Court Opinion

ID: 9839934
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-14 18:00:59.819756+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:42:14.746011
License: Public Domain

Case: 22-30686     Document: 00516895282        Page: 1    Date Filed: 09/14/2023

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

                               ____________                                 FILED
                                                                    September 14, 2023
                                No. 22-30686                           Lyle W. Cayce
                               ____________                                 Clerk

   Damon Landor,

                                                          Plaintiff—Appellant,

                                      versus

   Louisiana Department of Corrections and Public
   Safety; James M. LeBlanc, in his official capacity as Secretary thereof,
   and individually; Raymond Laborde Correctional Center;
   Marcus Myers, in his official capacity as Warden thereof, and
   individually; John Does 1-10; ABC Entities 1-10,

                                           Defendants—Appellees.
                  ______________________________

                  Appeal from the United States District Court
                      for the Middle District of Louisiana
                            USDC No. 3:21-CV-733
                  ______________________________

   Before Clement, Graves, and Higginson, Circuit Judges.
   Edith Brown Clement, Circuit Judge:
         The question presented is whether the Religious Land Use and
   Institutionalized Persons Act (“RLUIPA”) provides for money damages
   against officials sued in their individual capacities. Because we’ve already
   answered that question in the negative, we AFFIRM.
Case: 22-30686        Document: 00516895282              Page: 2       Date Filed: 09/14/2023

                                         No. 22-30686

                                               I.
           Damon Landor is a devout Rastafarian who vowed to “let the locks of
   the hair of his head grow,” a promise known as the Nazarite Vow. See
   Numbers 6:5. 1 Landor kept that promise—for almost two decades, he didn’t
   cut his hair. But that changed when he arrived at the Raymond Laborde
   Correctional Center.
           Stepping back, Landor was incarcerated in 2020. During his brief stint
   in prison, Landor was primarily housed at two facilities, St. Tammany Parish
   Detention Center and LaSalle Correctional Center. Both stays were
   relatively uneventful—each facility respected Landor’s vow and allowed him
   to either wear his hair long or to keep it under a “rastacap.” LaSalle even
   went as far as to voluntarily amend its grooming policy to allow Landor to
   keep his dreads. Then, after five peaceful months—and with only three
   weeks left in his sentence—Landor was transferred to RLCC.
           Upon arrival, Landor was met by an intake guard. Acting
   preemptively, Landor explained that he was a practicing Rastafarian and
   provided proof of past religious accommodations. And, amazingly, Landor
   also handed the guard a copy of our decision in Ware v. Louisiana Department
   of Corrections, 866 F.3d 263 (5th Cir. 2017), which held that Louisiana’s
   policy of cutting the hair of Rastafarians violated RLUIPA. Unmoved by our
   caselaw, the guard threw Landor’s papers in the trash and summoned
   RLCC’s warden, Marcus Myers. When Myers arrived, he demanded Landor
   hand over documentation from his sentencing judge that corroborated his
   religious beliefs. When Landor couldn’t instantly meet that demand, two

           _____________________
           1
           Because this arrives on appeal from a granted motion to dismiss, the facts in the
   complaint are taken as true. See White v. U.S. Corr., L.L.C., 996 F.3d 302, 306–07 (5th Cir.
   2021).

