Court Opinion

ID: 9904736
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-11-27 18:01:05.67023+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:21:13.871810
License: Public Domain

NOT PRECEDENTIAL

                   UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
                        FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
                             ___________

                                 No. 23-2673
                                 ___________

                           ERCOLE A. MIRARCHI,
                                           Appellant

                                       v.

     UNITED STATES EXECUTIVE BRANCH OF THE GOVERNMENT;
   UNITED STATES EXECUTIVE BRANCH OF THE GOVERNMENT; JOHN
 FETTERMAN, United States Senator, PA; DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE PA AND
 WDC; FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION PA AND WDC; SECURITIES
 AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION WDC; CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY;
    COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA EXECUTIVE BRANCH OF
  GOVERNMENT; COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA SECRETARY OF
 STATE; ARMSTRONG COUNTY PA BOARD OF ELECTIONS; CABLE NEWS
NETWORK, AKA CNN; EDISON RESEARCH; FAIRFAX FINANCIAL HOLDINGS
              LTD; MARSHALL & SWIFT/ BOECKH LLC
               ____________________________________

                 On Appeal from the United States District Court
                     for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania
                            (D.C. No. 2:23-cv-01549)
                 District Judge: Honorable Mitchell S. Goldberg
                  ____________________________________

      Submitted Possible Dismissal Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B) or
      Summary Action Pursuant to Third Circuit L.A.R. 27.4 and I.O.P. 10.6
                             on October 26, 2023

             Before: BIBAS, MATEY, and CHUNG, Circuit Judges

                      (Opinion filed: November 27, 2023)
                  ____________________________________
                                       ___________

                                        OPINION *
                                       ___________

PER CURIAM

    Pro se litigant Ercole Mirarchi appeals from the District Court’s August 29, 2023 or-

der that, among other things, dismissed his amended complaint as frivolous pursuant to

28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B)(i). For the reasons that follow, we will summarily affirm that

decision.

                                              I.

    In April 2023, Mirarchi filed in the District Court a document titled “Report to Court

(This Is Not a Lawsuit) Under 18 U.S. Code § 2382” (hereinafter “the Report”). Therein,

Mirarchi claimed, inter alia, that “a falsified record crime” had gone “unpunished by the

Eastern District Courts,” and that, for years, primary and general elections in this country

“have been rigged at all levels of government.” (Dist. Ct. docket # 1, at 1 (emphasis

omitted).) He asserted that “it is proper for the citizen who uncovered [this election

fraud] to report it to Authorities as treason and a coup d’état.” (Id.)

       The District Court Clerk docketed the Report as a civil complaint, and the District

Court then entered an order addressing that filing. The District Court observed that “it is

not clear that Mirarchi intended to pursue a lawsuit.” (Dist. Ct. Order entered May 8,

2023, at 1 n.1.) To the extent that he did intend to pursue one, the District Court

*
  This disposition is not an opinion of the full Court and pursuant to I.O.P. 5.7 does not
constitute binding precedent.
                                              2
concluded that the Report was defective and could not proceed as filed. The District

Court explained that “a plaintiff may not pursue generalized concerns about government

or society through the courts,” (id.), that the Report did not comply with Federal Rules of

Civil Procedure 8 and 10 (setting forth rules of pleading), and that Mirarchi had not

shown that § 2382, which makes it a crime to commit misprision of treason, provides a

private right of action. Additionally, the District Court noted that Mirarchi had not paid

the fee for filing a lawsuit, nor had he moved to proceed in forma pauperis (“IFP”). Ac-

cordingly, the District Court directed Mirarchi to pay the filing fee (or move to proceed

IFP) and file an amended complaint if he wished to proceed with this action. If, on the

hand, he did not wish to proceed, the District Court explained that he could file a notice

of dismissal pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 41(a).

       Mirarchi responded by filing a “Motion for Reconsideration and for This Filing to

Remain a Report of Treason to the Court” (hereinafter “Reconsideration Motion”). But

he also filed an IFP motion and an amended complaint. The amended complaint was

brought against the respective executive branches of the United States and the Common-

wealth of Pennsylvania, as well as against a United States senator, the Securities and Ex-

change Commission, the Central Intelligence Agency, Cable News Network, and several

other governmental and non-governmental entities.

