         _____________________
         *
             District Judge of the Eastern District of Texas, sitting by designation.
         †
             This opinion is not designated for publication. See 5th Cir. R. 47.5.
Case: 22-50413        Document: 00516849572             Page: 2      Date Filed: 08/08/2023

                                        No. 22-50413

           Plaintiff-Appellant Samuel San Miguel, proceeding pro se and in forma
   pauperis, appeals the district court’s grant of motions to dismiss filed by
   Defendants-Appellees Greg Abbott, Marsha McLane, Michael Searcy,
   Jessica Marsh, Wellpath Recovery Solutions, and Management Training
   Corporation (collectively, “Defendants”). San Miguel also appeals the
   district court’s orders denying his motion for preliminary injunction and his
   motion to alter or amend the judgment.
                                              I.
           In 2002, San Miguel pled guilty to two counts of aggravated sexual
   assault of a child and was sentenced to thirteen years in prison. Near the end
   of San Miguel’s imprisonment, the State of Texas filed a petition to have him
   civilly committed as a sexually violent predator (“SVP”) under the Texas
   Sexually Violent Predator Act (“SVPA”). See Tex. Health & Safety
   Code §§ 841.001–.153. 1 Following a jury trial, San Miguel was civilly
   committed under the SVPA.
           In 2021, San Miguel sued Defendants under 42 U.S.C. § 1983,
   alleging that the SVPA is so punitive that it constitutes a criminal—rather
   than civil—statute, which violates his constitutional rights. Defendants
   subsequently moved to dismiss pursuant to Federal Rules of Civil Procedure
   12(b)(1) and 12(b)(6). San Miguel moved for a preliminary injunction. The
   district court granted Defendants’ motions and dismissed San Miguel’s
   complaint with prejudice pursuant to Rule 12(b)(6), explaining that San
   Miguel failed to “allege that there are no circumstances under which the
   SVPA would be valid, and the Texas state courts have found both the original
           _____________________
           1
             The SVPA permits the civil commitment of SVPs who have committed multiple
   sexually violent offenses and are found to suffer from behavioral abnormalities that make
   them likely to commit additional sexually violent offenses. Tex. Health & Safety
   Code §§ 841.001, .003(a).

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Case: 22-50413      Document: 00516849572           Page: 3     Date Filed: 08/08/2023

                                     No. 22-50413

   and amended SVPAs to be non-punitive.” It also denied San Miguel’s
   motion for preliminary injunction as he could not “show he is substantially
   likely to succeed on the merits.” San Miguel then filed a motion to alter or
   amend the judgment under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59(e). The
   district court denied this motion too, and San Miguel timely appealed.
                                          II.
          We review de novo a district court’s grant of a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to
   dismiss, accepting well-pled facts as true and viewing those facts in the light
   most favorable to the plaintiff. Dorsey v. Portfolio Equities, Inc., 540 F.3d 333,
   338 (5th Cir. 2008). “To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must
   contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to state a claim to relief
   that is plausible on its face.” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009)
   (quotation and citation omitted). We construe a pro se litigant’s brief
   liberally, but the litigant “must still brief the issues and reasonably comply
   with the standards” outlined in Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 28.
   Grant v. Cuellar, 59 F.3d 523, 524 (5th Cir. 1995) (per curiam).
                                         III.
          On appeal, San Miguel contends that the district court erred in
   (1) granting Defendants’ motions to dismiss, (2) denying his motion for
   preliminary injunction, and (3) denying his Rule 59(e) motion. At the
   threshold, we note that San Miguel’s brief fails to comply with Rule 28 by
   failing to include a jurisdictional statement or a summary of the argument
   identifying the district court’s purported errors. See Fed. R. App. P.
   28(a)(4), (7). Nonetheless, we have “considered a pro se appellant’s brief
   despite its technical noncompliance with the Rules of Civil Procedure when
   it at least argued some error on the part of the district court.” Grant, 59 F.3d
   at 524–25. Construed liberally, we understand San Miguel’s brief to contend,
   with respect to Defendants’ motions to dismiss and his motion for

