Court Opinion

ID: 9394751
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-05-16 14:01:23.395722+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:19:02.555464
License: Public Domain

22-823
   Miller v. Carroll

                             UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
                                 FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT

                                          SUMMARY ORDER

RULINGS BY SUMMARY ORDER DO NOT HAVE PRECEDENTIAL EFFECT.
CITATION TO A SUMMARY ORDER FILED ON OR AFTER JANUARY 1, 2007, IS
PERMITTED AND IS GOVERNED BY FEDERAL RULE OF APPELLATE PROCEDURE
32.1 AND THIS COURT’S LOCAL RULE 32.1.1. WHEN CITING A SUMMARY ORDER
IN A DOCUMENT FILED WITH THIS COURT, A PARTY MUST CITE EITHER THE
FEDERAL APPENDIX OR AN ELECTRONIC DATABASE (WITH THE NOTATION
“SUMMARY ORDER”). A PARTY CITING TO A SUMMARY ORDER MUST SERVE
A COPY OF IT ON ANY PARTY NOT REPRESENTED BY COUNSEL.

         At a stated term of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit,
   held at the Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse, 40 Foley Square, in the
   City of New York, on the 16th day of May, two thousand twenty-three.

   PRESENT:

              SUSAN L. CARNEY,
              RICHARD J. SULLIVAN,
              WILLIAM J. NARDINI,
                    Circuit Judges.
   _____________________________________

   JOSEPHINE MILLER,

                            Plaintiff-Appellant,

                       v.                                                         No. 22-823

   PATRICK CARROLL III, Honorable,
   Official and Individual Capacities,

                    Defendant-Appellee. ∗
   ___________________________________

   ∗
       The Clerk of Court is respectfully directed to amend the official case caption as set forth above.
For Plaintiff-Appellant:                         JOSEPHINE MILLER,         pro    se,
                                                 Danbury, CT.

For Defendant-Appellee:                          EMILY ADAMS GAIT (Timothy J.
                                                 Holzman, Benjamin A. Abrams,
                                                 on the brief), Assistant Attorneys
                                                 General, for William Tong,
                                                 Attorney General for the State of
                                                 Connecticut, Hartford, CT.

      Appeal from a judgment of the United States District Court for the District

of Connecticut (Vanessa L. Bryant, Judge).

      UPON      DUE     CONSIDERATION,           IT   IS   HEREBY       ORDERED,

ADJUDGED, AND DECREED that the judgment of the district court is

AFFIRMED.

      Josephine Miller, an attorney proceeding pro se whose license to practice

law was previously suspended in the State of Connecticut, appeals from the

district court’s judgment dismissing her third amended complaint (the “TAC”) for

failure to state a claim under Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure

and denying as futile her motion for leave to amend. In the TAC, Miller asserted

race-discrimination, retaliation, and due-process claims pursuant to 42 U.S.C.

§ 1983 against Judge Patrick Carroll III, the Chief Court Administrator for the State

of Connecticut, based on his purported involvement in the delay between Miller’s

                                         2
application for reinstatement to the Connecticut Bar and the initial hearing before

the Standing Committee for Recommendations for Admission (the “Standing

Committee”).     Miller subsequently sought leave to file a fourth amended

complaint (the “FAC”) that included additional allegations against Judge Carroll

and proposed adding a second defendant – Judge David Sheridan, the

Presiding/Administrative Judge for the Hartford Judicial District. We assume the

parties’ familiarity with the underlying facts, procedural history, and issues on

appeal.

      Miller argues that the TAC sufficiently stated a claim for relief and that the

district court erred in denying as futile her request for leave to amend and file the

FAC. We review de novo a district court’s dismissal of a complaint for failure to

state a claim, accepting all well-pleaded factual allegations as true and drawing all

reasonable inferences in Miller’s favor. See Lynch v. City of New York, 952 F.3d 67,

74–75 (2d Cir. 2020). We likewise review de novo a district court’s denial of leave

to amend on the ground that amendment would be futile. See Smith v. Hogan, 794

F.3d 249, 253 (2d Cir. 2015).

      Section 1983 establishes a cause of action for “the deprivation of any rights,

privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws.”          42 U.S.C.

