LYNN J. BUSH, Senior District Judge.
The court has before it defendant's motion to dismiss this suit, which was brought pursuant to Rule 12(b)(1) of the Rules of the United States Court of Federal Claims (RCFC). Defendant's motion has been fully briefed.
Plaintiff Harry Edwin Miles is incarcerated in a federal prison in California. Def.'s Mot. at 1. He simultaneously filed five complaints in this court which were consolidated into one case. These complaints name five federal agency heads as defendants: Michael Astrue, Commissioner of the Social Security Administration (Case No. 14-416C), Robert Mueller, former Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (Case No. 14-417C), Eric Holder, Attorney General of the United States (Case No. 14-418C), Douglas Shulman, former Commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service (Case No. 14-419C), and Charles Samuels, Director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons (Case No. 14-420C). All of the cases are deemed to name the United States as defendant, because the United States is the only proper defendant in this court. All of the complaints contain the same legal arguments and request the same types of relief.
Each complaint is accompanied by four attachments, which plaintiff has titled "Common Law Copyright Notice"; "Commercial Notice of Trade Name"; "Notice of Fault and Opportunity to Cure"; and "Notice of Default/Dishonor"; these attachments are virtually identical except for the federal agency heads named therein. All of these attachments are signed by Mr. Miles and the only reasonable inference is that these documents were created by him. According to plaintiff these attached documents (and other unattached documents), as well as the lack of response to various communications from Mr. Miles, entitle plaintiff to receive multi-million dollar checks drawn upon the United States Treasury. Compl. at 3-4.
More specifically, each of the complaints requests injunctive relief and at least $202,000,000 for what Mr. Miles describes as copyright infringement and violation of "Commercial . . . Trade Name contracts" related to his "Copyrighted Property, HARRY EDWIN MILES." Compl. at 1-2. At least one purpose of the injunctive relief requested by Mr. Miles appears to be that he be released from prison:
Id. at 3. Plaintiff's request for monetary relief is founded on what Mr. Miles describes as the government's "unauthorized usages of Secured Parties Copyrighted Property"; in other words, Mr. Miles asserts that the federal government owes him over 200 million dollars for the use of the copyrighted name "HARRY EDWIN MILES."
On July 14, 2014, defendant filed a motion to dismiss this case arguing that plaintiffs claims do not fall within this court's jurisdiction. Plaintiffs "Notice of Non-Response by Defendants Representatives," filed by leave of the court on July 30, 2014, has been deemed to constitute plaintiff's response to the government's motion to dismiss (M.'s Resp.). On September 12, 2014, after plaintiff filed an application to proceed in forma pauperis, the government filed its reply brief. Thus, defendant's motion to dismiss is fully briefed and ripe for a decision.
The court acknowledges that Mr. Miles is proceeding pro se, and is "not expected to frame issues with the precision of a common law pleading." Roche v. US. Postal Serv., 828 F.2d 1555, 1558 (Fed. Cir. 1987). Pro se plaintiffs are entitled to a liberal construction of their pleadings. See Haines v. Kerner, 404 U.S. 519, 520 (1972) (requiring that allegations contained in a pro se complaint be held to "less stringent standards than formal pleadings drafted by lawyers"). Accordingly, the court has examined the complaints, their attachments, and plaintiff's response brief thoroughly in an attempt to discern plaintiff's legal arguments.
In considering the issue of subject matter jurisdiction, this court must presume all undisputed factual allegations in the complaint to be true and construe all reasonable inferences in favor of the plaintiff. Scheuer v. Rhodes, 416 U.S. 232, 236 (1974), abrogated on other grounds by Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800 (1982); Reynolds v. Army & Air Force Exch. Serv., 846 F.2d 746, 747 (Fed. Cir. 1988). However, plaintiff bears the burden of establishing subject matter jurisdiction, Alder Terrace, Inc. v. United States, 161 F.3d 1372, 1377 (Fed. Cir. 1998) (citing McNutt v. Gen. Motors Acceptance Corp. of Ind., 298 U.S. 178, 189 (1936)), and must do so by a preponderance of the evidence, Reynolds, 846 F.2d at 748 (citations omitted). If jurisdiction is found to be lacking, this court must dismiss the action. RCFC 12(h)(3).
