Dixon v. Hamm (LEAD)

1IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE MIDDLE DISTRICT OF ALABAMA

NORTHERN DIVISION

DARRYL LANE DIXON, )

AIS # 161637, )

)

Plaintiff, )

)

v. ) CASE NO. 2:20-CV-524-RAH

)

JEFFERSON S. DUNN, et al., )

)

Defendants. )

EDWARD SMITH, )

AIS # 205015, )

)

Plaintiff, )

)

v. ) CASE NO. 2:20-CV-525-RAH

)

ANNIE BAGGETT, et al., )

)

Defendants. )

RODRIQUES SIMPSON, )

AIS # 284700, )

)

Plaintiff, )

) CASE NO. 2:20-CV-528-RAH

v. )

)

JEFFERSON S. DUNN, et al., )

)

Defendants. )

TOREE JONES, )

AIS # 268125, )

)

Plaintiff, )

)

v. ) CASE NO. 2:20-CV-542-RAH

)

JEFFERSON S. DUNN, et al., )

)

Defendants. )

KENNETH SHAUN TRAYWICK, )

AIS # 177252, )

)

Intervenor Plaintiff, )

)

v. ) CASE NO. 2:20-CV-524-RAH

)

JEFFERSON S. DUNN, et al., )

)

Defendants. )

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

INTRODUCTION

Pending before the Court is the Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss as to Dixon

Plaintiffs filed on March 24, 2025. (Doc. 125.) The motion is fully briefed and ripe

for decision. For the reasons that follow, the motion will be granted.

BACKGROUND AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

This case arises out of a custody policy of the Alabama Department of

Corrections (ADOC) that treated women and men, with the same convictions,

differently. In 2016, ADOC instituted a policy that allowed female inmates, who

were incarcerated for certain homicide crimes, to be placed in minimum-community

custody. In particular, female inmates who were not serving a life sentence for

homicide and had completed 50% of their sentence for homicide were eligible for

minimum-community custody. Similar male inmates, however, were not.

In 2020, male inmates Darryl Lane Dixon, Edward Smith, Rodriques

Simpson, and Toree Jones (Dixon Plaintiffs) sued, alleging that the policy violated

the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution. The

Dixon Plaintiffs sought injunctive relief “to order [the Defendants] to allow the

[Dixon Plaintiffs] . . . eligibility (equally to female inmates) for minimum-

community custody classification, work release status, in order to achieve

rehabilitative opportunities as well as the opportunity to obtain gainful

employment.” (Doc. 1 at 8.)

Four years later, male sex offender Kenneth Shaun Traywick intervened in the

lawsuit and raised a similar disparate treatment claim as pertinent to sex offenders.

Like inmates with homicide convictions, under the policy, male sex offenders are

ineligible for minimum-community custody while female sex offenders are eligible.

On September 25, 2024, ADOC modified the policy pertinent to women

serving homicide convictions. In particular, the policy was updated to eliminate

female “inmates convicted of a homicide case” from eligibility for minimum-

community custody (doc. 125 at 5), therefore eliminating the differential treatment

between male and female inmates convicted of homicides. The Defendants now

move to dismiss the Dixon Plaintiffs from this consolidated case on mootness

grounds.

JURISDICTION AND VENUE

When this action was filed, the Court had original subject matter jurisdiction

over the federal issues raised here under 28 U.S.C. § 1331. But a court has an

ongoing “obligation . . . to examine its own jurisdiction . . . at each stage of the

proceedings.” Cuban Am. Bar Ass’n, Inc. v. Christopher, 43 F.3d 1412, 1423 (11th

Cir. 1995) (quoting Hallandale Professional Fire Fighters Local 2238 v. City of

Hallandale, 922 F.2d 756, 759 (11th Cir. 1991)). Whether the Court has subject

matter jurisdiction is the subject of this opinion. As for venue, the parties do not

contest venue, and adequate allegations exist to support it here. See 28 U.S.C. §

1391.

LEGAL STANDARD

The Defendants move to dismiss under Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(1). Fed. R. Civ.

P. 12(b)(1) allows a party to assert by motion the defense of “lack of subject-matter

jurisdiction.” Federal courts are courts of limited subject matter jurisdiction. U.S.

