Bass v. Bass

1

ASHLEY BASS, Plaintiff, v. BENTON BASS, Defendant.

No. 1:23-cv-1215-STA-jay

United States District Court, W.D. Tennessee, Eastern Division

April 30, 2024

ORDER ADOPTING MAGISTRATE JUDGE'S REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION ORDER OF DISMISSAL ORDER CERTIFYING APPEAL NOT TAKEN IN GOOD FAITH ORDER ON APPELLATE FILING FEE

S THOMAS ANDERSON UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

On January 25, 2024, the United States Magistrate Judge issued a report and recommendation (ECF No. 7), screening Plaintiff Ashley Bass' Pro Se Complaint and recommending the dismissal of the case for failure to state a plausible claim for relief. Plaintiff has filed timely objections to the report (ECF No. 8). For the reasons set forth below, the Court ADOPTS the report and recommendation and DISMISSES some claims for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction and the rest for failure to state a claim.

BACKGROUND

Plaintiff Ashley Bass initiated this case by filing a Pro Se Complaint (ECF No. 1) on October 10, 2023. The Pro Se Complaint names Benton Bass, Plaintiff's biological father, as the Defendant. The Magistrate Judge has provided in his report the following summary of Plaintiff's allegations, to which Plaintiff has not raised any objection. Therefore, the Court adopts that portion of the report as the findings of the Court.

Plaintiff alleges that her father has failed to comply with provisions of a postnuptial agreement by which Plaintiff was to receive certain real and personal property. Pro Se Compl. 812 (ECF No. 1). According to Plaintiff, her biological mother filed for divorce from Defendant in December 2007. Id. at 1. In the course of the divorce proceedings, a trial court held and an appellate court affirmed that the couple's postnuptial agreement was valid and enforceable. Id. at 2. The postnuptial agreement “gave real property rights or ownership of the jointly owned assets in the mar[ital] estate to” Plaintiff and her “adult younger brother Bubba.” Id. at 4. Plaintiff now alleges that Defendant has failed to comply with the property allocations in the postnuptial. Id. at 2.

The Pro Se Complaint alleges four causes of action: (1) bad faith (2) defamation of character, (3) theft, and (4) failure to devise thirty-five acres of real property. Id. at 8-12.^[1]First, Plaintiff alleges that her father has acted in bad faith by breaching his agreement to devise Plaintiff the property to which she believes the postnuptial entitles her. Id. at 8.^[2] Plaintiff alleges that Defendant lied to her and has either kept the property for himself or given it to Plaintiff's brother. Id. at 8. The Pro Se Complaint alleges one of the properties is a marina. Id. at 9. Plaintiff also alleges she is owed an imported, 65-piece sterling silver dinnerware set and 35 acres of real property in an undisclosed location. Id. at 11-12.

Next, Plaintiff alleges that Defendant is liable for defamation of character. Plaintiff's claim is based on a comment her father allegedly made about her during a deposition in the divorce case. According to Plaintiff, her father described her as a “work in progress,” which Plaintiff believes was an attack on her character. Id. at 9. The Pro Se Complaint denies the truth of the statement and cites Plaintiff's employment history working for her father. Id. at 10.^[3]As part of Count 3, Plaintiff alleges that her father is liable for theft because he has retained possession of Plaintiff's grandmother's sterling silver, even though under the postnuptial agreement Plaintiff was to receive the silver on her 36th birthday. Id. at 11-12. Plaintiff alleges she is now 39 years old and has yet to receive the silver. Plaintiff does not label the final “count” with a particular cause of action. The Pro Se Complaint simply states that Plaintiff's brother received 35 acres of real property and Plaintiff was supposed to receive another 35 acres, again under the terms of their parents' postnuptial agreement. Id. at 12.

The Pro Se Complaint seeks damages in the amount of $500,000.00 “or the net operating income . . . from one or more of the marinas for the prior 15 years.” Id. at 13. Plaintiff also demands a house or other property equal in value to the property her brother has received as well as title to Lakeview Marina “or others.” Id. at 13-14. Plaintiff also seeks compensatory damages for severe mental anguish. Id. at 14.