                                                2
Case: 22-30686       Document: 00516895282             Page: 3      Date Filed: 09/14/2023

                                        No. 22-30686

   guards carried him into another room, handcuffed him to a chair, held him
   down, and shaved his head.
          After he served his time, Landor sued the Louisiana Department of
   Corrections, the prison, Myers, and the Department’s Secretary, James
   LeBlanc, in their individual and official capacities. Landor brought claims
   under RLUIPA and § 1983 for violations of his First, Eighth, and Fourteenth
   Amendment rights. He also pleaded state law claims for negligence,
   intentional infliction of emotional distress, and violations of the Louisiana
   constitution. Below, the defendants moved to dismiss. As is relevant here,
   Myers and LeBlanc argued that Landor’s RLUIPA claims against them in
   their individual capacities are barred under our precedent. The district court
   agreed and held that those claims were “moot as [RLUIPA] ‘does not
   authorize a private cause of action for compensatory or punitive damages.’”
   Landor appeals.
                                             II.
           We review a district court’s dismissal for failure to state a claim de
   novo. Thurman v. Med. Trans. Mgmt., Inc., 982 F.3d 953, 955 (5th Cir. 2020).
   To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint “must contain sufficient factual
   matter [] to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.” Ashcroft v.
   Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (quotations and citation omitted). In
   reviewing a complaint, we “accept[] all well-pleaded facts as true, viewing
   them in the light most favorable to the plaintiff.” Thurman, 982 F.3d at 955
   (quotations and citation omitted).
           On appeal, Landor maintains that RLUIPA allows litigants to recover
   money damages against officials in their individual capacities. 2 That

          _____________________
          2
           The defendants argue that Landor forfeited this argument by filing nothing below
   beyond his complaint. While we agree that not pressing an argument before the district

                                              3
Case: 22-30686         Document: 00516895282               Page: 4      Date Filed: 09/14/2023

                                          No. 22-30686

   argument, however, runs squarely into one of our decisions, Sossamon v. Lone
   Star State of Texas, 560 F.3d 316 (5th Cir. 2009), aff’d, 563 U.S. 277 (2011)
   [hereinafter Sossamon I and Sossamon II, respectively]. In Sossamon I, we
   plainly held that RLUIPA does not permit suits against officers in their
   individual capacities, which, in turn, means claimants cannot recover
   monetary damages. Sossamon I, 560 F.3d at 329. That decision ends this case.
   Landor, however, advances two arguments in response: (1) a recent Supreme
   Court decision abrogated Sossamon I, and (2) alternatively, our reasoning in
   Sossaman I was flawed. We take those in turn.
                                                A.
           First, abrogation. To overcome our decision in Sossamon I, Landor
   points us to Tanzin v. Tanvir, 141 S. Ct. 486 (2020). There, the Supreme
   Court concluded that—under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act
   (“RFRA”)—litigants can “obtain money damages against federal officials in
   their individual capacities.” Id. at 493. But that’s not enough for abrogation.
           Generally speaking, “for a Supreme Court decision to change our
   Circuit’s law, it must be more than merely illuminating with respect to the
   case before the court”—it “must unequivocally overrule prior precedent.”
   Tech. Automation Servs. Corp. v. Liberty Surplus Ins. Corp., 673 F.3d 399, 405
   (5th Cir. 2012) (cleaned up). That requires more than merely a “flawed”
           _____________________
   court often means it is forfeited, we generally conclude otherwise when the issue “fairly
   appears in the record as having been raised or decided.” Lampton v. Diaz, 639 F.3d 223, 227
   n.14 (5th Cir. 2011) (emphasis added) (quotations and citation omitted); see also Walker v.
   S. Cent. Bell Tel. Co., 904 F.2d 275, 276 n.1 (5th Cir. 1990) (per curiam) (“The arguments
   we are considering, however, were those made by the district court in dismissing the
   complaint. . . . [T]here is no rule which forbids [the appellant] from urging that the grounds
   given by the district court for dismissing her complaint are wrong.”). The defendants below
   insisted—and the district court agreed—that RLUIPA did not allow a suit against officials
   in their individual capacities for money damages. Consequently, Landor is now free to
   argue to the contrary, and we may hear him out.