Const. art. III, § 2. If a court lacks subject-matter jurisdiction over a matter, it must

dismiss it. Travaglio v. Am. Exp. Co., 735 F.3d 1266, 1268–69 (11th Cir. 2013).

Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(1) permits two forms of attack on a court’s subject matter

jurisdiction: facial attacks and factual attacks. Lawrence v. Dunbar, 919 F.2d 1525,

1528–29 (11th Cir. 1990). “Facial attacks” on subject matter jurisdiction are similar

to the Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6) standard in that the court takes the allegations as true

and then determines whether the complaint “sufficiently alleged a basis of subject

matter jurisdiction.” Id. at 1529 (internal quotations and citation omitted). “Factual

attacks,” however, “challenge the existence of subject matter jurisdiction in fact,

irrespective of the pleadings.” Id. (internal quotations and citation omitted). With

factual attacks, a “district court may consider extrinsic evidence such as deposition

testimony and affidavits.” Carmichael v. Kellogg, Brown & Root Servs., Inc., 572

F.3d 1271, 1279 (11th Cir. 2009) (citation omitted). This means a court may weigh

the facts and is “not constrained to view them in the light most favorable to [the

plaintiff].” Id. (citation omitted).

DISCUSSION

The issue before the Court is whether ADOC’s policy change, which

eliminates the eligibility disparity between male and female inmates convicted of

certain homicide crimes, moots the Dixon Plaintiffs’ claims. ADOC argues that it

does.

A federal court’s subject matter jurisdiction is limited to “Cases” or

“Controversies.” U.S. Const. art. III, § 2. Without a live case or controversy, the

case is moot and must be dismissed for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Soliman

v. United States ex rel. INS, 296 F.3d 1237, 1242 (11th Cir. 2002). “A case is moot

when the issues presented are no longer live or the parties lack a legally cognizable

interest in the outcome.” Id. (alteration adopted and internal quotation marks

omitted) (quoting Powell v. McCormack, 395 U.S. 486, 496 (1969)).

If events occur after the filing of the lawsuit that “deprive the court of the

ability to give the plaintiff meaningful relief,” those post-filing events render the

case moot, and it must be dismissed. Cambridge Christian Sch., Inc. v. Fla. High

Sch. Athletic Ass’n, Inc., 115 F.4th 1266, 1283 (11th Cir. 2024) (internal quotation

marks and citation omitted). But a case only becomes moot “when it is impossible

for a court to grant any effectual relief . . . to [a] prevailing party.” Chafin v. Chafin,

568 U.S. 165, 172 (2013) (quoting Knox v. Serv. Emps., 567 U.S. 298, 307 (2012)).

Even if there is only a small interest “in the outcome of the litigation,” the case

remains live. Id.

In the injunctive relief context, “[t]he purpose of an injunction is to prevent

future violations.” United States v. W.T. Grant Co., 345 U.S. 629, 633 (1953)

(citation omitted). Therefore, an action may remain a live case or controversy after

the wrongful conduct stops. See id. The case is not moot if the party seeking the

injunction “satisf[ies] the court that relief is needed.” Id. To carry this burden and

keep the case alive, the party seeking injunctive relief must show that there is still a

“cognizable danger” that the violation reoccurs. Id. Cognizable danger of

reoccurrence is “something more than the mere possibility” of reoccurrence. Id.;

Cambridge Christian Sch., 115 F.4th at 1283; see also Cotterall v. Paul, 755 F.2d

777, 780 (11th Cir. 1985) (“Past exposure to illegal conduct does not in itself show

a pending case or controversy regarding injunctive relief if unaccompanied by any

continuing, present injury or real and immediate threat of repeated injury.” (citation

omitted) (emphasis added)).

ADOC’s policy change moots this case because the Dixon Plaintiffs seek

solely injunctive relief. Male and female inmates with homicide convictions are no

longer treated differently for purposes of their eligibility for minimum-community

custody. Now, neither male nor female inmates are eligible. This change puts

female and male homicide inmates back on even footing. As such, there is no active

equal protection issue; that is, there is no longer a live constitutional violation.

Chafin, 568 U.S. at 172; Soliman , 296 F.3d at 1244.

