Court Opinion

ID: 9949194
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-03-09 01:00:31.171271+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:28:42.623914
License: Public Domain

Case: 23-40379          Document: 69-1        Page: 1      Date Filed: 03/08/2024

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

                                                                                 FILED
                                  No. 23-40379                               March 8, 2024
                                 ____________                               Lyle W. Cayce
                                                                                 Clerk
Robbie Reynolds,

                                                               Plaintiff—Appellant,

                                        versus

United States of America,

                                           Defendant—Appellee.
                 ______________________________

                 Appeal from the United States District Court
                      for the Eastern District of Texas
                           USDC No. 1:22-CV-553
                 ______________________________

Before Jones, Southwick, and Ho, Circuit Judges.
Per Curiam:*
       Plaintiff Robbie Reynolds appeals the district court’s grant of
summary judgment to the United States on her Federal Tort Claims Act
(“FTCA”) claims. Finding no error, we AFFIRM.
       Reynolds claims that she was involved in a motor vehicle accident with
a United States Postal Service (“USPS”) driver on September 19, 2020. In
       _____________________
       *
          Pursuant to 5th Circuit Rule 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion
should not be published and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set
forth in 5th Circuit Rule 47.5.4.
Case: 23-40379        Document: 69-1        Page: 2     Date Filed: 03/08/2024

                                  No. 23-40379

November 2020, Reynolds submitted an administrative tort claim to the
USPS, which the Postal Service denied on November 23, 2021.                   But
Reynolds did not file her complaint for damages under the FTCA, 28 U.S.C.
§§ 1346(b), 2671-2680 et seq., in federal court until September 13, 2022.
After further filings, the district court considered all pleadings and granted
the United States’s motion for summary judgment on May 25, 2023.
       Reynolds now appeals, claiming that the district court erred in
refusing to apply the equitable tolling doctrine to extend the statute of
limitations on her FTCA claim. She also asserts that the district court
violated her due process rights because she lacked sufficient notice of the
United States’s motion for summary judgment to be able to adequately
respond by the district court’s extended deadline of March 9.
       “This court reviews a district court's grant of summary judgment de
novo, applying the same legal standards as the district court.” Condrey v.
SunTrust Bank of Ga., 429 F.3d 556, 562 (5th Cir. 2005). “Summary
judgment is appropriate when ‘the movant shows that there is no genuine
dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a
matter of law.’” United States v. Nature's Way Marine, L.L.C., 904 F.3d 416,
419 (5th Cir. 2018) (quoting FED. R. CIV. P. 56(a)). Where the application of
equitable tolling turns on “fact-specific, discretionary matter[s], the
appropriate standard of review is abuse of discretion.” Granger v. Aaron's,
Inc., 636 F.3d 708, 712 (5th Cir. 2011).
       Under the FTCA:
       A tort claim against the United States shall be forever barred
       unless it is presented in writing to the appropriate Federal
       agency within two years after such claim accrues or unless
       action is begun within six months after the date of mailing, by
       certified or registered mail, of notice of final denial of the claim
       by the agency to which it was presented.

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Case: 23-40379        Document: 69-1          Page: 3     Date Filed: 03/08/2024

                                  No. 23-40379

28 U.S.C. § 2401.     “It is well-settled that these limitation periods are
jurisdictional.” Flory v. United States, 138 F.3d 157, 159 (5th Cir. 1998).
Here, Reynolds’s claims accrued on September 19, 2020—the date of the
accident. Reynolds then timely presented and exhausted her administrative
claims. But she failed to file her federal lawsuit by May 23, 2021—six months
after she received her final denial from USPS on November 23, 2022. Thus,
no federal court would have jurisdiction over Reynolds’s claims unless
equitable tolling is applied.
       “Equitable     tolling   applies       only   in   rare   and   exceptional
circumstances.” Teemac v. Henderson, 298 F.3d 452, 457 (5th Cir. 2002)
(quotation marks and citation omitted). “Courts have typically extended
equitable tolling where the claimant has actively pursued his judicial
remedies by filing a defective pleading during the statutory period, or where
complainant has been induced or tricked by his adversary's misconduct into
allowing the filing deadline to pass.” Harris v. Boyd Tunica, Inc., 628 F.3d
237, 239 (5th Cir. 2010) (quotation marks and citation omitted).
       Our review of the pleadings and record confirms that the district court
did not abuse its discretion in refusing to grant Reynolds the equitable tolling
she claims to be entitled to because her initial attorney left her law firm and
Reynolds’s case then got lost in the administrative chaos. Reynolds disputes
that her case amounts to “a garden variety claim of excusable neglect” in
which courts are less likely to apply the principles of equitable tolling. Irwin
v. Dep't of Veterans Affairs, 498 U.S. 89, 96, 111 S. Ct. 453, 458 (1990). We
disagree and do not believe that the district court abused its discretion in
coming to that conclusion.       Reynolds insists that she was subject to
administrative turnover beyond her control. But as we held in Harris,
“negligence. . . on the part of [an] attorney and his staff does not entitle [a
litigant] to equitable tolling—a party is bound by the acts of her lawyer.”
628 F.3d at 240.

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Case: 23-40379        Document: 69-1       Page: 4    Date Filed: 03/08/2024

                                  No. 23-40379

       Concurrently, we do not agree that the district court violated
Reynold’s due process rights by only granting her a one-week extension.
Reynolds claims that lack of notice stemmed from her attorney e-filing the
documents under a fellow attorney’s information because her attorney lacked
the appropriate credentials to e-file in the Eastern District of Texas. Thus,
she claims her attorney did not receive the proper notification when the
United States filed its motion for summary judgment, and further that the
United States did not make her attorney aware of its motion despite being
aware of the situation described above. Reynolds claims that although the
district was made aware of this at the status conference, she was still given
only a six-day extension to file her response to the summary judgment
motion. Although the parties dispute whether Reynolds preserved this issue
by timely and properly objecting to the district court, it is irrelevant to the
outcome.    Because the electronic filing system provided notice to the
Reynolds’s attorney of record as listed on the docket sheet, the United States
properly gave notice that was “reasonably calculated, under all the
circumstances. Mullane v. Hannover Bank and Trust Co., 339 U.S. 306, 314,
70 S. Ct. 652, 657 (1950); see also FED. R. CIV. P. 5(b)(2)(E).
       In light of the above, we AFFIRM.

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