                                         3
§ 1983. Liability under section 1983 must be direct. See Tangreti v. Bachmann, 983

F.3d 609, 618 (2d Cir. 2020) (explaining that supervisors are responsible for their

own acts but not for those of subordinates). A plaintiff must therefore plead, and

ultimately prove, “that each [g]overnment-official defendant, through the

official’s own individual actions, has violated the Constitution.”              Id. (quoting

Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 676 (2009)).

       The TAC alleges very little in the way of conduct on the part of Judge

Carroll. And, critically, it nowhere alleges that he was personally involved in

processing Miller’s application for reinstatement. To be sure, Miller does allege

that the Statewide Grievance Committee (the “SGC”) and the Connecticut Office

of Chief Disciplinary Counsel (the “COCDC”) failed to timely issue a report on her

application and that the Standing Committee failed to timely provide her with a

hearing.    But she fails to allege that Judge Carroll was a member of these

disciplinary bodies or that he was in any way responsible for the delays. In fact,

the deadlines associated with processing applications for reinstatement were

suspended on March 24, 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 1 And while Miller

1 While Miller asserts in conclusory fashion that these deadlines were selectively suspended by
Judge Carroll and Judge Sheridan, she has failed to support this allegation with any factual
content. In actuality, these rules were suspended by the Superior Court Rules Committee acting

                                              4
alleges that Judge Carroll was “copied on [an] email” notifying him “of the transfer

of her application for reinstatement to the Middlesex Standing Committee from

the Hartford Standing Committee,” that allegation does not give rise to an

inference that Judge Carroll engaged in any conduct at all, let alone that he was

responsible for the purportedly unconstitutional delay alleged here. Dist. Ct.

Doc. No. 27 at 36–37. We therefore agree with the district court that Miller has

failed to plead that Judge Carroll’s own conduct was the cause of the delay about

which she now complains.

       Miller’s proposed amendments in the FAC do not alter this conclusion, and

therefore the filing of an amended pleading would have been futile.                         Miller

sought to add Judge Sheridan as a defendant but alleged no facts to suggest that

he was personally involved in preventing her from being reinstated to the attorney

rolls. Like Judge Carroll, Judge Sheridan is not alleged to have been a member of

the SGC, COCDC, or any Standing Committee. Nor does Miller allege that Judge

Sheridan was responsible for scheduling her reinstatement hearing or that he had

any control over the processing of her application.                       Relying only on a

pursuant to its emergency authority under Connecticut Practice Book § 1-9B. See Fed. R.
Evid. 201(b)(2) (explaining that we may take judicial notice of any fact that “can be accurately and
readily determined from sources whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned”).

                                                 5
second-hand statement from a court employee who relayed to Miller that Judge

Sheridan said he would “have to get permission to use” the “remote/virtual

courtroom” for a Standing Committee hearing, J. App’x at 72, Miller conclusorily

asserts, based on “information and belief,” that permission was not in fact required

and that Judge Sheridan was able to schedule other attorney-reinstatement

hearings without approval, id. at 73; see Citizens United v. Schneiderman, 882 F.3d

374, 384 (2d Cir. 2018) (noting that plaintiffs “cannot merely plop ‘upon

information and belief’ in front of a conclusory allegation and thereby render it

non-conclusory”). But Judge Sheridan’s reported statement that approval was

needed to schedule a remote proceeding, without more, does not give rise to an

inference that his own conduct was the cause of the delay.

      Miller also argues that she should have been permitted to add allegations

that both judges “established and maintained” unlawful policies pertaining to the

attorney-discipline and reinstatement process.      J. App’x at 66–67.   But these

assertions – which allege only that the policies are “racially discriminatory,”

“arbitrary and capricious,” and violative of the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due

Process Clause, id. – are wholly conclusory and are thus entitled to no weight in

assessing the plausibility of Miller’s pleadings.    See Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678–79.

                                         6
Given that Miller’s allegations fail to connect either judge to the conduct

underlying     her    race-discrimination,     retaliation,   due-process,     and

selective-enforcement claims, the district court did not err in granting the motion

to dismiss and denying leave to amend.

      We have considered Miller’s remaining arguments and find them to be

without merit. Accordingly, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court.

                                      FOR THE COURT:
                                      Catherine O’Hagan Wolfe, Clerk of Court

                                         7