The Dixon Plaintiffs raise several arguments against dismissal on mootness

grounds. First, they argue the case is not moot because their exclusion from the

minimum-community custody represents ongoing and past damages. Specifically,

they state that “years of exclusion resulted in lost economic opportunities,

diminished parole prospects, and reduced rehabilitative access.” (Doc. 127 at 4.)

The Dixon Plaintiffs add that they have a right to “seek nominal or compensatory

damages for those harms.” (Id.) The problem, however, is that they did not seek

this relief in their complaints. They only sought injunctive relief. As such, they

cannot save their claims from dismissal based on relief they never sought.

The Dixon Plaintiffs also claim the two exceptions to the mootness doctrine

apply—capable of repetition yet evading review and voluntary cessation.

The capable of repetition yet evading review exception “applies when (1) the

challenged action is in its duration too short to be fully litigated prior to cessation or

expiration, and (2) there is a reasonable expectation that the same complaining party

will be subject to the same action again.” Warren v. DeSantis, 125 F.4th 1361,

1364–65 (11th Cir. 2025) (per curiam) (internal quotations and citation omitted)

(emphasis added); see also Soliman, 296 F.3d at 1242–43 (“[C]apable of being

repeated and evading review [is] . . . [a] narrow [exception], and applies only in

exceptional situations.” (internal quotations and citation omitted)). The plaintiff

bears the burden of showing application of this exception. See Warren, 125 F.4th at

1364–65.

The Dixon Plaintiffs state that “ADOC has a long and well-documented

pattern of altering its policies quietly, frequently, and strategically—often in

response to litigation.” (Doc. 127 at 2.) Further, the Dixon Plaintiffs argue that “[t]he

risk of repetition is not speculative; it is imminent.” (Id.)

But they have not shown this to be the “exceptional situation” to which this

“narrow” exception applies. Soliman, 296 F.3d at 1242–43. They have not shown

that the nearly five years in which these consolidated cases have been litigated is too

short a time to allow meaningful judicial review. See, e.g., Doe v. Kearney, 329 F.3d

1286, 1293 (11th Cir. 2003) (holding that because a period of 24 hours was

insufficient to allow judicial review of challenged governmental actions, an

aggrieved party had standing to challenge them under the “capable of repetition yet

evading review” doctrine). Moreover, each Dixon Plaintiff is sentenced to at least

twenty years of imprisonment, which is sufficiently long for each of them to

challenge ADOC’s classification policy if it is reinstated. See Turner v. Rogers, 564

U.S. 431, 440 (2011) (explaining that an imprisonment period of one to two years is

too short).

Further, the Dixon Plaintiffs have failed to show there is a reasonable

expectation that the disparate treatment will reoccur. The Supreme Court has

clarified that this “exception requires a ‘reasonable expectation’ or a ‘demonstrated

probability’ that ‘the same controversy will recur.’” Fed. Election Comm’n v. Wisc.

Right to Life, Inc., 551 U.S. 449, 463 (2007) (internal quotation marks omitted)

(quoting Murphy v. Hunt, 455 U.S. 478, 482 (1982) (per curiam)). The Dixon

Plaintiffs only hypothesize that ADOC could reinstate the policy and afford females

more favorable treatment. They allege that such “reversals have been a recurring

tactic throughout ADOC’s litigation history.” (Doc. 127 at 4.) But the Dixon

Plaintiffs do not sufficiently point to specific instances in which ADOC has

implemented such reversals, nor have they otherwise demonstrated there is a

reasonable expectation or a demonstrated probability that this policy will change

again in the future. The Dixon Plaintiffs have therefore failed to show that this case

meets the capable of repetition yet evading review exception.

The Dixon Plaintiffs also fail to show that the voluntary cessation exception

applies here. Normally, when a governmental entity, such as ADOC, voluntarily

ceases the challenged action, “there is a presumption that the government will not

later resume the action.” Walker v. City of Calhoun, 901 F.3d 1245, 1270 (11th Cir.

2018); Troiano v. Supervisor of Elections in Palm Beach Cty., Fla., 382 F.3d 1276,

1283 (11th Cir. 2004) (“[W]hen the defendant is not a private citizen but a

government actor, there is a rebuttable presumption that the objectionable behavior

will not recur . . . [C]essation of the allegedly illegal conduct by government officials

has been treated with more solicitude by the courts than similar action by private

parties . . . . Courts are more apt to trust public officials than private defendants to

desist from future violations” (internal quotation marks and citations omitted));

Coral Springs St. Sys., Inc. v. City of Sunrise, 371 F.3d 1320, 1328–29 (11th Cir.