                                                 4
Case: 22-30686      Document: 00516895282          Page: 5    Date Filed: 09/14/2023

                                    No. 22-30686

   “interpretation of the law” by a past panel. Jacobs v. Nat’l Drug Intel. Ctr.,
   548 F.3d 375, 378 (5th Cir. 2008) (quotations and citation omitted). Still, it
   is not necessary that the Court “explicitly overrule the circuit precedent at
   issue, or specifically address the precise question of law at issue.” In re
   Bonvillian Marine Service, Inc., 19 F.4th 787, 792 (5th Cir. 2021). Instead, the
   key focus is whether “a former panel’s decision has fallen unequivocally out
   of step with some intervening change in the law.” Id. That includes, for
   example, decisions that have been “implicitly overruled [by] a subsequent
   Supreme Court opinion establish[ing] a rule of law inconsistent with that
   precedent.” Gahagan v. USCIS, 911 F.3d 298, 302 (5th Cir. 2018)
   (quotations and citation omitted).
          Consider Sossamon I. In that case, an inmate sued under RLUIPA to
   recover compensatory and punitive damages from several prison officials in
   their individual capacities. Sossamon I, 560 F.3d at 321, 322 & n.2. On appeal,
   however, we held that “an action under RLUIPA does not exist for
   individual-capacity claims . . . .” Id. at 329. We found that although RLUIPA
   seems to contemplate “action[s] against defendants in their individual
   capacities,” including money damages, doctrine dictated otherwise. Id. at
   327 & n.26. Sure, RLUIPA’s language—“any other person acting under
   color of state law”—“mirrors the ‘under color of’ language in § 1983, which
   . . . creates an individual-capacity cause of action for damage.” Id. at 328
   (quoting 42 U.S.C. § 2000cc-5). But RLUIPA has other considerations at
   play. Unlike § 1983 or its sister statute, RFRA, RLUIPA was “enacted
   pursuant to Congress’s Spending Clause power, not pursuant to the Section
   5 power of the Fourteenth Amendment.” Id. Spending Clause legislation
   “operates like a contract,” so “only the grant recipient—the state—may be
   liable for its violation.” Id. In other words, Spending Clause legislation does
   not “impose direct liability on a non-party to the contract between the state
   and the federal government.” Id. at 329. So, “as a matter of statutory

                                          5
Case: 22-30686         Document: 00516895282                Page: 6       Date Filed: 09/14/2023

                                           No. 22-30686

   interpretation and to avoid the constitutional concerns that an alternative
   reading would entail,” we held that RLUIPA did not permit suits against
   defendants in their individual capacities. Id. 3
           But Landor insists that we’ve been freed from Sossamon I’s shackles
   by the Supreme Court’s decision in Tanzin, 141 S. Ct. 486. In Tanzin, the
   Court held that RFRA authorizes money damages against officials sued in
   their individual capacities. Id. at 493. Starting with the text, the Court
   emphasized that RFRA says a plaintiff can sue “official[s] (or other person[s]
   acting under color of law)” broadly. Id. at 490 (quoting 42 U.S.C. § 2000bb-
   2(1)). Although that is not typically what a suit against the “government”
   means, the Court concluded that RFRA simply expanded the horizon to
   include officials. Id. Such a conclusion was apparent from context, too. RFRA
   employs almost the same language—“person[s] acting under color of
   law”—as § 1983, the latter of which the Court had “long interpreted . . . to
   permit suits against officials in their individual capacities.” Id. (citation
   omitted). Because “RFRA uses the same terminology as § 1983 in the very
   same field of civil rights law, it is reasonable to believe that the terminology
   bears a consistent meaning.” Id. at 490–91 (quotations and citation omitted).
   So, like under § 1983, the Supreme Court found that plaintiffs can proceed
   against officials in their individual capacities under RFRA.
            What, then, is the proper remedy for litigants seeking to recover
   against officials in their individual capacities? Money, for one. Id. at 493.
   Generally, the Court read “appropriate relief” as “‘open-ended’ on its
   face,” meaning “what relief is ‘appropriate’ is ‘inherently context

           _____________________
           3
             The court also held that even if RLUIPA created a cause of action for damages
   against officials in their official capacities, such suits were nevertheless barred by a state’s
   sovereign immunity. Sossamon I, 560 F.3d at 329–31. It is this conclusion that the Supreme
   Court affirmed. See generally Sossamon II, 563 U.S. 277.