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Case: 22-50413        Document: 00516849572              Page: 4       Date Filed: 08/08/2023

                                          No. 22-50413

   preliminary injunction, that the district court erred by failing to consider
   certain arguments, case law, and legislative history. As such, we will consider
   San Miguel’s brief to the extent it bears on the district court’s disposition of
   those motions. 2 Id.
           We specifically consider San Miguel’s argument that the district court
   erred in granting Defendants’ motions to dismiss and that the SVPA is a
   criminal statute that violates his constitutional rights. San Miguel contends
   that this challenge to the SVPA is not facial. However, “to categorize a
   challenge as facial or as-applied we look to see whether the ‘claim and the
   relief that would follow . . . reach beyond the particular circumstances of the
   [] plaintiff[].’” Cath. Leadership Coal. of Tex. v. Reisman, 764 F.3d 409, 426
   (5th Cir. 2014) (first alteration in original) (quoting Doe v. Reed, 561 U.S. 186,
   194 (2010)).       Because his requested relief extends beyond his own
   circumstances and would invalidate the SVPA in its entirety, we conclude
   that San Miguel lodges a facial challenge. Id.
           To sustain a facial constitutional challenge to a statute, “the
   challenger must establish that no set of circumstances exists under which the
   [law] would be valid.” United States v. Salerno, 481 U.S. 739, 745 (1987). San
   Miguel, however, has not properly alleged that there is no set of
   circumstances in which the SVPA would be valid. For this reason, we
   conclude he fails adequately to allege a facial challenge to the SVPA, and that

           _____________________
           2
             San Miguel “fails to advance arguments in the body of [his] brief in support of”
   his contention that the district court erred in failing to grant his Rule 59(e) motion. See
   Justiss Oil Co. v. Kerr-McGee Refin. Corp., 75 F.3d 1057, 1067 (5th Cir. 1996). Accordingly,
   “we consider [this] issue[] abandoned” and decline to consider its merits. Id.; see also
   Rollins v. Home Depot USA, 8 F.4th 393, 397 (5th Cir. 2021) (“A party forfeits an
   argument . . . by failing to adequately brief the argument on appeal.”).

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Case: 22-50413        Document: 00516849572              Page: 5       Date Filed: 08/08/2023

                                          No. 22-50413

   the district court did not err in granting Defendants’ motions to dismiss. 3 See
   Ctr. for Individual Freedom v. Carmouche, 449 F.3d 655, 662–63 (5th Cir.
   2006).
            Separately, in the light of the district court’s judgment denying
   permanent injunctive relief, as well as our affirmance of the district court’s
   Rule 12(b)(6) dismissal of San Miguel’s claims, we conclude that San
   Miguel’s appeal of his motion for preliminary injunction is moot. See Koppula
   v. Jaddou, 72 F.4th 83, 84 (5th Cir. 2023) (“[T]here is no need for a
   preliminary injunction to preserve the status quo during the pendency of trial
   court proceedings that are now over,” as a “denial of permanent relief moots
   the appeal from a denial of preliminary relief.”); see also La. World Exposition,
   Inc. v. Logue, 746 F.2d 1033, 1037–38 (5th Cir. 1984) (citing Payne v. Fite, 184
   F.2d 977, 978 (5th Cir. 1950)).
                             AFFIRMED in part; DISMISSED in part as moot.

            _____________________
            3
              To the extent San Miguel challenges the SVPA as applied based on his conditions
   of confinement, we conclude that he has forfeited this argument by failing to address the
   district court’s conclusion that our precedent in Brown v. Taylor, 911 F.3d 235, 243–44 (5th
   Cir. 2018) (per curiam), precludes such a challenge. See Rollins, 8 F.4th at 397; see also
   Washington v. Scott, 786 F. App’x 483, 485 (5th Cir. 2019) (per curiam) (collecting cases
   and holding that a pro se appellant “waived his ability to challenge” a district court’s
   decision by “not address[ing] the basis of the . . . decision”).

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