JURISDICTION

“Courts have an independent obligation to determine whether subjectmatter jurisdiction exists, even when no party challenges it.” Akno 1010 Mkt. Street St. Louis Mo LLC v. Pourtaghi, 43 F.4th 624, 626 (6th Cir. 2022) (quoting Hertz Corp. v. Friend, 559 U.S. 77, 94, 130 S.Ct. 1181, 175 L.Ed.2d 1029 (2010)). The Court has jurisdiction over Plaintiff's claims against Defendant by virtue of the amount in controversy and the parties' diversity of citizenship under 28 U.S.C. §1332(a). Plaintiff's claims, nevertheless, arise out of a contractual property settlement between her parents as part of their divorce proceedings. The domestic relations exception “divests the federal courts of power to issue divorce, alimony, and child custody decrees” based on the text of the Judiciary Act of 1789 and in recognition of “the special proficiency developed by state tribunals over the past century and a half in handling issues that arise in the granting of such decrees.” Ankenbrandt v. Richards, 504 U.S. 689, 703-04, 112 S.Ct. 2206, 119 L.Ed.2d 468 (1992). The exception applies to “a narrow range of domestic relations issues.” Id. at 701.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit has held that “[w]hen analyzing the applicability of the domestic-relations exception,” courts should “focus on the remedy that the plaintiff seeks.” Chevalier v. Estate of Barnhart, 803 F.3d 789, 797 (6th Cir. 2015). In other words, “[d]oes the plaintiff seek an issuance or modification or enforcement of a divorce, alimony, or child-custody decree?” Id. For example, the Sixth Circuit has held that the domestic relations exception applied where one former spouse sued the other former spouse for breach of a separation agreement to sell real property. McLaughlin v. Cotner, 193 F.3d 410, 413 (6th Cir. 1999). In McLaughlin, the Court of Appeals distinguished Ankenbrandt and concluded the domestic relations exception applied because the contract at issue was “a separation agreement that was incorporated in the divorce decree.” Id. at 414. The rights of the plaintiff in McLaughlin were not merely contractual rights under state law but rights based on the divorce decree itself. Id. “McLaughlin stands for the uncontroversial proposition that a plaintiff may not artfully cast a suit seeking to modify or interpret the terms of a divorce, alimony, or child-custody decree as a statelaw contract or tort claim in order to access the federal courts.” Chevalier, 803 F.3d at 795-96.

The Court holds that the domestic relations exception applies to Plaintiff's claims for the direct transfer of any real or personal property which the postnuptial agreement allegedly entitled Plaintiff to receive after her parents' divorce. The Pro Se Complaint refers extensively to a postnuptial agreement between Plaintiff's parents and implies that Plaintiff was an intended third-party beneficiary of the agreement. Concerning the transfer of real property, Plaintiff alleges in Count 5 of her Pro Se Complaint that her brother received 35 acres from their father but that Plaintiff “never received title to the other 35 acres that was part of the marital estate which was required to be given to me by the Postnuptial . . . .” Pro Se Compl. 12. Plaintiff also seeks the transfer of marina property. Even so, Plaintiff's pleading denies that she is alleging breach of the postnuptial or seeking specific performance of the contract. Id. 5 (“It should be noted this is not a suite [sic] for specific performance or breach of contract.”). Be that as it may, Plaintiff essentially seeks specific performance of the postnuptial's disposition of the real property that was allegedly intended for Plaintiff. Specific performance of a contract is an equitable remedy, Hillard v. Franklin, 41 S.W.3d 106, 111 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2000), particularly well-suited for “contracts for the conveyance of real property.” St. George Holdings LLC v. Hutcherson, 632 S.W.3d 515, 529 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2020). Because the postnuptial is part of a final divorce decree, the remedy sought by Plaintiff, the transfer of the 35 acres and a marina property, is simply the “enforcement of a divorce . . . decree.” Chevalier, 803 F.3d at 797. The Court concludes then that it lacks subjectmatter jurisdiction over Plaintiff's claim for the specific performance of this aspect of the postnuptial.

Likewise, Plaintiff's conversion claim seeking the return of her grandmother's silver is simply a request for the enforcement of the postnuptial. The silver was addressed in the postnuptial as part of the division of property between Plaintiff's parents who agreed that Plaintiff would receive the silver at a later time. The Pro Se Complaint alleges that Plaintiff's grandmother owned a 65-piece set of imported silverware, which Plaintiff's father was “holding” for Plaintiff.

According to Plaintiff, Defendant agreed as part of the postnuptial to turn the silver over to Plaintiff on her 36th birthday.^[4] For the reasons the Court has already explained, the Court lacks subjectmatter jurisdiction over any claim Plaintiff has for the enforcement of the provisions of the postnuptial to compel her father to turn over the family silverware.

As for Plaintiff's remaining claims sounding in tort, the Court is satisfied that it has subjectmatter jurisdiction over the claims. Plaintiff alleges that her father acted in bad faith and slandered her. Plaintiff seeks...