noting that the Wallace Court “implied that, even if [the plaintiff’s] [timely filed] claims had accrued before the district court dismissed them under Heck, the statutes of limitations should be tolled as long as the bar of Heck prevented [the plaintiff’s] suit from going forward”
How later courts described this case
- noting that the Wallace Court “implied that, even if [the plaintiff’s] [timely filed] claims had accrued before the district court dismissed them under Heck, the statutes of limitations should be tolled as long as the bar of Heck prevented [the plaintiff’s] suit from going forward”
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
United States Court of Appeals
FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT
Argued December 2, 2011 Decided March 6, 2012
No. 09-5085
IN RE: ANTOINE JONES,
PETITIONER
On Petition for Writ of Mandamus
Anthony F. Shelley, appointed by the court, argued the
cause as amicus curiae. With him on the briefs were Dawn E.
Murphy-Johnson, Michael N. Khalil, and Jeffrey M. Hahn. *
Antoine Jones, pro se, filed a brief.
Alexander D. Shoaibi, Assistant U.S. Attorney, argued
the cause for respondent. With him on the briefs were Ronald
C. Machen, Jr., U.S. Attorney, and R. Craig Lawrence,
Assistant U.S. Attorney.
Before: BROWN, Circuit Judge, and WILLIAMS and
GINSBURG, Senior Circuit Judges.
Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge BROWN.
*
The Court thanks the amicus curiae for their able assistance in this
case.
2
BROWN, Circuit Judge: In 2007, a jury acquitted Antoine
Jones on a number of drug-related charges, but failed to reach
a verdict on conspiracy to distribute and possession with
intent to distribute cocaine and cocaine base. The government
retried Jones on the unresolved conspiracy count and obtained
a conviction in 2008. The court imposed a life sentence.
Between the first and second trials, Jones filed a pro se
complaint alleging federal officials violated the Fourth
Amendment by conducting warrantless searches of his
apartment and a warehouse leased in his name. Jones sought
$1 million in damages and an investigation of the
Immigration and Customs officials that performed the
searches.
On May 28, 2008—after Jones’ conviction in the second
trial—the district court dismissed Jones’ civil case sua sponte.
Under Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477, 486–87 (1994), a
plaintiff seeking to recover damages for harm “caused by
actions whose unlawfulness would render a conviction or
sentence invalid . . . must prove that the conviction or
sentence has been reversed on direct appeal, expunged by
executive order, declared invalid by a state tribunal authorized
to make such determination, or called into question by a
federal court’s issuance of a writ of habeas corpus.” In the
district court’s view, Heck mandated dismissal of Jones’ case
because Jones had not “demonstrated that his conviction or
sentence ha[d] already been invalidated,” and his Fourth
Amendment claims, “if proved, would render his conviction
invalid.” Jones v. Gikas, No. 07-1068, 2008 WL 2202264, at
*1 (D.D.C. May 27, 2008).
More than eight months after that dismissal, on January
31, 2009, Jones filed a document in district court styled as a
“Motion for Leave to File Notice of Appeal pro se by
3
Plaintiff” (the “January Motion”). Jones, who had been
incarcerated since 2005, claimed he had never received a
notice of dismissal, and had only become aware of the
dismissal when he requested and obtained a copy of the case
docket in December 2008. He asserted he requested a copy of
the dismissal opinion after seeing the docket, received the
opinion on January 13, 2009, and filed the January Motion
shortly thereafter. Based on those circumstances, he asked
the “Court of Appeal to accept [his] ‘EXCUSABLE’ time[]
delay and [his] pro se Brief on this issue.” His “pro se Brief”
argued primarily that dismissal under Heck was improper
because his claims, if proven, would not necessarily imply
that his criminal conviction was invalid.
In a February 26, 2009 Minute Order, the district court
denied Jones leave to file the January Motion. Jones
responded by filing a document he styled a “Notice of
Appeal,” which stated he wished to obtain review of the
denial of the January Motion. We determined Jones was
appealing the district court’s denial of leave to file a notice of
appeal, and therefore deemed Jones’ filing a petition for writ
of mandamus.
On the face of things, mandamus is unwarranted because
the district court properly denied Jones leave to file. Jones
submitted the January Motion more than eight months after
the district court entered its dismissal, well past the 60-day
deadline imposed by Fed. R. App. P. 4(a)(1)(B), and past the
180-day deadline imposed by Fed. R. App. P. 4(a)(6)(B) for
reopening the period to file an appeal. But Jones claims the
January Motion was timely under one of two theories:
because Rule 4(a)(1)(B)’s 60-day filing period started on the
date when he learned of the dismissal (sometime in December
2008), or the date when he received a copy of the dismissal
opinion (January 13, 2009), rather than the date when the
4
district court entered its dismissal (May 28, 2008); or because
the January Motion should have been construed as a timely
motion for relief from judgment under Fed. R. Civ. P.
60(b)(1).