2004) (“[G]overnmental entities and officials have been given considerably more

leeway than private parties in the presumption that they are unlikely to resume illegal

activities.”). However, there is an exception to this presumption when there is a

reasonable expectation that the voluntarily ceased activity will, in fact, actually recur

after termination of the suit. Therefore, “the opposing party must show a reasonable

expectation that the government will reverse course.” Djadju v. Vega, 32 F.4th 1102,

1108 (11th Cir. 2022) (citing Walker, 901 F.3d at 1270).

There are three factors to determine whether there is a reasonable expectation

that a defendant will reverse course: (1) whether “the change in conduct resulted

from substantial deliberation or is merely an attempt to manipulate jurisdiction”; (2)

whether termination of “the challenged conduct was unambiguous, i.e., permanent

and complete”; and (3) whether the defendant “has consistently maintained its

commitment to the new policy or legislative scheme.” Id. at 1109. Such factors are

non-exhaustive and non-dispositive and instead guide courts in examining whether

the doctrine of voluntary cessation applies. Keohane v. Fla. Dep’t of Corr. Sec’y,

952 F.3d 1257, 1268 (11th Cir. 2020).

Ultimately, the question under voluntary cessation is whether a plaintiff has

shown a “substantial likelihood” that a “government defendant will reverse course

and reenact” the offending conduct. Keohane, 952 F.3d at 1268 (internal quotation

marks and citation omitted). For the Dixon Plaintiffs’ suit to continue, they therefore

must show that there is a reasonable expectation that ADOC is likely to “‘reverse

course’ and reinstate the repealed policy if the lawsuit is terminated.” Cambridge

Christian Sch., 115 F.4th at 1284 (quoting Keohane, 952 F.3d at 1268).

There is no factual basis here to conclude that a reasonable expectation exists

that the custody policy will be changed once again. The Dixon Plaintiffs argue that

the change is an “abrupt reversal[]” with the intent to evade judicial review. (Doc.

127 at 4.) But they have not provided any evidence of it. Cambridge Christian Sch.,

Inc.,115 F.4th at 1286 (“Also, while the new statute may have been enacted in

response to Cambridge Christian’s legal challenge, there’s no evidence the change

is temporary or was made in ‘an attempt to manipulate our jurisdiction.’”). Rather,

the record shows the policy change came about because ADOC decided to abandon

the pilot program from the Tutwiler Consent Decree in August 2024 and because of

a deliberate prioritization of public safety.

Further, the Dixon Plaintiffs argue the policy change is not permanent because

ADOC could reverse course at a later point in time. This is technically true, but the

record reveals the policy modification evinces a permanent policy change rather than

discretionary nonenforcement. And the Dixon Plaintiffs have not pointed to specific

instances in which ADOC has reversed policy changes sufficient to rebut the

presumption of good faith that exists here. In short, the Dixon Plaintiffs have failed

to carry their burden that ADOC will “‘reverse course’ and reinstate the repealed

policy if the lawsuit is terminated.”' Cambridge Christian Sch., 115 F.4th at 1284.

The Dixon Plaintiffs have therefore failed to show that this case satisfies the

voluntary cessation mootness exception.

CONCLUSION

Accordingly, it is ORDERED as follows:

(1) The Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss as to Dixon Plaintiffs (doc. 125) is

due to be and is hereby GRANTED;

(2) The claims of Plaintiffs Darryl Lane Dixon, Edward Smith, Rodriques

Simpson, and Toree Jones are DISMISSED without prejudice;

(3) The Clerk of Court is hereby ORDERED to terminate Case Numbers

2:20-cv-525, 2:20-cv-528, and 2:20-cv-542;

(4) The claims of Plaintiff Kenneth Shaun Trawick, Case Number 2:20-cv-

524, remain pending and shall proceed under that case designation.

DONE, on this the 10th day of June 2025.

UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

' The Dixon Plaintiffs also invoke the possibility of new litigation initiated by female inmates who

have been adversely impacted by the policy change. That may be so. But the Dixon Plaintiffs

lack standing to assert harms suffered by female inmates.

10