There are no claims in these complaints that fall within this court's jurisdiction. The primary focus of plaintiff's suit founds a claim for copyright or trademark infringement, and perhaps other less easily identifiable legal claims, on four meaningless documents attached to the complaint. Similar frivolous claims have been advanced by a number of pro se plaintiffs in this court but have been uniformly rejected. See, e.g., Williams v. United States, No. 14-85C (Fed. Cl. Apr. 9, 2014) (dismissing a prisoner suit for lack of jurisdiction because it was founded on a "frivolous compendium of forms and argument purporting to be a binding contract with the United States"); Taylor v. United States, No. 12-660C (Fed. Cl. Feb. 15, 2013) (same); Rivera v. United States, 105 Fed. Cl. 644, 649-50 (2012) (dismissing for lack of jurisdiction a contract claim founded on the prisoner's birth certificate, social security number, and his name which was asserted to be a "common-law-copyrighted trade-name/trademark"); Gravatt v. United States, 100 Fed. Cl. 279, 288 (2011) (dismissing a prisoner claim for lack of jurisdiction because it was founded on a "patently frivolous" allegation that his birth certificate and other documents entitled him to the proceeds of an unsubstantiated trust account at the United States Treasury); Jennett v. United States, 77 Fed. Cl. 126, 131-32 (2007) (dismissing for lack of jurisdiction a pro se plaintiff's claim alleging copyright infringement of his name).
With respect to plaintiff's requests for equitable relief, to the extent that Mr. Miles's complaints state a demand that this court free him from prison, there is no jurisdiction in this court for a collateral attack on a criminal conviction and subsequent incarceration. E.g., Beadles v. United States, 115 Fed. Cl. 242, 246 (2014) (citing Carter v. United States, 228 Ct. Cl. 898, 900 (1981)). As to any other aspects of the injunctive relief requested in plaintiff's complaints, this court lacks the power to issue injunctions except in limited circumstances not applicable here. E.g., Gravatt, 100 Fed. Cl. at 288 (citing Nat'l Air Traffic Controllers Ass'n v. United States, 160 F.3d 714, 716 (Fed. Cir. 1998)). The court now turns to a review of plaintiff's claims for monetary compensation.
In the court's view, the most clearly stated claim asserted by Mr. Miles is that he copyrighted his name and that the United States infringed upon that copyright.
This court has considered similar claims alleging a copyright of a plaintiff's name and has rejected them for lack of jurisdiction.
The court finds that any claim for copyright infringement in this suit is frivolous. There is no allegation in the complaints that Mr. Miles applied for a copyright in order to satisfy the preconditions for a copyright infringement suit. See 17 U.S.C. § 411 (2012). The "Common Law Copyright Notice" he apparently created is patently insufficient to support a nonfrivolous copyright infringement claim.
Although there is no explicit claim for trademark infringement in the complaints filed by Mr. Miles, he refers to "violation/infringement of my tradename/trademark" in one of the attachments to his complaints. See Compl. Att. 3 at 1. This court lacks jurisdiction over trademark infringement claims because jurisdiction for those claims lies in the district courts, not this court. E.g., 15 U.S.C. § 1121 (2012); Lockridge v. United States, 218 Ct. Cl. 687, 689 (1978) ("We therefore conclude that we have no jurisdiction over claims for trademark infringement."). Thus, to the extent that Mr. Miles asserts that the United States has infringed upon his trademarked name, that claim is beyond this court's jurisdiction and must be dismissed.
In plaintiff's response brief, Mr. Miles insists that the claims in his complaints are based upon provisions of the Uniform Commercial Code or UCC. Although the exact nature of these claims is difficult to discern, it is evident that Mr. Miles, who refers to himself as the Secured Party, believes the UCC to provide the proper source of law for his suit:
Secured Party NOTICES that the Uniform Commercial Code is the primary source of Commercial Law Rules governing all transactions such as the issue in Secured Parties Complaint, and must be adhered to by the Court.
Pl.'s Resp. at 1-3. The court need not attempt to decipher what type of UCC-based claim Mr. Miles may be attempting to litigate, because it is beyond dispute that this court has no jurisdiction over UCC-based claims. E.g., GAF Corp. v. United States, 932 Rid 947, 951 (Fed. Cir. 1991); Spencer v. United States, 98 Fed. Cl. 349, 357 (2011) (citing Clark v. United States, 116 F. App'x 278, 279 (Fed. Cir. 2004)).
For the foregoing reasons, plaintiff's claims must be dismissed for lack of jurisdiction. Because the claims are frivolous, transfer to another court is not in the interest of justice.
Accordingly, it is hereby