                                                  6
Case: 22-30686        Document: 00516895282              Page: 7       Date Filed: 09/14/2023

                                         No. 22-30686

   dependent.’” Id. at 491 (quoting Sossamon II, 563 U.S. at 286). And, in the
   context of suits against government officials in their individual capacities, the
   Court had long blessed monetary damages as appropriate. Id. That was
   doubly true for RFRA given that it was passed to “reinstat[e]” the Court’s
   prior, more robust protections for the “First Amendment and the right to
   vindicate those protections by a claim.” Id. As § 1983 had always permitted
   damages “for clearly established violations of the First Amendment,”
   “parties suing under RFRA must have at least the same avenues for relief
   against officials that they would have had” in the past. Id. at 492. That, of
   course, includes money. 4
           We held that RLUIPA does not permit suits for money damages
   against officers in their individual capacities. The Supreme Court then held
   that RFRA does. So, does the latter holding abrogate our former one? We
   find that it does not. Reaching that decision is straightforward enough
   because, after all, Sossamon I and Tanzin involve different laws. That alone is
   not necessarily dispositive—“[s]ometimes a Supreme Court decision
   involving one statute implicitly overrules our precedent involving another
   statute,” and “[s]ometimes it does not.” Gahagan, 911 F.3d at 302–03
   (collecting cases). But the point is made when we look to “the similarity of
   the issues decided.” Id. at 303. And, Tanzin doesn’t address, directly or
   indirectly, our decision in Sossamon I. Instead, it tackled the existence of
   individual damages under RFRA. 141 S. Ct. at 490. Referring to RLUIPA
           _____________________
           4
              Not to mention, for some violations of RFRA, damages are not just
   “appropriate,” but the “only form of relief that can remedy” the harm. Tanzin, 141 S. Ct.
   at 492. For some injuries—like the inability to use plane tickets or the destruction of
   religious property—an injunction does not, and cannot, right the wrong. Id. (citing
   examples). Since RFRA permits “appropriate relief,” “it would be odd to construe [it] in
   a manner that prevents courts from awarding such relief” (especially since, noted the
   Court, Congress had restricted remedies to those in equity elsewhere). Id. (citing 29 U.S.C.
   §1132(a)(3), 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-5(g)(1), and 15 U.S.C. § 78u(d)(5)).

                                                7
Case: 22-30686         Document: 00516895282               Page: 8       Date Filed: 09/14/2023

                                           No. 22-30686

   only as a “related statute,” the unanimous Court didn’t extend the holding
   in Tanzin, much less its logic, to RLUIPA. The Court’s sole mention of
   RLUIPA differentiates the case from a prior one, Sossamon II. Id. at 492–93.
   That relative silence makes sense, though: RLUIPA and RFRA rely on
   different Congressional powers. See Holt v. Hobbs, 574 U.S. 352, 357 (2015)
   (noting RFRA’s basis in the Fourteenth Amendment and RLUIPA’s in the
   Spending and Commerce Clauses).
           That distinction wasn’t lost on other circuits. 5 For example, in Mack
   v. Warden Loretto FCI, the Third Circuit grappled with this distinction, too.
   839 F.3d 286, 303 (3d Cir. 2016). In recognizing individual damages under
   RFRA, the court distinguished its prior prohibition on such a remedy under

