Court Opinion

ID: 9369873
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-02-09 21:00:38.15373+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:16:17.890153
License: Public Domain

Case: 22-2297   Document: 24     Page: 1    Filed: 02/09/2023

        NOTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.

   United States Court of Appeals
       for the Federal Circuit
                 ______________________

            LAUNA GOLDDEEN OGBURN,
                 Plaintiff-Appellant

                            v.

                   UNITED STATES,
                   Defendant-Appellee
                 ______________________

                       2022-2297
                 ______________________

     Appeal from the United States Court of Federal Claims
 in No. 1:22-cv-00502-CNL, Judge Carolyn N. Lerner.
                  ______________________

                Decided: February 9, 2023
                 ______________________

    LAUNA GOLDDEEN OGBURN, Woodbridge, VA, pro se.

     IOANA CRISTEI, Commercial Litigation Branch, Civil
 Division, United States Department of Justice, Washing-
 ton, DC, for defendant-appellee. Also represented by
 BRIAN M. BOYNTON, TARA K. HOGAN, PATRICIA M.
 MCCARTHY.
                  ______________________

     Before LOURIE, PROST, and CHEN, Circuit Judges.
Case: 22-2297    Document: 24    Page: 2   Filed: 02/09/2023

 2                                            OGBURN   v. US

 PER CURIAM.
     Launa Golddeen Ogburn appeals a decision of the U.S.
 Court of Federal Claims dismissing her complaint for lack
 of subject-matter jurisdiction. We affirm.
                       BACKGROUND
      Ms. Ogburn served in the U.S. Navy from 2001 until
 2004 and contributed to a Thrift Savings Plan (“TSP”) ac-
 count through automatic paycheck deductions. SAppx8. 1
 In 2005, after she had retired from the Navy and begun
 working for a private company, Ms. Ogburn requested that
 funds from her TSP account be rolled over into her private
 retirement account. Id. She alleges that she received TSP
 correspondence in March 2005 informing her that she had
 failed to complete paperwork necessary to roll her funds
 over and ultimately decided to keep the funds in the TSP
 account. Id.; SAppx28.
     In 2007, TSP received a request, which Ms. Ogburn had
 ostensibly signed, that all of Ms. Ogburn’s TSP funds be
 transferred to a private retirement plan.        SAppx11,
 SAppx33–34. Ms. Ogburn alleges that the handwriting on
 the request is not her own and that the transferee account
 was fraudulent. SAppx8, SAppx28. A 2007 Internal Rev-
 enue Service Form 1099-R showed a total distribution of
 $9,978.97 from Ms. Ogburn’s TSP account. SAppx35.
      In 2016, Ms. Ogburn withdrew $73,315.43 from her ci-
 vilian TSP account—a separate, additional account from
 her Navy TSP account—and rolled it over to her private
 account. SAppx15–17. Sometime after that, a $6,518.32
 withdrawal from her private account occurred, and Ms. Og-
 burn alleges that she did not receive it. SAppx12,
 SAppx14, SAppx17–18.

     1   “SAppx” refers to the supplemental appendix that
 the government submitted with its informal response brief.
Case: 22-2297     Document: 24     Page: 3    Filed: 02/09/2023

 OGBURN   v. US                                              3

     Ms. Ogburn filed a pro se complaint in the Court of Fed-
 eral Claims in May 2022. SAppx1. That court liberally
 construed her complaint to allege that:
     (1) she did not authorize a rollover of $9,978.97
     from her Navy TSP account into a Fidelity invest-
     ment account in 2007; (2) she does not have access
     to the Fidelity account to which the funds were
     rolled over, and the Fidelity account and the IRS
     form documenting the transfer are fraudulent;
     (3) an unidentified “civilian employee of the Fed-
     eral Government” seemingly “claimed” the funds
     from the Fidelity account following the rollover;
     and (4) in 2016, after rolling over her Navy TSP
     funds into a First Command Financial Planning ac-
     count, an error caused $6,518.32 to be withdrawn
     from her First Command account without Ms. Og-
     burn having “requested or received” the transfer.
 Id. She requested that the court award her the allegedly
 fraudulently withdrawn sum and “yearly gains,” which the
 Court of Federal Claims interpreted to be the interest those
 funds would have accrued since 2004. SAppx1–2.
      The Government moved to dismiss Ms. Ogburn’s
 claims for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction, and the Court
 of Federal Claims granted the motion. SAppx2. It con-
 cluded that it lacked subject-matter jurisdiction over Ms.
 Ogburn’s 2007 rollover claims because they did “not
 amount to a taking under the Fifth Amendment to the
 United States Constitution or arise out of a contract with
 the United States.” SAppx3 (citation omitted). It also ob-
 served that “Ms. Ogburn’s claims of fraud sound in tort,
 and the Tucker Act expressly deprives this Court of juris-
 diction over tort claims.” Id. (citing Brown v. United States,
 105 F.3d 621, 622–23 (Fed. Cir. 1997)). The court went on
 to interpret the Federal Employees’ Retirement System Act
 as the applicable money-mandating provision governing
 Ms. Ogburn’s 2007 rollover claims and noted that Congress
Case: 22-2297    Document: 24      Page: 4    Filed: 02/09/2023