       In the amended complaint, Mirarchi invoked § 2382 and several other federal

criminal statutes. He alleged that defendants and other actors had covered up a “falsified

records crime” that (1) “hid how key values and math logic w[ere] used to engineer vari-

ous financial fraud and money laundering schemes,” and (2) “allowed that same math

                                             3
logic to be reconfigured, by a group of bad actors yet to be identified, to . . . direct an at-

tack against the mechanics of our Election System to manipulate and configure the vote

results . . . of PA’s 2020 Presidential and 2022 U[.]S[.] Senate and Governor Elections.”

(Am. Compl. 6-7.) In view of these allegations, Mirarchi asked the District Court to “re-

view all the submissions for this lawsuit as a report of treason,” “investigate the crimes

that took place,” and “bring that to the attention of honest Law-enforcement and Justice

Authorities.” (Id. At 7.) Additionally, Mirarchi asserted that he “deserves a fair hearing

on how he can be made whole for the many hardships he endured over the past 10 years,”

and for the tens of thousands of hours that he spent conducting the analysis “that led him

to uncover how this engineered attack on Pennsylvania’s and our Nation’s Election Sys-

tem used the same or similar geometric and rate of change math logic as the accounting

fraud that [defendants and other actors] allowed to be buried.” (Id.)

   Mirarchi subsequently filed several motions seeking permission to present additional

evidence in support of his amended complaint. Thereafter, on August 29, 2023, the Dis-

trict Court granted Mirarchi’s IFP motion, denied his Reconsideration Motion and his

other outstanding motions, and dismissed his amended complaint with prejudice as frivo-

lous pursuant to § 1915(e)(2)(B)(i). In doing so, the District Court explained that the

criminal statutes invoked by Mirarchi do not create a private cause of action, that “the

United States District Courts have no authority to order any law enforcement agencies or

prosecutors to initiate investigations or prosecutions,” (Dist. Ct. Op. entered Aug. 29,

2023, at 6), that Mirarchi’s “general grievances about government” are insufficient to

state a case or controversy over which the District Court could exercise jurisdiction, (id.

                                               4
At 7), 1 and that further amendment of his pleadings would be futile. This timely appeal

followed.

                                              II.

    We have jurisdiction over this appeal pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We exercise ple-

nary review over the District Court’s decision to dismiss Mirarchi’s amended complaint,

see Dooley v. Wetzel, 957 F.3d 366, 373-74 (3d Cir. 2020), and we review the District

Court’s denial of his Reconsideration Motion for abuse of discretion, see Walker v.

Coffey, 905 F.3d 138, 143 (3d Cir. 2018). We may take summary action if this appeal

fails to present a substantial question. See 3d Cir. I.O.P. 10.6.

     Under § 1915(e)(2)(B)(i), a district court must dismiss a case if, at any time, it deter-

mines that the case is frivolous. An example of a situation in which a case is frivolous is

when “it depends on an indisputably meritless legal theory.” See Dooley, 957 F.3d at

374 (internal quotation marks omitted). The District Court concluded that Mirarchi’s

case reflected that situation, thereby warranting the dismissal of his amended complaint.

For substantially the reasons provided by the District Court in its August 29, 2023 opin-

ion, we agree with that conclusion. We also agree with the District Court’s decision to

dismiss Mirarchi’s amended complaint with prejudice, see LaSpina v. SEIU Pa. State

Council, 985 F.3d 278, 291 (3d Cir. 2021) (explaining that “leave to amend need not be

granted if amendment would be futile or inequitable” (internal quotation marks omitted)),

1
 “Article III of the [United States] Constitution limits the jurisdiction of the federal
courts to actual cases or controversies.” Greenberg v. Lehocky, 81 F.4th 376, 384 (3d
Cir. 2023).
                                              5
and we see no reason to disturb the District Court’s decision to deny the Reconsideration

Motion and Mirarchi’s other motions that were outstanding.

   Because this appeal does not present a substantial question, we will summarily affirm

the District Court’s August 29, 2023 order. Mirarchi’s motion filed in our Court on Sep-

tember 29, 2023, which appears to seek expedited review of this appeal, is denied. To the

extent that Mirarchi seeks any other relief from us, that relief is denied, too.

                                              6