           _____________________
           5
              Most other circuits’ reasoning tracks ours in Sossamon I (i.e., that because
   RLUIPA is Spending Clause legislation, non-recipients of funds cannot be liable). See, e.g.,
   Washington v. Gonyea, 731 F.3d 143, 145 (2d Cir. 2013) (“RLUIPA does not provide a cause
   of action against state officials in their individual capacities because the legislation was
   enacted pursuant to Congress’ spending power . . . which allows the imposition of
   conditions . . . only on those parties actually receiving the state funds.”); Sharp v. Johnson,
   669 F.3d 144, 154–55 (3d Cir. 2012) (“Pennsylvania, not Defendants, was the direct
   recipient of any federal funds. Thus, RLUIPA cannot impose direct liability on Defendants,
   who were not parties to the contract created between Pennsylvania and the federal
   government.”); Nelson v. Miller, 570 F.3d 868, 887–89 (7th Cir. 2009) (same); Wood v.
   Yordy, 753 F.3d 899, 904 (9th Cir. 2014) (“The statute does not authorize suits against a
   person in anything other than an official or governmental capacity, for it is only in that
   capacity that the funds are received.”); Stewart v. Beach, 701 F.3d 1322, 1335 (10th Cir.
   2012) (agreeing with Sossamon I); Smith v. Allen, 502 F.3d 1255, 1269–76 (11th Cir. 2007)
   (same). A couple of the other circuits advance a slightly different, but still related, line of
   reasoning. Rendelman v. Rouse, 569 F.3d 182, 187–89 (4th Cir. 2009), declined to answer
   whether Spending Clause legislation can impose liability on non-recipients, holding instead
   that either way, RLUIPA did not provide clear notice that it was doing so. Haight v.
   Thompson, 763 F.3d 554, 567–70 (6th Cir. 2014), also held that RLUIPA did not clearly
   impose any such liability as a condition of accepting funds, but explicitly denounced the
   third-party liability rational as “prov[ing] too much.”

                                                 8
Case: 22-30686      Document: 00516895282           Page: 9   Date Filed: 09/14/2023

                                     No. 22-30686

   RLUIPA. Id. The court, in other words, was “unmoved . . . by the similarities
   in the text of RFRA and its sister statute, RLUIPA.” Id.
          Although the judicial relief provision in RLUIPA mirrors that
          in RFRA, RLUIPA was enacted pursuant to Congress’s
          powers under the Spending Clause, thereby allowing Congress
          to impose certain conditions, such as civil liability, on the
          recipients of federal funds, such as state prison institutions.
          Because state officials are not direct recipients of the federal
          funds, and thus would have no notice of the conditions
          imposed on them, they cannot be held individually liable under
          RLUIPA. RFRA, by contrast, was enacted pursuant to
          Congress’s powers under the [Fourteenth Amendment] and
          thus does not implicate the same concerns.
   Id. at 303–04 (emphasis added).
          In response, Landor insists that because RLUIPA’s and RFRA’s texts
   are almost the same, we should read RLUIPA the same way the Supreme
   Court read RFRA. After all, the two laws are often treated similarly. See e.g.,
   Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, 573 U.S. 682, 696 n.5 (2014). But “[i]n law as in
   life, . . . the same words, placed in different contexts, sometimes mean
   different things.” Yates v. United States, 574 U.S. 528, 537 (2015). The
   Supreme Court has often held “that identical language may convey varying
   content when used in different statutes, [and] sometimes even in different
   provisions of the same statute.” Id. (collecting cases). Where “the scope of
   the legislative power exercised in one case is broader than that exercised in
   another, the meaning [of identical words] well may vary to meet the purposes
   of the law . . . and of the circumstances under which the language was
   employed.” Atlantic Cleaners & Dyers v. United States, 286 U.S. 427, 433
   (1932) (citations omitted). That’s the case here. Section 5 of the Fourteenth
   Amendment and the Spending Clause do not empower Congress to the same
   degree, and Tanzin does nothing to fill that gap.

                                          9
Case: 22-30686     Document: 00516895282            Page: 10   Date Filed: 09/14/2023

                                     No. 22-30686

          In sum, we concluded in Sossamon I that although RLUIPA’s text
   suggests a damages remedy, recognizing as much would run afoul of the
   Spending Clause. Tanzin doesn’t change that—it addresses a different law
   that was enacted under a separate Congressional power with “concerns not
   relevant to [RLUIPA].” Tanvir v. Tanzin, 894 F.3d 449, 467 n.12 (2d Cir.
   2018), aff'd, 141 S. Ct. 486 (2020). Because Sossamon I remains the law,
   Landor cannot recover monetary damages against the defendant-officials in
   their individual capacities under RLUIPA.