 4                                              OGBURN   v. US

 had “granted ‘exclusive jurisdiction’ to the United States
 district courts for causes of action for funds from federal
 government TSP accounts, including military TSP ac-
 counts such as Ms. Ogburn’s.” Id. (citation omitted). Fi-
 nally, the court noted that Ms. Ogburn’s 2007 rollover
 claims were time-barred because she failed to bring her
 claim “by the earlier of six years after her claim occurred,
 or six years after she discovered the [allegedly] fraudulent
 violation.” SAppx4 (citation omitted).
     With respect to Ms. Ogburn’s 2016 withdrawal, the
 court concluded that it lacked subject-matter jurisdiction
 because “the funds ceased to be part of a federal govern-
 ment retirement account” when Ms. Ogburn rolled over her
 TSP funds into her private account. Id. “Because the 2016
 withdrawal claim centers on an alleged error concerning
 Ms. Ogburn’s private retirement account,” the court said,
 “this allegation cannot be considered a claim for money
 damages against the United States.” Id. (citing Jankovic
 v. United States, 204 Ct. Cl. 807, 807 (1974)). Because the
 claim was not founded upon the Constitution, an Act of
 Congress, any regulation, or any contract with the United
 States, the claim did “not present a cognizable basis for ju-
 risdiction under the Tucker Act.” Id.
     The Court of Federal Claims then entered judgment
 dismissing Ms. Ogburn’s claims for lack of subject-matter
 jurisdiction. SAppx6. Ms. Ogburn appeals. 2 We have ju-
 risdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1295(a)(3).
                         DISCUSSION
     A plaintiff must establish subject-matter jurisdiction
 by a preponderance of the evidence. M. Maropakis Car-
 pentry, Inc. v. United States, 609 F.3d 1323, 1327 (Fed. Cir.

     2   Ms. Ogburn’s Informal Brief does not mention any
 claims related to the 2016 withdrawal, so we do not discuss
 that transaction.
Case: 22-2297     Document: 24     Page: 5    Filed: 02/09/2023

 OGBURN   v. US                                             5

 2010). We review a Court of Federal Claims decision dis-
 missing a complaint for lack of jurisdiction de novo. Id. In
 conducting the review, we treat the complaint’s factual al-
 legations as true and construe them in the light most fa-
 vorable to the non-moving party. See Inter-Tribal Council
 of Ariz., Inc. v. United States, 956 F.3d 1328, 1338 (Fed.
 Cir. 2020).
     The Tucker Act gives the Court of Federal Claims ju-
 risdiction over claims “against the United States founded
 either upon the Constitution, or any Act of Congress or any
 regulation of an executive department, or upon any express
 or implied contract with the United States, or for liqui-
 dated or unliquidated damages in cases not sounding in
 tort.” 28 U.S.C. § 1491(a)(1). A plaintiff asserting subject-
 matter jurisdiction under the Tucker Act must identify a
 source of law separate from the Tucker Act that creates a
 right to money damages, i.e., a money-mandating provi-
 sion. Fisher v. United States, 402 F.3d 1167, 1172 (Fed.
 Cir. 2005).
     Ms. Ogburn first contends that the Court of Federal
 Claims “has the means to investigate fraud and theft of
 the” TSP. Appellant’s Informal Br. 1. She does not explain
 what means she envisions, nor does she identify any errors
 underlying the court’s conclusions that the Tucker Act ex-
 pressly deprives the Court of Federal Claims of jurisdiction
 over tort claims or that district courts, which the Court of
 Federal Claims is not, have exclusive jurisdiction over
 causes of action for funds from federal-government TSP ac-
 counts. See SAppx3–4. We see no error in the court’s anal-
 ysis.
      Ms. Ogburn next suggests that the Court of Federal
 Claims applied the wrong law and, instead, should have
 applied “TSP [r]ules, [s]tatutes, [a]mendment and [g]uide-
 lines to include TSP.” In making this argument, she spe-
 cifically notes 5 U.S.C. § 8474. Appellant’s Informal Br. 2.
 No TSP rule or statute, however, undermines the Tucker
Case: 22-2297    Document: 24      Page: 6   Filed: 02/09/2023

 6                                              OGBURN   v. US

 Act’s limitations on the Court of Federal Claims’ jurisdic-
 tion, and § 8474 simply provides for the appointment of an
 Executive Director for the Federal Retirement Thrift In-
 vestment Management System and outlines that director’s
 responsibilities; it does not confer upon the Court of Fed-
 eral Claims the jurisdiction Ms. Ogburn seeks. See
 5 U.S.C. § 8474.
     The rest of Ms. Ogburn’s brief seeks repayment of the
 funds that she alleges were fraudulently transferred in
 2007. Appellant’s Informal Br. 2–3. Ms. Ogburn identifies
 no errors in the Court of Federal Claims’ decision, nor does
 she articulate any basis for that court’s jurisdiction over
 her claims. Finally, Ms. Ogburn did not challenge the
 Court of Federal Claims’ determination that her claims are
 barred by the applicable statute of limitations. Accord-
 ingly, we affirm the Court of Federal Claims’ judgment of
 dismissal.
                        CONCLUSION
     We have considered Ms. Ogburn’s remaining argu-
 ments and find them unpersuasive. For the reasons set
 forth above, we affirm the Court of Federal Claims’ judg-
 ment.
                        AFFIRMED
                           COSTS
 No costs.