Court Opinion

ID: 9916720
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-01-10 16:01:12.273347+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:25:50.779427
License: Public Domain

Case: 23-1541   Document: 28     Page: 1    Filed: 01/10/2024

        NOTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.

   United States Court of Appeals
       for the Federal Circuit
                 ______________________

                 GREGORY A. AUSTIN,
                   Plaintiff-Appellant

                            v.

                   UNITED STATES,
                   Defendant-Appellee
                 ______________________

                       2023-1541
                 ______________________

     Appeal from the United States Court of Federal Claims
 in No. 1:22-cv-00808-ZNS, Judge Zachary N. Somers.
                  ______________________

                Decided: January 10, 2024
                 ______________________

    GREGORY A. AUSTIN, Fresno, CA, pro se.

     LIRIDONA SINANI, Commercial Litigation Branch, Civil
 Division, United States Department of Justice, Washing-
 ton, DC, for defendant-appellee. Also represented by
 BRIAN M. BOYNTON, STEVEN JOHN GILLINGHAM, PATRICIA
 M. MCCARTHY, LOREN MISHA PREHEIM.
                  ______________________

    Before LOURIE, BRYSON, and STARK, Circuit Judges.
Case: 23-1541    Document: 28      Page: 2    Filed: 01/10/2024

 2                                               AUSTIN v. US

     PER CURIAM.
     Gregory Austin appeals the dismissal of his complaint
 by the Court of Federal Claims for lack of subject matter
 jurisdiction. Because Mr. Austin’s claims were clearly out-
 side the jurisdiction of the Court of Federal Claims, dismis-
 sal was appropriate. We affirm.
      This case relates to multiple California state court ac-
 tions relating to the dissolution of Mr. Austin’s marriage
 and the issuance of a domestic violence restraining order
 against him. Between 2015 and 2022, Mr. Austin at-
 tempted to challenge the restraining order, and its re-
 newal, by filing a variety of suits in two of California’s
 federal district courts. Both district courts ultimately dis-
 missed his complaints for failure to state a claim or lack of
 subject matter jurisdiction. Mr. Austin then filed a similar
 complaint in the Court of Federal Claims on July 22, 2022,
 challenging the restraining order, attacking other actions
 of the state and district courts, and identifying numerous
 other general grievances. Upon finding that Mr. Austin’s
 complaint failed to clearly articulate any possible basis for
 its jurisdiction, the Court of Federal Claims dismissed the
 complaint for lack of subject matter jurisdiction.
     We have jurisdiction over Mr. Austin’s appeal of the
 Court of Federal Claims’ dismissal pursuant to 28 U.S.C.
 § 1295(a)(3). We review the dismissal de novo. See Fair-
 holme Funds, Inc. v. United States, 26 F.4th 1274, 1284
 (Fed. Cir. 2022).
     The jurisdiction of the Court of Federal Claims is lim-
 ited. See Brown v. United States, 105 F.3d 621, 623 (Fed.
 Cir. 1997). As the plaintiff, it is Mr. Austin’s burden to
 show that his claims are within the limited jurisdiction of
 the Court of Federal Claims. See Brandt v. United States,
 710 F3d. 1369, 1373 (Fed. Cir. 2013). Mr. Austin failed to
 meet this burden in the trial court and his arguments be-
 fore us fare no better.
Case: 23-1541     Document: 28      Page: 3    Filed: 01/10/2024

 AUSTIN v. US                                                 3

     Mr. Austin argues that the Court of Federal Claims
 had jurisdiction pursuant to the Tucker Act, 28 U.S.C.
 § 1491. But that court’s Tucker Act jurisdiction only ex-
 tends to claims for money damages against the United
 States based on “a separate source of substantive law that
 creates a right to money damages;” that is, what is often
 referred to as a “money-mandating” source of law. Fisher
 v. United States, 402 F.3d 1167, 1172 (Fed. Cir. 2005). Mr.
 Austin has not identified a non-frivolous basis for his con-
 tention that he stated a claim against the United States
 arising under a money-mandating provision. To the con-
 trary, Mr. Austin’s purported claims against the United
 States sound principally in tort, matters over which the
 Court of Federal Claims plainly lacks jurisdiction. See 28
 U.S.C. §1491(a) (establishing that Tucker Act jurisdiction
 extends only to “cases not sounding in tort”); Brown, 105
 F.3d at 623. He also tries to state claims of criminal mis-
 conduct and various constitutional violations (e.g., under
 the First, Second, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments) but
 offers no persuasive reason to conclude that any of these
 allegations implicate money-mandating sources of law. See
 generally Allen v. United States, 88 F.4th 983, 986 (Fed.
 Cir. 2023); LeBlanc v. United States, 50 F.3d 1025, 1028
 (Fed. Cir. 1995) (holding that Court of Federal Claims lacks
 jurisdiction over constitutional claims based on amend-
 ments that do not obligate federal government to pay
 money).
     Further, we agree with the Court of Federal Claims
 that, in reality, the entirety of Mr. Austin’s complaint is a
 challenge to the restraining order entered against him (and
 renewed) by the San Francisco Superior Court. The Court
 of Federal Claims does not have jurisdiction over claims
 against state governments, state courts, or state or local
 government employees or officials, or over any claims
 founded on state law. See United States v. Sherwood, 312
 U.S. 584, 588 (1941) (“[I]f the relief sought is against others
 than the United States the suit as to them must be ignored
Case: 23-1541     Document: 28      Page: 4   Filed: 01/10/2024

 4                                                AUSTIN v. US

 as beyond the jurisdiction of the court.”); Souders v. S.C.
 Pub. Serv. Auth., 497 F.3d 1303, 1307 (Fed. Cir. 2007). Nor
 is the Court of Federal Claims authorized to review the dis-
 missals of the two California federal district courts. See
 Joshua v. United States, 17 F.3d 378, 380 (Fed. Cir. 1994)
 (stating that Court of Federal Claims “does not have juris-
 diction to review the decisions of district courts or the
 clerks of district courts relating to proceedings before those
 courts”). Moreover, to the extent Mr. Austin is bringing
 claims against individuals, as opposed to the United States
 itself, the Court of Federal Claims lacks jurisdiction over
 such claims as well. See Brown, 105 F.3d at 624.
      Finally, Mr. Austin contends that the Supreme Court
 of the United States has original jurisdiction over his case.
 Even if this were the case – and it is not, as none of his
 claims fall within the narrow categories of cases within the
 Supreme Court’s original jurisdiction, see U.S. Const. art.
 III, § 2, cl. 2 (“In all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other
 public Ministers and Consuls, and those in which a State
 shall be Party, the supreme Court shall have original Ju-
 risdiction.”); see also 28 U.S.C. § 1251 – neither the Court
 of Federal Claims nor the Court of Appeals for the Federal
 Circuit is the Supreme Court. Mr. Austin did not file his
 claims in the proper court.
      Accordingly, we agree with the Court of Federal Claims
 that it lacked jurisdiction over Mr. Austin’s complaint. We
 affirm the trial court’s dismissal.
                         AFFIRMED
                            COSTS
 No costs.