Filed: Dec. 05, 2008
Latest Update: Feb. 12, 2020
Summary: UNPUBLISHED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT No. 08-1468 PAULL ANDERSON, Plaintiff - Appellant, v. JULIUS JENNINGS WADE, JR., Individually and d/b/a Wade & Wade, Attorneys at Law; JAMES H. WADE, Individually and d/b/a Wade & Wade, Attorneys at Law; WADE & WADE, ATTORNEYS AT LAW; MARGARET L. GODLEY, Individually and as Executrix of the Estate of M.R. Godley, deceased; GODLEY, INCORPORATED, Defendants – Appellees. No. 08-1520 PAULL ANDERSON, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. FRANK H. G
Summary: UNPUBLISHED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT No. 08-1468 PAULL ANDERSON, Plaintiff - Appellant, v. JULIUS JENNINGS WADE, JR., Individually and d/b/a Wade & Wade, Attorneys at Law; JAMES H. WADE, Individually and d/b/a Wade & Wade, Attorneys at Law; WADE & WADE, ATTORNEYS AT LAW; MARGARET L. GODLEY, Individually and as Executrix of the Estate of M.R. Godley, deceased; GODLEY, INCORPORATED, Defendants – Appellees. No. 08-1520 PAULL ANDERSON, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. FRANK H. GO..
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UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 08-1468
PAULL ANDERSON,
Plaintiff - Appellant,
v.
JULIUS JENNINGS WADE, JR., Individually and d/b/a Wade &
Wade, Attorneys at Law; JAMES H. WADE, Individually and
d/b/a Wade & Wade, Attorneys at Law; WADE & WADE, ATTORNEYS
AT LAW; MARGARET L. GODLEY, Individually and as Executrix of
the Estate of M.R. Godley, deceased; GODLEY, INCORPORATED,
Defendants – Appellees.
No. 08-1520
PAULL ANDERSON,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v.
FRANK H. GODLEY,
Defendant - Appellant,
and
JULIUS JENNINGS WADE, JR., d/b/a Wade & Wade, Attorneys at
Law, Individually; JAMES H. WADE, d/b/a Wade & Wade,
Attorneys at Law, Individually; WADE & WADE, ATTORNEYS AT
LAW; MARGARET L. GODLEY, Individually and as Executrix of
the Estate of M.R. Godley, deceased; GODLEY, INCORPORATED;
JOHNNY C. GODLEY, Executor of the Estate of Margaret L.
Godley; JAMES GODLEY,
Defendants.
Appeals from the United States District Court for the Western
District of North Carolina, at Charlotte. Martin K. Reidinger,
District Judge. (3:05-cv-00033-MR-DCK)
Submitted: October 20, 2008 Decided: December 5, 2008
Before KING, SHEDD, and DUNCAN, Circuit Judges.
Affirmed in part; vacated and remanded in part by unpublished
per curiam opinion.
Paull Anderson, Appellant Pro Se. Michael F. Schultze,
CRANFORD, SCHULTZE, TOMCHIN & ALLEN, PA, Charlotte, North
Carolina; Jon P. Carroll, William Kase Diehl, Jr., Jared Edgar
Gardner, JAMES, MCELROY & DIEHL, PA, Charlotte, North Carolina,
for Appellees.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
2
PER CURIAM:
Paull Anderson brought this declaratory judgment
action against Margaret L. Godley 1 and Godley, Inc., as well as
Julius Jennings Wade, Jr., James H. Wade, and Wade and Wade,
Attorneys at Law (the “Godley and Wade Defendants”), requesting
the district court to declare his Kentucky federal judgment
against the defendants to be valid and enforceable in North
Carolina state courts. 2 Anderson later brought an action against
Frank Godley (“Godley”) asserting that Godley’s parents, who
were then deceased, “engaged in a racketeering conspiracy
injuring numerous victims, including Anderson,” and that Godley
defrauded Anderson to prevent him from collecting on his
judgment. The district court granted Anderson’s summary
judgment motion and issued a judgment declaring that Anderson
had a valid judgment that was unenforceable against the Wade and
Godley Defendants in North Carolina state courts, and denying
Godley’s motion for Fed. R. Civ. P. 11 sanctions against
Anderson for filing an allegedly frivolous action against him.
1
Mrs. Godley passed away in 2007 and her son, Johnny C.
Godley, was substituted as a party defendant as the executor of
her estate.
2
Anderson previously tried to enforce his judgment in North
Carolina state courts, but the judgment was found to be against
North Carolina public policy and therefore unenforceable.
3
Anderson appealed, Godley cross-appealed, and the matters have
been consolidated. After considering the parties’ respective
arguments, we affirm in part and vacate and remand in part.
We find that the district court did not err when it
issued the declaratory judgment. Because the enforceability of
Anderson’s judgment in North Carolina has already been
determined by the North Carolina state courts, a subsequent
review of its enforceability by the district court is barred by
the doctrine of res judicata. See Mirga v. Warren City Sch.