                                          B.

          Landor raises one final argument. He contends that our Spending
   Clause analysis in Sossamon I was flawed from the outset. Landor suggests
   that, per Sabri v. United States, 541 U.S. 600 (2004), “Congress has the
   power under the Spending Clause . . . to impose liability on officials who
   work” for a recipient of federal funds. But Landor’s reading of Sabri is
   flawed.

          In Sabri, a real estate developer tried to bribe a Minneapolis official to
   get preferential treatment in his dealings with the municipality. Id. at 602.
   When Sabri was caught, he was charged under 18 U.S.C. § 666(a)(2), or
   “Theft or bribery concerning receiving federal funds.” Id. On appeal, the
   Supreme Court found § 666(a)(2) to be a valid exercise of Congressional
   authority under the Spending Clause. Id. at 608. Now, Landor contends that
   Sabri’s conviction is proof positive that Congress can “bring federal power
   to bear directly on individuals,” namely third parties who aren’t privy to a
   funding agreement, under the spending power. But that’s an oversimplistic,
   expansive reading.

          Sure, Sabri recognized that Congress has the “prerogative to protect
   spending objects” by targeting individuals who aren’t a party to the contract.

                                          10
Case: 22-30686     Document: 00516895282           Page: 11   Date Filed: 09/14/2023

                                    No. 22-30686

   Id. at 608. That decision rested on a common-sense extension of the spending
   power—Congress can safeguard its allocated dollars from bribery,
   embezzlement, and “local administrators on the take.” Id. Criminal
   punishments are simply a “rational means” for securing the valid use of
   federal funds. Id. at 605. From that it doesn’t necessarily follow that
   Congress has the power to hold third-party, non-recipients (e.g., employees)
   responsible for violating RLUIPA. As the Court said itself, Congress may
   impose criminal liability on those “who convert public spending into
   unearned private gain.” Id. at 608. Landor’s situation, both legally and
   factually, simply isn’t comparable. Sabri involved criminal liability for a
   person who directly threatened the “object” of a spending agreement,
   namely federal dollars, while Landor is a civil case that’s based on conduct
   unrelated to the federal purse. The Third Circuit similarly recognized the
   limits of Sabri in an RLUIPA case.

          Sharp’s reliance on [Sabri] for the proposition that Congress
          may regulate the actions of third parties under the Spending
          Clause, is misplaced. In Sabri, Congress enacted the statute
          at issue, 18 U.S.C. § 666(a)(2), pursuant to its powers under
          the Spending and the Necessary and Proper Clauses to
          protect its expenditures against local bribery and corruption.
          Here, however, Congress did not enact RLUIPA to protect
          its own expenditures, but rather it enacted RLUIPA to
          protect the religious rights of institutionalized persons. Thus,
          Sabri is inapposite.

   Sharp v. Johnson, 669 F.3d 144, 155 n.15 (3d Cir. 2012) (citation omitted).

          The Ninth Circuit, too, has employed likeminded reasoning. In Wood
   v. Yordy, the plaintiff argued that Sabri “means defendants in a civil damage

                                         11
Case: 22-30686     Document: 00516895282            Page: 12   Date Filed: 09/14/2023

                                     No. 22-30686

   action under RLUIPA need not be recipients of federal funds.” 753 F.3d at
   903. The Ninth Circuit—emphasizing the need to monitor monetary
   disbursements under the spending power—found that wasn’t “a sensible
   conclusion.” Id. In sum, as the Sixth Circuit found, “RLUIPA is nothing like
   the Sabri statute.” Haight, 763 F.3d at 570. We agree.

                                         III.
          We emphatically condemn the treatment that Landor endured. Still,
   we remain bound by our prior decision in Sossamon I that, under RLUIPA, he
   cannot seek money damages from officials in their individual capacities. In re
   Bonvillian, 19 F.4th at 792 (the rule of orderliness). Because the district court
   correctly held so, we AFFIRM.

                                          12