Neither theory holds water. Jones’ contention that we
should push back the start of the filing period is based on
Houston v. Lack, 487 U.S. 266, 270 (1988), where the
Supreme Court held a pro se prisoner’s notice of appeal was
“filed” for the purposes of Fed. R. App. P. 4(a) when “he
delivered the notice to prison authorities for forwarding,” not
when the district court actually received the notice. Jones
urges us to extend Houston to hold that a pro se prisoner’s
period for filing a notice of appeal begins when he receives
notice of the judgment from which he wishes to appeal. But
the statutory basis for Fed. R. App. P. 4(a), 28 U.S.C. § 2107,
precludes such a holding. First, Section 2107(a) states the
filing period for a notice of appeal begins “after the entry of
[the] judgment, order or decree” that is being appealed. We
cannot plausibly hold the “entry” of Jones’ dismissal only
occurred when he received notice of it. Second, Section
2017(c) allows courts to reopen the filing period if a party
does not receive notice of the judgment within 21 days of its
entry, but only (at the latest) “upon motion filed within 180
days after entry of the judgment.” Jones filed the January
Motion more than 180 days after the entry of dismissal, and
we may not create equitable exceptions to the 180-day
deadline. See In re Sealed Case (Bowles), 624 F.3d 482, 487–
89 (D.C. Cir. 2010).
Nor can we fault the district court for failing to construe
the January Motion as a Rule 60(b)(1) motion. Motions under
Rule 60(b) request that the district court relieve a party from a
final judgment. And even if the district court here was
mindful of its “obligation to construe pro se filings liberally,”
5
Toolasprashad v. Bureau of Prisons, 286 F.3d 576, 583 (D.C.
Cir. 2002), it did not abuse its discretion by refusing to view
the January Motion as seeking such relief. Instead, the
Motion gave every indication that Jones was seeking appellate
review: the Motion was titled a “Motion for Leave to File
Notice of Appeal pro se by Plaintiff”; stated that, on “this 31st
day of January, 2009, plaintiff is filing a notice of Appeal and
requesting the Court of Appeal to accept my ‘EXCUSABLE’
time[] delay”; and directed its explanation of why the district
court erred at this Court. We have previously found that
certain motions should have been construed as Rule 60(b)
motions, but those motions have always requested relief from
the district court. See, e.g., Hall v. CIA, 437 F.3d 94, 99 (D.C.
Cir. 2006) (construing untimely motion for reconsideration
under Rule 59(e) as a Rule 60(b) motion); Toolasprashad,
286 F.3d at 582–83 (construing motion for enlargement of
time to file a motion for reconsideration as a Rule 60(b)
motion).
Because we deny Jones’ petition for mandamus, we do
not reach the merits of the district court’s dismissal under
Heck. But we note the tension between the district court’s
ruling and the Supreme Court’s observation in Heck itself that
“a suit for damages attributable to an allegedly unreasonable
search may lie even if the challenged search produced
evidence that was introduced in a state criminal trial resulting
in the § 1983 plaintiff’s still-outstanding conviction.” 512
U.S. at 487 n.7. The Court reasoned that, “[b]ecause of
doctrines like independent source and inevitable discovery,
and especially harmless error, such a § 1983 action, even if
successful, would not necessarily imply that the plaintiff’s
conviction was unlawful.” Id.
* * *
6
Two years after the district court dismissed Jones’ civil
case¸ this Court reversed Jones’ conviction. See United States
v. Maynard, 615 F.3d 544 (D.C. Cir. 2010). The Supreme
Court recently affirmed that ruling. See United States v.
Jones, 132 S. Ct. 945 (2012). Because Jones can now show
that the dismissal of his civil suit was “based on an earlier
judgment that has been reversed or vacated,” he might
consider filing a motion in district court under Fed. R. Civ. P.
60(b)(5). See Robinson v. Connell, No. 9:05-CV-1428
(GLS/ATB), 2010 WL 6268444, at *2 (N.D.N.Y. Sept. 8,
2010) (magistrate report and recommendation) (Second
Circuit remanded civil claim, which had been dismissed under
Heck, to district court to consider motion under Rule 60(b)(5)
after criminal sentence was allegedly vacated), on remand
from No. 08-1992-pr (2d Cir. Aug. 25, 2009). In the
alternative, Jones might consider re-filing his complaint.
Although Jones expresses concern that re-filing might raise
“statute of limitations issues,” Pet. Br. 13–14 n.3, the
Supreme Court has implied that, even if Jones’ claims had
accrued before the district court dismissed them under Heck,
the statutes of limitations should be tolled as long as the bar of
Heck prevented Jones’ suit from going forward. See Wallace
v. Kato, 549 U.S. 384, 395 n.4 (2007) (“Had petitioner filed
suit upon his arrest and had his suit then been dismissed under
Heck, the statute of limitations, absent tolling, would have run
by the time he obtained reversal of his conviction. If under
those circumstances he were not allowed to refile his suit,
Heck would produce immunity from § 1983 liability, a result
surely not intended.”).
Jones’ petition for mandamus, however, is
Denied.