Dist. Bd. of Educ., 465 U.S. 75, 81 (1984) (“It is now settled
that a federal court must give to a state-court judgment the
same preclusive effect as would be given that judgment under the
law of the State in which the judgment was rendered.”); Bockweg
v. Anderson,
428 S.E.2d 157, 161 (N.C. 1993) (“Under the
doctrine of res judicata, a final judgment on the merits in a
prior action in a court of competent jurisdiction precludes a
second suit involving the same claim between the same parties or
those in privity with them.”).
Moreover, because Anderson’s action essentially asked
the district court to overrule the North Carolina state courts’
determinations that his judgment was unenforceable in North
Carolina, any such action by the district court is barred by the
Rooker-Feldman abstention doctrine. See Plyler v. Moore, 129
F.3d 728, 731 (4th Cir. 1997) (holding that the Rooker-Feldman
4
doctrine disallows a federal court from reviewing claims that
derive from a state court judgment, “as when success on the
federal claim depends upon a determination that the state court
wrongly decided the issues before it”) (internal citation and
quotation marks omitted); see also Exxon Mobil Corp. v. Saudi
Basic Indus. Corp., 544 U.S. 280, 284 (2005) (recognizing that
the Rooker-Feldman doctrine is confined to “cases brought by
state-court losers complaining of injuries caused by state-court
judgments rendered before the district court proceedings
commenced and inviting district court review and rejection of
those judgments”). Accordingly, we conclude that the district
court correctly declared Anderson’s judgment to be valid, albeit
unenforceable in the North Carolina state courts.
We nonetheless find that the district court’s
rationale for denying Godley’s motion for sanctions was
erroneous. The district court denied Godley’s motion for
sanctions solely because Anderson’s complaint against Godley was
initially filed in the district court for the Western District
of Virginia and then transferred to the Western District of
North Carolina. Because of this, the district court concluded
that it could not issue sanctions against Anderson for pleadings
he filed before the case was transferred.
If a civil action is transferred from one district
court to another, “the action or appeal shall proceed as if it
5
had been filed in or noticed for the court to which it is
transferred.” 28 U.S.C. § 1631 (2000). Under § 1631, then,
when Anderson’s action against Godley was transferred to the
Western District of North Carolina, it was as if Anderson had
originally filed the action there. See, e.g., Mayfield v.
Klevenhagen, 941 F.2d 346, 347-49 (5th Cir. 1991) (upholding
sanctions imposed by Southern District of Texas even though
violative filings were made in the District of Columbia district
court); cf. LeVay Corp. v. Dominion Fed. Sav. & Loan Ass’n,
830
F.2d 522, 524, 528 (4th Cir. 1987) (vacating and remanding
Eastern District of Virginia district court’s order denying
sanctions even though some of plaintiffs’ possibly violative
filings were made in a Maryland district court before transfer).
In determining that it lacked authority to impose
sanctions against Anderson for filings that were made in the
Virginia district court, the district court relied on Edwards v.
General Motors Corp., 153 F.3d 242 (5th Cir. 1998), In re
Allnutt,
155 F.3d 557,
1998 WL 414248 (4th Cir. July 16, 1998)
(unpublished) (No. 97-2613), and Green v. Foley,
907 F.2d 1137,
1990 WL 86210 (4th Cir. June 6, 1990) (unpublished) (Nos. 88-
2666, 88-2667). In those cases, however, the respective federal
courts refused to impose sanctions for filings made in state
courts prior to removal to federal court. See
Edwards, 153 F.3d
at 245-46 (holding that Rule 11 applies only to federal filings
6
and not to state filings made prior to removal to federal
court); Allnutt, 1998 WL 414248, at *2 (“[T]he signing of a
pleading in a state court action cannot be the basis for
imposition of sanctions pursuant to Rule 11.”); Green,
1990 WL
86210, at *7 (holding that the district court should limit
sanctions to legal fees expended in the federal system, and
exclude those incurred in a related state proceeding). We find
those cases to be inapposite.
Accordingly, because a transferee district court has
authority to impose Rule 11 sanctions for sanctionable filings
made in the federal transferor court, we find that the district
court erred in denying Godley’s motion for sanctions on that
ground. We accordingly vacate that portion of the district
court’s order denying Godley’s sanctions motion, and remand the
matter to the district court for a merits determination as to
whether Godley is entitled to sanctions. 3 We affirm the
remainder of the district court’s declaratory judgment and
3
Anderson’s eventual voluntary dismissal of his action
against Godley after the district court gave him notice of its
violative nature does not preclude imposing sanctions upon
Anderson for its filing. See Cooter & Gell v. Hartmarx Corp.,
496 U.S. 384, 394-95 (1990) (“As the violation of Rule 11 is
complete when the paper is filed, a voluntary dismissal does not
expunge the Rule 11 violation.”) (internal citation and
quotation marks omitted).
7
order. We dispense with oral argument because the facts and
legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials
before the court and argument would not aid the decisional
process.
AFFIRMED IN PART;
VACATED AND REMANDED IN PART
8
