Filed: Dec. 03, 1996
Latest Update: Mar. 02, 2020
Summary: UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT No. 96-60113 Summary Calendar CLARENCE McDONALD LELAND, Plaintiff-Appellant, VERSUS MISSISSIPPI STATE BOARD OF REGISTRATION FOR PROFESSIONAL ENGINEERS AND LAND SURVEYORS; DAVID W. ARNOLD; ROSEMARY BRISTER; JOE L. BROWN; ROBERT M. CASE; MAURY BAYNE GUNTER; ROBERT KILMER HUNTER; ROBERT R. REDDING; ROBERT MARTIN SCHOLTES; RYLAND EUGENE SNEED; EDWARD SPRINGER, Defendants-Appellees. Appeal from the United States District Court For the Southern Dist
Summary: UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT No. 96-60113 Summary Calendar CLARENCE McDONALD LELAND, Plaintiff-Appellant, VERSUS MISSISSIPPI STATE BOARD OF REGISTRATION FOR PROFESSIONAL ENGINEERS AND LAND SURVEYORS; DAVID W. ARNOLD; ROSEMARY BRISTER; JOE L. BROWN; ROBERT M. CASE; MAURY BAYNE GUNTER; ROBERT KILMER HUNTER; ROBERT R. REDDING; ROBERT MARTIN SCHOLTES; RYLAND EUGENE SNEED; EDWARD SPRINGER, Defendants-Appellees. Appeal from the United States District Court For the Southern Distr..
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UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT
No. 96-60113
Summary Calendar
CLARENCE McDONALD LELAND,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
VERSUS
MISSISSIPPI STATE BOARD OF REGISTRATION FOR
PROFESSIONAL ENGINEERS AND LAND SURVEYORS; DAVID W. ARNOLD;
ROSEMARY BRISTER; JOE L. BROWN; ROBERT M. CASE; MAURY BAYNE GUNTER;
ROBERT KILMER HUNTER; ROBERT R. REDDING; ROBERT MARTIN SCHOLTES;
RYLAND EUGENE SNEED; EDWARD SPRINGER,
Defendants-Appellees.
Appeal from the United States District Court
For the Southern District of Mississippi
(3:93-CV-193-LN)
November 26, 1996
Before JONES, DeMOSS and PARKER, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:*
Plaintiff-Appellant Clarence McDonald Leland (“Leland”) sued
*
Pursuant to Local 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this opinion should not be published and is not precedent except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 Local Rule 47.5.4.
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Defendants-Appellees the Mississippi State Board of Registration
for Professional Engineers and Land Surveyors (“the Board”) and its
members claiming, inter alia, that defendants revoked his
Mississippi engineering license in violation of his procedural and
substantive due process rights. After a bench trial, the district
court entered judgment for Leland, awarding him $10.00 in nominal
damages due to the defendants’ violation of Leland’s procedural due
process rights. The district court further found that Leland
suffered no deprivation of his substantive due process rights and
was not entitled to punitive damages, injunctive or declaratory
relief.
FACTS
Leland graduated from Louisiana Tech University with a degree
in electrical engineering in 1969. He sat for and passed a
national professional examination and has been registered as a
professional engineer in Louisiana since 1976, and in Texas since
1984. After working as a engineer in Louisiana for over ten years,
Leland moved to Mississippi to attend law school. He planned to
work part time as a professional engineer in Mississippi while he
finished his law degree. He applied for a Mississippi professional
engineer’s license which the Board granted effective June 28, 1991
“on the basis of graduation, plus experience, examination and
registration in another state.” In November 1991, the Board
notified Leland that his registration had been approved due to a
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clerical error that indicated that he had taken and passed both
examinations required, when in fact he had not taken the second
test, Principles and Practices of Engineering Examination (“PE”).
Therefore, the Board revoked his license and gave him two options:
withdraw his application and surrender his seal or take the PE.
Leland advised the Board by letter that he believed the Mississippi
statute entitled him to a professional license without sitting for
the PE, requested that they reconsider their decision and offered
to meet with them. The Board, without notice to Leland, met,
reconsidered his application and determined that he was not
qualified for a Mississippi engineering license without sitting for
and passing the PE. ANALYSIS
Leland contends that the district court erred by holding that
compensatory damages cannot be awarded a plaintiff whose procedural
due process rights are violated and who proved damages arising from
that violation, unless the plaintiff suffered a violation of his
substantive due process rights as well, citing Carey v. Piphus,
435
U.S. 247,
98 S. Ct. 1042,
55 L. Ed. 2d 252 (1978). While Leland’s
articulation of the law is correct, his argument miscomprehends the
district court’s ruling.
The plaintiff obviously has suffered harm --
emotional as well as financial -- as a consequence of the
Board’s actions relating to his license. But the harm he
has sustained has been caused by the revocation of his
license and not merely by the Board’s failure to afford
him a due process hearing. And because the actual
revocation of plaintiff’s license did not, in the court’s
opinion, amount to a substantive due process violation,
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plaintiff may recover herein no more than nominal damages
for the proven procedural due process violation.
Leland v. Mississippi State Board of Registration, 3:93CV193(L)(N),
at 7 (S.D.Miss. Dec. 28, 1995). Following Carey, the district
court concluded that there was a procedural due process violation
as a consequence of which plaintiff sustained no actual damages,
and awarded Leland only nominal damages. Because we have concluded
after a review of the record that the district court was correct,
we will affirm its denial of Leland’s actual damages.
Leland also contends that the district court erred in
declining to enjoin the Board to reissue Leland’s Mississippi
license. The district court noted that while it was “likely” that
the Board regulations requiring Leland to take the PE examination
were contrary to the Mississippi statutes regulating engineer
licensure, it was without jurisdiction to impose its view of the
state law on the state agency under Pennhurst State School & Hosp.
v. Halderman,
465 U.S. 89,
104 S. Ct. 900,
79 L. Ed. 2d 67 (1984).
The district court was again correct.
CONCLUSION
For the foregoing reasons, we AFFIRM the district court’s
opinion.
AFFIRMED.
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