Court Opinion

ID: 9891387
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-10-18 15:01:44.51692+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:47:06.222764
License: Public Domain

Case: 23-1676     Document: 16    Page: 1    Filed: 10/18/2023

           NOTE: This order is nonprecedential.

   United States Court of Appeals
       for the Federal Circuit
                  ______________________

                CHARLES DERECK ADAMS,
                       Petitioner

                             v.

             DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE,
                      Respondent
                ______________________

                        2023-1676
                  ______________________

    Petition for review of the Merit Systems Protection
 Board in No. DC-3443-18-0287-I-1.
            -------------------------------------------------

                CHARLES DERECK ADAMS,
                       Petitioner

                             v.

             DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE,
                      Respondent
                ______________________

                        2023-1681
                  ______________________

    Petition for review of the Merit Systems Protection
 Board in No. DC-3443-21-0051-I-1.
Case: 23-1676    Document: 16     Page: 2    Filed: 10/18/2023

 2                                          ADAMS v. DEFENSE

                  ______________________

     Before DYK, CUNNINGHAM, and STARK, Circuit Judges.
 PER CURIAM.
                         ORDER
    Having considered the parties’ responses to this court’s
 May 10, 2023, show cause order, the court dismisses the
 above-captioned petitions for review.
      In 2016, Charles Dereck Adams filed an appeal at the
 Merit Systems Protection Board challenging the Depart-
 ment of Defense’s denial of his request for early retirement
 under the agency’s Voluntary Early Retirement Authority
 (“VERA”) as discriminatory. The Board issued a final de-
 cision rejecting Mr. Adams’ argument that the agency
 knowingly withheld information, including a hard drive,
 relevant to his claims.
     Mr. Adams then brought suit before the United States
 District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, where
 he argued, among other things, that the agency concealed
 “[m]y complete Uncensored Unclassified Profile or H:
 drive” and “EEO Records concerning the Discriminators
 and the Key Decision-maker in this case.” Compl. at 21,
 Adams v. Dep’t of Def., No. 1:16-cv-01468 (E.D. Va. Mar.
 16, 2017), ECF No. 11 at 21. The Eastern District of Vir-
 ginia ultimately entered judgment against Mr. Adams in
 the case, Adams v. Dep’t of Def., No. 1:16-cv-01468 (E.D.
 Va. Sept. 29, 2017), and Mr. Adams’ appeal was subse-
 quently dismissed as untimely by the United States Court
 of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. Adams v. Dep’t of Def.,
 No. 17-2383, slip op. at 2 (4th Cir. Jan. 22, 2018).
     Years later, Mr. Adams filed the two underlying ap-
 peals at the Board reasserting that the Department of De-
 fense improperly withheld the hard drive evidence and
 EEO records and statistics relevant to his prior VERA ap-
 peal and a similar claim raised before the Equal
Case: 23-1676     Document: 16     Page: 3    Filed: 10/18/2023

 ADAMS v. DEFENSE                                            3

 Employment Opportunity Commission. The Board con-
 cluded that Mr. Adams was barred from rechallenging the
 denial of his request for early retirement under VERA and
 that the Board otherwise lacked jurisdiction over his
 claims. * Mr. Adams then filed these petitions. Because he
 asserted that he raised a discrimination claim before the
 Board and did not want to abandon that claim, we directed
 the parties to address our jurisdiction.
     We have jurisdiction to review final decisions from the
 Board, except in “[c]ases of discrimination subject to the
 provisions of [5 U.S.C. §] 7702,” 5 U.S.C. §§ 7703(b)(2),
 (b)(1)(A). Those so-called mixed cases, which involve ap-
 peals to the Board and allegations of covered discrimina-
 tion, 5 U.S.C. § 7702(a)(1), instead belong in district court.
 5 U.S.C. § 7703(b)(2); Perry v. Merit Sys. Prot. Bd., 582 U.S.
 420, 432 (2017). When this court lacks jurisdiction, we can
 transfer to another court where the case “could have been
 brought at the time it was filed,” but only if transfer is “in
 the interest of justice.” 28 U.S.C. § 1631. We need not
 reach any definitive resolution on the issue of whether
 Mr. Adams brings mixed cases because, regardless of how
 we would answer that question, we would dismiss.
     If we construe Mr. Adams’ contentions here as only
 raising allegations that the agency improperly withheld in-
 formation, divorced from any personnel action plausibly
 appealable to the Board, we would conclude that dismissal
 is appropriate because Mr. Adams has failed to identify any
 arguable basis for the Board’s jurisdiction. See, e.g., 5
 U.S.C. § 7512. We would reach the same outcome if we
 were to alternatively take the view that Mr. Adams is

     *  In the same decisions, the Board joined these pro-
 ceedings with other appeals filed by Mr. Adams. Mr. Ad-
 ams’ petitions for judicial review of those matters are
 separately docketed. This order addresses only DC-3443-
 18-0287-I-1 and DC-3443-21-0051-I-1.
Case: 23-1676     Document: 16     Page: 4      Filed: 10/18/2023

 4                                             ADAMS v. DEFENSE

 trying to relitigate his prior mixed case. It would not be in
 the interest of justice to transfer after Mr. Adams already
 fully litigated, and lost, these same claims in his prior case
 regarding the same VERA dispute.
     Accordingly,
     IT IS ORDERED THAT:
     (1) These petitions for review are dismissed.
     (2) Each side shall bear its own costs.
                                         FOR THE COURT

 October 18, 2023                        /s/ Jarrett B. Perlow
      Date                               Jarrett B. Perlow
                                         Clerk of Court